The Road to 2012

In London over the past few days and in other English cities its been “Mob Rule” on a massive scale.

The British Government and Police are all saying it's just a tiny minority getting out of control.  But as the vision from Birmingham,  Manchester and Liverpool proved,  it's clear the problem isn't just a few thugs organizing a "mobile vulgus" on their "mobile Blackberries". 

Poigniantly, the use of mobile phones to organise may well come back to haunt the “mob” because  mobiles have cameras too…and social media is already being used to identify the rioters in full cry.  

As Europe's largest urban area descended into anarchy the rest of the world watched intently.  If it can happen there, then it can happen anywhere is the chord that strikes at the heart of anyone that lives in a city, whether it's Rio, Sydney or Bangkok.

The London riots were originally sparked after Mark Duggan's killing in Tottenham..but the subsequent mayhem had nothing to do with a police shooting be it right or wrong.  It happened because normally dis-empowered and marginalised people realized they could be in control for a day, or a night, a freedom to do what they wanted without impunity.
 
Just days before Duggan’s shooting, the London Borough of Hackney closed 8 out of its 13 youth and community centres.  Perhaps some of those youths looting and burning could have been somewhere else at the time if they had been kept open.  

I was born and bred in London, and lived through the Brixton and Poll Tax riots, and witnessed a peaceful anti-Thatcher miners march descend into pitched battles with police in Whitehall.  All those flashpoints had obvious beginnings be it anger against the police stop and search policy, the hatred of a new tax or fear of jobs being lost.

Recent events however are much harder to justify. 

I believe  London will rise above the destruction and disorder just as it has done throughout its history.  The “Broom Gangs” that hit the streets to help clean-up the mess are evidence of that spirit. 

Shelley put it far better than I ever could: “London, that great sea, whose ebb and flow,  at once is deaf and loud, and on the shore, vomits it's wrecks, and still howls on for more.”