Over the past week we have some some absolutely horrific scenes as thousands of people, primarily youths, engaged in scenes that would make the Next sale queues look like a walk in the park.Shops and businesses throughout the country were looted and set alight, peoples lives were turned upside down and homes were destroyed. It became quickly apparent that one thing that was seriously lacking in society was 'Respect'. Respect for authority, respect for property and a massive lack of respect for each other in general. In fact the only thing that there doesn't seem to have been a lack of is 'excuses'. Let's take a look at some of my personal favourites.
'The riots occurred because a man with a gun got shot'
It is widely understood that it was the 'unprovoked' shooting of Mark Duggan (father of 4... I think it is law that the media have to point this fact out every time he is mentioned) that was the catalyst for these riots. And rightly so. I mean lets ignore the fact he had a gun for a second (I am sure he had a self loading handgun for a completely innocent reason), a dad was shot. Everyone knows dad's don't cause trouble, even ones with self loading handguns. He could have been a farmer...in Tottenham. Perfect reason for the rioting...no?
'Young people have nothing to do'
This is very true... Call of Duty MW3 isn't going to be released until November and everyone has finished COD: Black Ops. These kids COULD have spent their time doing what young people did when I was a kid, (building go carts, climbing trees, playing football, flicking through a discarded 'adult' magazine in the park... innocent stuff like that) but nothing can compare to nicking some Reeboks!
'The coalition government caused it'
Everyone knows that cutting EMA is a perfect excuse for a massive group of 9 to 30 year old's to go out and steal stuff. It doesn't matter that most of these people wouldn't be able to claim EMA anyway...what with them choosing not to go to college. I suppose it could have been a lack of employment prospects caused by lib/con economic policy (and not a thing to do with Labour letting banks do what they want for 12years of course!) but I'm not sure there are enough paper rounds to go around, especially not with the News of the World gone.
So there you have it. Perfect excuses for what has happened over the past 5 days. Indeed we haven't even touched on the 'coming from a single parent family' or 'living in a council house' yet. Oh wait... both of those applied to me growing up! better go grab myself a free telly!
love and hugs
Kev Walsh
xxxxx
