EURO DESK : *** London's Burning ***

[brob]

Fear not Borys, you are not alone!

spoiler (click to show/hide)

[close]

[MyNameIsMethodis]

Black people and chavs get together over something that isn't lowering the legal age to have sex? Impressive!

[Herr Mafflard]

planking in front of riot police... smh

[Herr Mafflard]

this flyer's been doing the rounds among looters



sign on the door of a Subway in Manchester

seems it's quieter in London tonight, but there are various reports coming out that people are congregating around Enfield, and possibly Greenwich. Still only quarter past nine at the moment, things haven't heated up in the past couple of days until after midnight so you never know. 

Troubles definitely spreading up north now...

[Herr Mafflard]

boss Sikh standing guard

[Fresh Prince]

White people, smh.

[Positive Touch]

White people, smh.

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

lol

[Skidmark]

Iran urges UK to restrain police

Iran has called on the British police to exercise restraint against people protesting over the killing of a Black man in London.



Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast urged the British government to order the police to stop their violent confrontation with the people, IRNA reported in the early hours of Tuesday.

Mehmanparast asked the British government to start dialogue with the protesters and to listen to their demands in order to calm the situation down.

The Iranian official also asked independent human rights organizations to investigate the killing in order to protect the civil rights and civil liberties.

The unrest began on Saturday when a few hundred people gathered outside a police station in Tottenham to protest against the fatal shooting of Mark Duggan on Thursday.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/193030.html

[Fresh Prince]

 , Putin lectures America, Iran lectures the UK. What is the world coming too?

[Great Rumbler]

White people, smh.

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

lol

The disconnect there is palpable.

[brob]

DAT HAIR

[brob]

Brass Eye

[MyNameIsMethodis]

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

[chronovore]

(Image removed from quote.)

Gorgeous. Unsettling.

[Fresh Prince]

Mark Duggan, whose shooting by police sparked London's riots, did not fire a shot at police officers before they killed him, the Independent Police Complaints Commission said on Tuesday.

Releasing the initial findings of ballistics tests, the police watchdog said a CO19 firearms officer fired two bullets, and that a bullet that lodged in a police radio was "consistent with being fired from a police gun".

One theory, not confirmed by the IPCC, is that the bullet became lodged in the radio from a ricochet or after passing through Duggan.

Doesn't look too good for the MET. First leaks to the press, Hans Soloing this guy and the perception of 'idly standing by' with rioters. Seems like incompetence all around.

[Joe Molotov]

Iran urges UK to restrain police

Iran has called on the British police to exercise restraint against people protesting over the killing of a Black man in London.

(Image removed from quote.)

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast urged the British government to order the police to stop their violent confrontation with the people, IRNA reported in the early hours of Tuesday.

Mehmanparast asked the British government to start dialogue with the protesters and to listen to their demands in order to calm the situation down.

The Iranian official also asked independent human rights organizations to investigate the killing in order to protect the civil rights and civil liberties.

The unrest began on Saturday when a few hundred people gathered outside a police station in Tottenham to protest against the fatal shooting of Mark Duggan on Thursday.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/193030.html

It's like his toupee is wearing a toupee.

[Himu]

Iran urges UK to restrain police

Iran has called on the British police to exercise restraint against people protesting over the killing of a Black man in London.

(Image removed from quote.)

Iranian Foreign Ministry Spokesman Ramin Mehmanparast urged the British government to order the police to stop their violent confrontation with the people, IRNA reported in the early hours of Tuesday.

Mehmanparast asked the British government to start dialogue with the protesters and to listen to their demands in order to calm the situation down.

The Iranian official also asked independent human rights organizations to investigate the killing in order to protect the civil rights and civil liberties.

The unrest began on Saturday when a few hundred people gathered outside a police station in Tottenham to protest against the fatal shooting of Mark Duggan on Thursday.

http://www.presstv.ir/detail/193030.html

that pic has to be fake

[Broseidon]

Chavscum cunts fucking up my Manchester.

