Well, it’s the day after the worst riots seen in London since the 1980’s. There is a sentence that I never thought I would write from my workplace in London. But its true, London erupted last night in a series of violent riots that were both senseless and without a cause.
On Saturday and Sunday there were riots in Tottenham and Brixton respectively. Sadly for Brixton it has a long history of rioting and it is a shame for this community who have fought to move past this, that a group of greedy youths, used the unrest in Tottenham to loot a Curry’s – for those outside of the UK, this is an electrical goods store. They looted it clean. And then set fire to other businesses and caused the public transport to that area to be closed. The result is even sadder – they claim to be disaffected youth and that they are claiming their taxes back. Hmmm, well now an employer of local people will be unable to open and these local people could loose their jobs. Didn’t really think that through did you? And at 14, have you really paid taxes?
The riots in Tottenham were sparked by a peaceful march over the killing of Mark Duggan last Thursday by Police, that is being disputed. By all accounts Mark Duggan was a gang member who routinely beat his wife and four children and was apparently shooting at Police at the time. But it’s not up to me to judge Mark Duggan. There is an inquiry into what went on and the results will be out in couple of months. What saddens me the most is that people are using this as an excuse to create civil unrest in an amazing city and to ruin people’s livelihoods.
I would put money on it that if you asked a rioter in Brixton, Hackney or Clapham Junction last night what their cause was, they would have been unable to tell you. They would not be able to name Mark Duggan or tell you how he was related to this. From what I saw on social media yesterday, people were looking to loot cause other areas of London had been looted and why should those areas be the only ones to get free stuff. Gee, that’s a great reason to riot. Juxtapose this with Syria where people are rioting and dying for their human rights, it just seems that this rioting is a senseless waste of time.
Last night as I left work, I walked to my monthly book club in my friend’s pub, in Battersea. When I left I knew that there was rioting going on in Hackney, but Hackney is in North London and I was well south of the river. I could hear sirens but assumed that they were for Brixton. How terrible is that, but to be fair there was unrest there the night before and I knew that the tubes were closed there and that there was ongoing trouble. When I walked into the pub, I was greeted with ‘OMG are you ok?’, I was a bit stunned to learn that it was kicking off in Clapham Junction. Surely not. Then my friends who live on Lavender Hill began to send photos of the Police station across the road and of what was going on. Bus drivers were being told by Police to radio and tell them not to send any more busses in that direction. People were being barricaded inside the UK’s busiest train station for safety. Trains were still running, but then they were taking people to safety. Teenagers in hoodies were arriving and wondering which way to go – they were not even from Clapham, had just come to loot. Rubbish bins were being set on fire. Shops were looted clean and destruction was everywhere.
We thought that we were ok being about a 5-10 min walk from the Junction. We were watching with some disbelief and anger at what was going on, through Sky News. Then a group of young men on bikes – one of them on a Boris bike (?!) with hoods and masks biked past the pub and made a hand signal like a gun. FUCK, SHIT!!! What do we do? So we pulled everything in from outside, we pulled everyone in from outside, we closed and locked the door and called A the owner, who is pretty huge and you would not like to mess with down from the kitchen where he was cooking our dinner. And we holed up and watched the craziness descend. The police took about an hour and half to arrive. They were busy elsewhere. We were all questioning – where is the army? Where are the water cannons – and why is this being allowed to keep happening. Turns out that the water cannons are all in Northern Ireland.
So I decided to stay put. To get home I would have to have gone through the Junction and that was not going to happen. The boys stayed out the front of the pub all night – I took them crackers and pate – how bourgeois of us. We stayed safe and continued to watch the news – of fires burning unchecked as it was not safe enough for the fire brigade to get in there, of police trying to stop civil unrest that appeared to have no cause and of just craziness. The last straw for us was when they interviewed a very shaken and scared woman who had her home invaded by a rioter. Oh and when they set fire to our local costume shop – when will the hurting stop people.
There were a few laughs though – on Facebook, there were calls that it was a step to far to loot and burn Greggs – again for those outside the UK this is a bakery chain, that lots of people get their lunch from. It’s a great hangover cure – dirty but good. There was footage in Clapham Junction of Boots the Chemist pretty much cleared out – the journalist picked up a packet of drugs that had been emptied and noted that it was Imodium – for when you get the shits whilst looting. Which brings me to the question – did these kids even know what they were looting.
After a very early morning, my eyes are hanging out of my head today. The feeling in London is one of anger, disgust and of this must not happen again for a fourth night. Most Londoners want the army called in. David Cameron has cut his holiday in Tuscany short to come back and sort this out. The man who once famously urged people to ‘Hug a Hoodie’, may now retract those words. Theresa May who seems to have been left at the helm whist the rest of the government were on holiday says that there is no way that the army will be called in and urges communities to sort this out. Great – what a way to incite more violence. Let’s have Joe Public take this into his own hands. Boris is on his way back from his undisclosed holiday destination – I can’t wait to hear his words of wisdom on this.
Londoners just want this to stop. We don’t condone this and we are scared. Falling asleep to the sounds of sirens and helicopters is not nice. Cancelling football games and worrying about the Olympics is not really enough right now. As my good friend said on her Facebook last night ‘Stop rioting outside my window, I want to go to sleep’. And that pretty much sums it up.
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