It was a horrid day yesterday.
Few can have watched the scenes in London without a sense of horror, disgust and fear. I lived in London for twenty two years. It's impossible not to feel empathic for those who will today go about their lives their today. And, lest we forget, this is not just now an issue in London: other cities have suffered too.
And yet this wasn't a surprise to me. Surely it wasn't to the government either? For thirty years or more economic crisis in this crisis has led, during the summer months, to rioting. That in no way excuses the rioting. It is criminal. It is wholly destructive. It alienates. Hope dies with it for a while, and takes a long time to rebuild.
But let's be clear. This rioting is not, as some want to cast it, just mindless violence. Violence, yes, undoubtedly and to be condemned as a result. With criminal prosecutions to follow as a result, I also hope. But mindless? No it is not that, as Dave Hill argued, exceptionally well, on his Guardian blog. There are motives and reasons for this behaviour, and in that case it demeans anyone to call it mindless.
Those motives and that behaviour may be destructive, but in that sense they may not be so far removed from the utterly irrational behaviour we are seeing on the world's markets at exactly the same moment. In a very real sense the stock market is being trashed. The FTSE has over the last few days done this:
Nothing suggested that it was going to crash as it has: a week ago there was some hope of stability. But then fear pervaded: the realistic fear in the eyes of those like me who have long forecast that this would happen that there will, as a consequence of the economic policies inappropriately and unwisely chosen by our political leaders, be another worldwide recession.
That fear was justified. Hope evaporated. Panic took its place and is still gripping the markets - as this morning's trading shows.
Was that fear that caused this rout that has trashed millions if not billions of people's hopes - and will do for a long time to come - the same fear that led people to tip over from quiet acceptance of those political decisions onto behaviour that is indication of the same loss of hope?
Can it really just be coincidence that these events happened at the same time?
I can't see any way that the tow are unrelated. When any real hope in political leaders - in the US and the EU faded - and with those in the UK just absent - the reality of despair hit.
This does not mean I condone violence: I am appalled by it.
But then I don't condone the behaviour of markets and the enormously adverse impact that they will have either.
What I am saying is simple: that the promise that underpinned neoliberalism - that unlimited cheap credit would be available to make life tolerable now with financialisation and securitisation promising the prospect of a better future tomorrow - when the charade that this has always been was exposed by the simultaneous failure of the politicians who supported it and the markets that sustained it - then at that moment the hope of those who had endured its consequences and who knew its promise of material well being was never going to be theirs to enjoy snapped.
I can't prove that, of course.
I can only suggest it.
I also suggest that this means that the only way forward is to now leave neoliberalism - both the form its been delivered in and even more so the extreme form that the Tea Party and Tory right propose - far behind us.
Now is the time for Courageous States. My new book on that theme is 85% done. I'll be working on it for the rest of the day.
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I remember when The Great Storm of October 1987 effectively closed the London markets. Even though Big Bang had happened a year before, ‘getting into work’ was still of major importance, and not much happened in the City the morning after. The pressure built up over the weekend, and the markets crashed when they opened on Monday.
Coincidence? Of course.
There was another coincidence, for me. At the time I lived in Croydon, directly opposite the Reeve’s furniture store that burned down last night. On the night of the storm, while I was asleep, a huge tree next door to my flat was blown down, damaging the furniture store slightly and blocking the road. I slept right through it and woke up slightly early because of the unnatural silence, since the Croydon city traffic couldn’t get past. We lived through it all and let it become history soon enough.
I’m not sure of the moral, except that, as in 24 years ago, I’m not going to let it panic me.
That is what I see -no hope – they have nothing to lose. Hope is a powerful thing, it is what gets us up in a morning, you can always hope for a better tomorrow.That has gone for a lot of young people – they see no future, they have no hope.
If it isn’t “mindless”, please enlighten us to the motives behind this criminality. What motive can there be for theft, part from greed or envy? What motive for wanton damage?
And what about the people who have lost homes, possessions and their businesses and livelihoods. What motive can there be?
You clearly have not read the Guardian link
Why not do so?
Mindless is not the correct term. “Stupid” would be more suitable. Smashing up your own community does not achieve anything.
Which shows how desperate people are
Of course it’s criminal
And stupid
But failing to ask why crime happens is….well, a crime
And neoliberalism has led to this
Just because you say it is not mindless or someone else says it is not mindless does not mean it is not mindless. These riots are very much, IMHO, carried out by mindless thugs who are no better than common criminals and should be put in prison.
And I support that fact that crime should be prosecuted
But let’s not think that prison works. We know it doesn’t. Removing the cause of crime is essential
That’s what I’m discussing
And deliberate recession – for that is what we’re getting – is the cause of this crime. Oh, not directly – I agree – but by destroying hope and society as politicians say ‘we’re cutting and getting out of here’ – which is what the Tories have done – is a prime cause
This doesn’t show how desperate people are. Desperate people don’t damage their own communities. This is just the behaviour of thugs.
Oh I assure you they do
Desperate people self harm
They commit suicide
And yes they harm their communities
That’s the irrationality of fear and desperation
I did read Dave Hill’s blog and everything he said was wholly unsubstantiated. Just an opinion without evidence, and at odds with what senior police and (minority) politicians are saying.