Good job the GMP aren't pussies like the Met.

[Phoenix Dark]

That video is very interesting. On one hand she asks some sensible follow up questions, something I don't see much in American media. On the other she makes some blatant attempts to paint the guy and his grandson as rioters, or sympathizers. He's clearly not saying "fuck yes they burned by community down." He's saying this shit isn't surprising given the horrible living conditions of many young, poor people in the city. Something I didn't know about

[Mr. Gundam]

Oi, wonna buy an iPhone?

http://london.craigslist.co.uk/mob/2536072357.html

[Shaka Khan]

Disgusting. Someone ask if he's black.

[Phoenix Dark]

Ok, lets say you stole 40 iPhones. It's a high demand item so it's likely you can sell each one. WHY THE FUCK WOULD YOU TRY TO SELL ALL 40 AT THE SAME FUCKING TIME. You could probably pay your rent selling one every other week, using various emails

[Boogie]

Doesn't look too good for the MET. First leaks to the press, Hans Soloing this guy and the perception of 'idly standing by' with rioters. Seems like incompetence all around.

I'm sorry, which part of that "looks bad"?  The fact that they didn't let buddy take a few shots at them before returning fire?

It's not the job of the police to let the bad guys take a couple free shots at us before our own use of lethal force is justified.

[Fresh Prince]

Pretty sure the police said he shot first.

[Boogie]

Pretty sure the police said he shot first.

Well, for the officers involved, distortion of perception can be one of the psychological and physiological effects of stress.  Or they could have lied.  I ain't judging either way.  That's why we have investigations to determine whether shootings are justified or not.

On the PR front, I'll never deny that police forces tend to have fucked up, confused, or amateur messaging in situations like these.  It's not our strong suit.

Of course, if the Met releases no info at all pending the investigation, media types cry coverup.  If they try to get out in front of the story and release what they know/believe initially, they get roasted if later info says the initial info was inaccurate. Can't win.

[CajoleJuice]

http://audioboo.fm/boos/434411-leana-hosea-speaks-to-croydon-looters-on-bbcworldservice

elektrikluv and friends

[Fresh Prince]

As expected: slags.

[Cerveza mas fina]

I love how Iran is trolling the UK.

(Image removed from quote.)

boss Sikh standing guard

Sikh are fucking hardcore.

[Cerveza mas fina]

[youtube=560,345][/youtube]

Chemical Brothers + Slow Mo

[T-Short]

http://london.craigslist.co.uk/mob/2536072357.html

huahua

[Fresh Prince]

It's interesting see other countries under the guidance of Murdoch tut-ting the UK

THE riots in London and elsewhere in Britain are a backhanded tribute to the long-term intellectual torpor, moral cowardice, incompetence and careerist opportunism of the British political and intellectual class.

They have somehow managed not to notice what has long been apparent to anyone who has taken a short walk with his eyes open down any frequented British street: that a considerable proportion of the country's young population (a proportion that is declining) is ugly, aggressive, vicious, badly educated, uncouth and criminally inclined.

Unfortunately, while it is totally lacking in self-respect, it is full of self-esteem: that is to say, it believes itself entitled to a high standard of living, and other things, without any effort on its own part.

Consider for a moment the following: although youth unemployment in Britain is very high, that is to say about 20 per cent of those aged under 25, the country has had to import young foreign labour for a long time, even for unskilled work in the service sector.

The headline does not suit the article

[Fresh Prince]

The historian and broadcaster David Starkey has provoked a storm of criticism after claiming during a televised discussion about the riots that "the problem is that the whites have become black".

In an appearance on BBC2's Newsnight, Starkey spoke of "a profound cultural change" and said he had been re-reading Enoch Powell's rivers of blood speech.

"His prophesy was absolutely right in one sense. The Tiber did not foam with blood but flames lambent, they wrapped around Tottenham and wrapped around Clapham," he said.

