Short Rant on the Riots 2011

No. Before any liberal vigilantes bombard my comments section and claim the rioters are victims of Britain’s austerity due to the difficult times the country is suffering, I thought that I would put it out there that I couldn’t give a shit. Sure perhaps society has failed these people and instead of facepalming I should actually feel guilty that I have accomplished that which society expects of me; instead of expecting someone else to do it for me yet complain when things don’t work out in my benefit. There are probably hundreds of factors to consider with situations like this, but only one discernable cause – the shooting of Mark Duggan by armed police unit CO19. He who lives by the sword…

It was his death that started this orgy of violence, but now that is all it is – an orgy of violence. People are destroying London, its surrounding areas, Birmingham and Liverpool because they want to, not because of some twisted crusade to avenge someone who was shot to death for pulling a gun out on police, pulling it out on an armed officer who had no idea of what Duggan would do and had to make a decision to save himself and fellow officers. Whether his killing was justifiable or not is not the issue here; the issue is whether scorching the Earth, shattering communities, striking fear into the hearts of many and causing hundreds of thousands pounds worth of damage when Britain has record debt, is a righteous way to protest the death of a man. I also feel it is irresponsible of the British media to focus on the role of social media such as Twitter in the same way that they did during the revolutions in the Middle East. It is not the same. In countries such as Syria there are a revolutions being fought against corrupt and evil governments, to bring about civil liberties. In England we are destroying our cities because a man who was possibly a gangster or drug peddler was killed by the police whom feared that he was going to open fire.

Like I said, I don’t want excuses posted in my feed, something which is as inevitable as Valve still not understanding that nobody gives a fuck about Team Fortress 2's damn hats.) I’ve already seen enough in the rioters portraying Mark Duggan as a god damn hero. Regardless of his 'guilt' decent people do not get themselves into such a situation. And frankly just imagine how many of the rioters are there to just fuck the establishment and for a chance to steal. Watching the scenes of selfish behaviour it is reminiscent of the scene in Escape from L.A. (yes I acknowledge it wasn't a very good film) in which Snake Plissken addresses the viewer with - "welcome to the human race". It is animalistic, though that is a word that I dislike using because animals never do anything so mindless without a reason. Maybe now the government will learn from the mistakes of the previous Tory government – this lady is not for turning? Perhaps a ravenous mob with petrol bombs will help. At least if the government does collapse and we regress to a primal and anarchistic feudal society, I will look good draped in the NCR Veteran Ranger armour.


"This time last week I was reading a book in Starbucks."