Frankly I preferred Tony Parson’s view in today’s Mirror –
http://www.mirror.co.uk/news/top-stories/2011/08/10/london-riots-tony-parsons-on-the-warped-logic-of-no-hopers-good-for-nothing-and-afraid-of-nothing-115875-23333279/
It is perfectly obvious – and you will note I have never said otherwise – that what is happening is criminal, unacceptable, and must first be stopped and second result in prosecution.
But say these people are just ‘bad’ is far too simplistic.
And even if that were true it’s still the case that it’s fair to ask why that’s the case
That’s the issue I’m trying to address.
If there’s mindlessness here it’s on the part of those not asking the questions who are all too ready to issue blanket condemnation. I’ll condemn the violence and the looting and the thuggery. I hate it. But if you’re saying I may not ask why 0- which is what you’re doing – then you are very definitely in the wrong.
Richard, I am a great supporter of tax reform. I agree with most of what you say regarding tax havens and how they have ruined our system. However, this is not one of your better posts. By saying that you do not condone this violence but you (and the Guardian) understand the reasons for it is somehow giving legitimacy to what has happened over the previous nights. It is wrong for you to politicise this when people are losing their livelihoods and homes.
Do you really think that all these ‘thugs’, and there is no kinder word for them, looked at the FTSE and Dow indices and thought ‘the stock market is bombing, we’d better get out and smash and loot shops’, is ridiculous in the extreme.
Lets be very clear; this is mindless violence and there are no excuses for it.
I’m sorry – you’re obviously more than able to think
Why not read what I am saying properly
Of course I’m not condoning crime – no one in their right minds is – or excusing it or saying people should not be punished for it
Thee are no excuses for it
But there are causes for heaven’s sake
And complete loss of hope is one
And the Tories alienating the police, civil servants, local authorities, social services by cutting them to the point where they too feel helpless is another
Use your reason, please. It’s the only way we have to stop recurrence
Respectfully, deny that
There is some unanswered questions that definitely need answers. One that definitely needs answering fully and not covered up is why the bullet that was found in a police radio was apparently police issue.
We need to know the reasons why ths violence has been unleashed, These uprisings do not happen inside a vacuum. Something occured to kick it off. It seems unclear that the man shot by police actually fired on police. I think there is a question mark (though I may be wrong) whether the man killed by police was actually armed or not.
I have my doubts that that community grievances will be properly investigated or addressed. The priority sems to be rushing in and arresting the perpetrators and leaving the causes mostly unaddressed, meaning the same mistakes are going to be made all over again!
Mr Murphy, may I say that I agree with you. It is very obvious that there is no ‘leader’ for all this mayhem. I belive if any of this was under coherent control then we would already have huge sitdown demo’s to surpass anyhting we have seen in the middle east. Our youth are very cynical and disaffected and are constantly being portrayed as worthless, shiftless and criminal by all the media primed by a Governing class which is busy scapegoating ‘the others’. I fear for our future. My parents generation fought for a socially fair system only to see it abused and wasted by politicans. I for one do not believe any of our traditional ‘authorities’ any more, least of all the police or political parties.
Yes, I do hope everyone’s enjoyed this preview of the Libertarian Utopia. Remember, kids: if we all had guns, we wouldn’t need silly things like police or public courts!
While I do not deny many inner city youth are alienated I think its simplistic to see these very disturbing events now being flashed around the world as just a function of economic or political inequality. There is an aspect of anti-social behaviour in the UK which is has been evolving for some time where some youths act as “packs” attacking victims in a barbaric way. Respect for their society be it in school or community has dissolved into a wild west like approach of weapons ( gang on gangs) or verbal swearing and borishness and machismo.
Some Schools have been too patronising with low expectations of both behaviour and very low levels of academic work especially for Afro-Carribean pupils. Our “free market in schooling” has meant selection by mortgage, parental influence and middle class cultural capital – our secondary school system is socially segregated typically in London.
Unfortunately while new Labour helped somewhat they lacked the guts to tackle our really poor schools, wide spread indiscipline and gang walfare culture.
I remember a very bright Asian student of mine voting for the London Tory – Boris J. -a few years ago & when I asked why he said he was sickened by the appalling levels of behaviour on London buses & hoped he would sort it.
I concur
Schooling does fail
So does the curriculum
So too does a society that says you’re measured by what you have not what you are
And yes, we need to tackle all those things. I agree
The word “mindless” applied in this context and others like it is devoid of meaning. Perhaps it expresses inarticulate rage? Like Grrrrr? An emotional signal, not a contribution to a dialogue. Maybe its useful for letting off steam, but gets us nowehere. Making off with a £500 TV may be criminal, greedy, etc, but mindless? No. (Grrr is what I feel when people use the word, but that’s my problem.)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/today/hi/today/newsid_9560000/9560646.stm
Say it all really, how can you reason with people like this?
You can’t
Of course you can’t
But you can ask why we got people with that reasoning
And that does require serious reconsideration of our economic logic – whose unaccountable greed he reflects