…over theft of their future

From London to Philadelphia,

youths erupting over theft of their futures

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/from-london-to-philadelphia-youths-erupting-over-theft-of-their-futures/2011/08/09/gIQAZ3Ff5I_story.html

…The Washington Post noted Tuesday that former London mayor Ken Livingstone believed the unrest in that city was the result of pent-up resentment “over the weak economy, high unemployment rates and historically deep budget cuts that are decreasing government funding for poor communities and grass-roots charities.”

Livingstone got it. Hopefully more politicians in this country will, too. In London, the flash point for the unrest was a police shooting of a black man. We need not wait for that to happen here before taking preventive action.

…Feeling disrespected and often outright ignored, many of them are threatening to destroy what they can’t have. And why not? The strategy worked so well for tea party anarchists that even President Obama started paying attention.

Christina Patterson: We can’t deny that race plays a part

Too many black men have been killed by the police. This is not the cause of these riots, but it’s in the mix

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/christina-patterson/christina-patterson-we-cant-deny-that-race-plays-a-part-2334813.html

 …There are 169 gangs in London. There are 22 in Hackney alone. These are people, often people who have grown up on estates where almost nobody works, often without fathers, and often without any qualifications, skills, or ambitions, who feel that the world has let them down. The guns and knives they carry make them feel that there’s a tiny corner of the world they can control. And because of these boys – no more than 2,000 of them – who carry guns and knives, and because it takes more than reports on “institutional racism” to get rid of “institutional racism”, you can hardly walk down a street, if you’re black, without being stopped and searched.

Too many black men have been killed by the police. Too many black men and women have been treated like criminals when they’re not. This is not the cause of these riots, but it’s there in the mix, a mix where the key ingredient is feeling powerless. Cuts won’t help. Growing unemployment won’t help. Some investment, in youth services, and better schools, and mentoring schemes, might, but money alone isn’t the answer.

It wasn’t these children who created the culture that told them that what mattered was the brand of their trainers, or the glitter of their bling. It wasn’t these children who created the culture that told them that their one hope of escape was hip hop, or fame. It wasn’t these children who created the institutions of a country where all the black workers were in the canteens. We have, as a society, created this monster and, as a society, and like those people heading into the trouble spots with dustpans and brushes, we must pick up the pieces.

 

 

 

 

Riots reveal London’s two disparate worlds

http://worldblog.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/08/09/7316057-riots-reveal-londons-two-disparate-worlds

 … But is it really surprising that under-educated, jobless youths go on the rampage, faced with the inconceivable gap between the rich and the poor and their sense of utter hopelessness and disenfranchisement?

They feel they deserve a slice of the cake too. Their sense of entitlement is this: We are entitled to steal what we can…

 

 

 

Bob Marley Burnin And Looting Tonight

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aVgHffdUPfI

Read Full Post »