"But it wasn't inter-community violence. This is where he was absolutely wrong." Gesturing towards one of the other guests, Owen Jones, who wrote Chavs: the Demonisation of the Working Classes, Starkey said: "What has happened is that a substantial section of the chavs that you wrote about have become black."

Let's blame that damn rap music!

[Fresh Prince]

I think 'black culture' taps into a feeling that's already there not the other way around. Urban youth really have no community or culture because their upbringing has become solely materialistic. They have no connection to the suburbs they live since they don't know their neighbours or shop locally (apart from the supermarket which is a huge chain- Tescos) and it just becomes a place to crash. Hence once they get an opportunity to loot they do so and damage and burn the rest they can't take home with them.

The truth is I sort of agree with him. 'Rap culture' should be counter-culture and in the past it was. I mean in the end who profits from materialism? Usually a middle aged white man. Hip-Hop has sort of become fucked but it was always fucked. I can't listen to Jay or Kanye brag about how much money they have or who they fuck there is so much more to life than that.

[Cormacaroni]

Enoch Powell, in case anyone is not aware, was a Nazi shitbag of the worst order and leading light of the British National Party. The 'rivers of blood' speech is a call to arms for racists to repatriate immigrants etc...anyone who endorses such sentiments is a danger to society, in other words.

[Fresh Prince]

Did not know that. It's sort of funny how they even had a better class of racist in the 60's. I mean if somebody took a line from Virgil now it would be seen as highfalutin'.

[drew]

i will now spend the rest of my day watching every single episode of brass eye in order on youtube

[Herr Mafflard]

Peter Oborne makes sense of it,

the looters are just following the examples set by the rich and the governing elite; and were incited by a systematic culture of dependency and entitlement, fostered in part by 'unemployment and indolence' as a way of life

David Cameron, Ed Miliband and the entire British political class came together yesterday to denounce the rioters. They were of course right to say that the actions of these looters, arsonists and muggers were abhorrent and criminal, and that the police should be given more support.

But there was also something very phony and hypocritical about all the shock and outrage expressed in parliament. MPs spoke about the week’s dreadful events as if they were nothing to do with them.

I cannot accept that this is the case. Indeed, I believe that the criminality in our streets cannot be dissociated from the moral disintegration in the highest ranks of modern British society. The last two decades have seen a terrifying decline in standards among the British governing elite. It has become acceptable for our politicians to lie and to cheat. An almost universal culture of selfishness and greed has grown up.

It is not just the feral youth of Tottenham who have forgotten they have duties as well as rights. So have the feral rich of Chelsea and Kensington. A few years ago, my wife and I went to a dinner party in a large house in west London. A security guard prowled along the street outside, and there was much talk of the “north-south divide”, which I took literally for a while until I realised that my hosts were facetiously referring to the difference between those who lived north and south of Kensington High Street.

Most of the people in this very expensive street were every bit as deracinated and cut off from the rest of Britain as the young, unemployed men and women who have caused such terrible damage over the last few days. For them, the repellent Financial Times magazine How to Spend It is a bible. I’d guess that few of them bother to pay British tax if they can avoid it, and that fewer still feel the sense of obligation to society that only a few decades ago came naturally to the wealthy and better off.

Yet we celebrate people who live empty lives like this. A few weeks ago, I noticed an item in a newspaper saying that the business tycoon Sir Richard Branson was thinking of moving his headquarters to Switzerland. This move was represented as a potential blow to the Chancellor of the Exchequer, George Osborne, because it meant less tax revenue.

I couldn’t help thinking that in a sane and decent world such a move would be a blow to Sir Richard, not the Chancellor. People would note that a prominent and wealthy businessman was avoiding British tax and think less of him. Instead, he has a knighthood and is widely feted. The same is true of the brilliant retailer Sir Philip Green. Sir Philip’s businesses could never survive but for Britain’s famous social and political stability, our transport system to shift his goods and our schools to educate his workers.

