Riot!
Sunday, August 21st, 2011 | Religion & Politics, Thoughts
As you may have noticed, we recently experienced some riots in the UK.
Everything was fine here in Leeds. Someone got shot in Chapeltown, but that is just a normal evening in Chapeltown. In fact, rather than a riot, we had a march of peace while other cities were kicking off. Good old Yorkshire values present such destruction, as we just stick kettle on instead (and it’s important to note I didn’t say stick the kettle on.
Two things I found interesting though.
Firstly, the amount of people who turn out to be rather right wing when it affects their lives. We should lock them up, evict them, beat school children with a cane and possibly bring back the death penalty should Facebook comments and tweets be believed.
Obviously we shouldn’t do this, we want to live in a fear-free progressive society, not a police state.
The second is that, the remaining people, though relatively few in number, seemed to think that those who were behind the riots, shouldn’t take much responsibility at all. It’s due to underlying social issues and the forgotten generation, so it isn’t their fault.
Of course this is equally nonsense. Even if there are underlying social causes, which there are, but rather contributing factors than absolute causes, people need to take some responsibility for their actions and nothing that took place in the past week is justified – stealing a loaf of bread for your starving family is justified, looting a shop isn’t.
So basically, if you expressed an opinion on the riots, you were probably wrong about it ;). But I look forward to blog posts from other people explaining to me why my middle of the road approach is nonsense as well… :D.
As you may have noticed, we recently experienced some riots in the UK.
Everything was fine here in Leeds. Someone got shot in Chapeltown, but that is just a normal evening in Chapeltown. In fact, rather than a riot, we had a march of peace while other cities were kicking off. Good old Yorkshire values present such destruction, as we just stick kettle on instead (and it’s important to note I didn’t say stick the kettle on.
Two things I found interesting though.
Firstly, the amount of people who turn out to be rather right wing when it affects their lives. We should lock them up, evict them, beat school children with a cane and possibly bring back the death penalty should Facebook comments and tweets be believed.
Obviously we shouldn’t do this, we want to live in a fear-free progressive society, not a police state.
The second is that, the remaining people, though relatively few in number, seemed to think that those who were behind the riots, shouldn’t take much responsibility at all. It’s due to underlying social issues and the forgotten generation, so it isn’t their fault.
Of course this is equally nonsense. Even if there are underlying social causes, which there are, but rather contributing factors than absolute causes, people need to take some responsibility for their actions and nothing that took place in the past week is justified – stealing a loaf of bread for your starving family is justified, looting a shop isn’t.
So basically, if you expressed an opinion on the riots, you were probably wrong about it ;). But I look forward to blog posts from other people explaining to me why my middle of the road approach is nonsense as well… :D.