Yet Sir Philip, who a few years ago sent an extraordinary £1 billion dividend offshore, seems to have little intention of paying for much of this. Why does nobody get angry or hold him culpable? I know that he employs expensive tax lawyers and that everything he does is legal, but he surely faces ethical and moral questions just as much as does a young thug who breaks into one of Sir Philip’s shops and steals from it?

Our politicians – standing sanctimoniously on their hind legs in the Commons yesterday – are just as bad. They have shown themselves prepared to ignore common decency and, in some cases, to break the law. David Cameron is happy to have some of the worst offenders in his Cabinet. Take the example of Francis Maude, who is charged with tackling public sector waste – which trade unions say is a euphemism for waging war on low‑paid workers. Yet Mr Maude made tens of thousands of pounds by breaching the spirit, though not the law, surrounding MPs’ allowances.

A great deal has been made over the past few days of the greed of the rioters for consumer goods, not least by Rotherham MP Denis MacShane who accurately remarked, “What the looters wanted was for a few minutes to enter the world of Sloane Street consumption.” This from a man who notoriously claimed £5,900 for eight laptops. Of course, as an MP he obtained these laptops legally through his expenses.

Yesterday, the veteran Labour MP Gerald Kaufman asked the Prime Minister to consider how these rioters can be “reclaimed” by society. Yes, this is indeed the same Gerald Kaufman who submitted a claim for three months’ expenses totalling £14,301.60, which included £8,865 for a Bang & Olufsen television.

Or take the Salford MP Hazel Blears, who has been loudly calling for draconian action against the looters. I find it very hard to make any kind of ethical distinction between Blears’s expense cheating and tax avoidance, and the straight robbery carried out by the looters.

The Prime Minister showed no sign that he understood that something stank about yesterday’s Commons debate. He spoke of morality, but only as something which applies to the very poor: “We will restore a stronger sense of morality and responsibility – in every town, in every street and in every estate.” He appeared not to grasp that this should apply to the rich and powerful as well.

The tragic truth is that Mr Cameron is himself guilty of failing this test. It is scarcely six weeks since he jauntily turned up at the News International summer party, even though the media group was at the time subject to not one but two police investigations. Even more notoriously, he awarded a senior Downing Street job to the former News of the World editor Andy Coulson, even though he knew at the time that Coulson had resigned after criminal acts were committed under his editorship. The Prime Minister excused his wretched judgment by proclaiming that “everybody deserves a second chance”. It was very telling yesterday that he did not talk of second chances as he pledged exemplary punishment for the rioters and looters.

These double standards from Downing Street are symptomatic of widespread double standards at the very top of our society. It should be stressed that most people (including, I know, Telegraph readers) continue to believe in honesty, decency, hard work, and putting back into society at least as much as they take out.
But there are those who do not. Certainly, the so-called feral youth seem oblivious to decency and morality. But so are the venal rich and powerful – too many of our bankers, footballers, wealthy businessmen and politicians.

Of course, most of them are smart and wealthy enough to make sure that they obey the law. That cannot be said of the sad young men and women, without hope or aspiration, who have caused such mayhem and chaos over the past few days. But the rioters have this defence: they are just following the example set by senior and respected figures in society. Let’s bear in mind that many of the youths in our inner cities have never been trained in decent values. All they have ever known is barbarism. Our politicians and bankers, in sharp contrast, tend to have been to good schools and universities and to have been given every opportunity in life.

Something has gone horribly wrong in Britain. If we are ever to confront the problems which have been exposed in the past week, it is essential to bear in mind that they do not only exist in inner-city housing estates.

The culture of greed and impunity we are witnessing on our TV screens stretches right up into corporate boardrooms and the Cabinet. It embraces the police and large parts of our media. It is not just its damaged youth, but Britain itself that needs a moral reformation.

[Fresh Prince]

^Pretty much. It just needs analysis of the overemphasis on the individual over society and Thatcher's quote, 'There is no such thing as society' and it's done.