The London Riots – trying to make sense of them

 The London Riots – trying to make sense of them

This is the first time I’ve gone off topic on my blog.  My thoughts today have nothing to do with death and grief….but I wanted to write down what I am thinking and feeling about what is happening here.  So I’m hijacking my blog for today. It’s not hijacking when you do it to yourself, right?

The last few days have been a bit surreal. I’ve lived here in London since this city stole my heart 4 1/2 years ago.  And I’ve always felt safe here.  You hear about London’s crime rates and tourists who are weary when in London because of it’s dangers….but I’ve never felt anything but safe. I’ve probably always been a little naive like that. I’ve travelled all over the world – often by myself – and wandered round at any time of night wherever I like, without any fear.  Some would argue that this is a good state of mind – not in fear – but let’s be honest, a little bit of measured awareness wouldn’t be a bad idea for me.  And I’ve had that in bucketloads the last 2 days.  Less the measured awareness…more the fear. I’m not a fear-merchant or a panic-monger, not by any stretch of the imagination. But it has been unpredictable and it has been frightening.

I knew it was getting bad on Monday but when I woke on Tuesday to find how bad things had really been overnight I was horrified, angry, and scared. And so so very sad. My beautiful city being torn apart by it’s own inhabitants.  People’s businesses and livelihoods destroyed overnight.  And for what?  I know the protest in Tottenham, which turned into a riot, started because of the death of Mark Duggan.  But the riots in different parts of the city and the country have little to do with this other than that this was the spark that ignited what came next.

I don’t follow politics at all (my dad would turn in his grave just to yell out ‘you dummy!’ if he knew how little interest I take) and I can’t make any great social commentary on what this is all about.  All I can do, all any of us can do, is share what makes sense to me.

I struggled initially between judgement and compassion. i.e. wanting to see every last rioter strung up vs. trying to figure out how this has happened, and what is going on in our society that had created a situation where youth all over the country have reacted in this way. I swung from one to the other without knowing where to land. Then I saw a great tweet reminding me that you don’t have to pick sides and do one or the other.  You can be furious and feel total disgust for this behaviour and those displaying it while, at the same time, trying to figure out how this has come about. I’ve seen plenty of arguments erupt on social media over these riots – mostly because people think they can only do one of the above.  If you talk about how angry you are and how you’d like to go out and start dishing out your own personal brand of justice to the rioters…..others will think you are ignoring the underlying factors that have created this situation.  And if you discuss what the underlying causes are……others can think you are defending these rioters.

You can do both though. That’s what I’m doing. At the same time as acknowledging how completely unacceptable (and heart-breaking) this is and what harsh penalties need to be dealt to those involved, I’m also thinking about what caused this. It’s shortsighted to imagine this is just mindless violence with no reason or purpose or cause.  Everything has a cause. This isn’t a group of 3 really bad kids we are talking about. This is thousands of people all over the UK behaving like this.  You can’t write this off as just random mindless thuggery.

There is a quote…..that I can’t remember exactly….that goes something like ‘in different circumstances, that would have been you’.  And I totally believe this. So what is it that has made this person different from me?  What has happened that they they will go out and loot and smash and burn…and I won’t.  It isn’t so simple as saying it’s an uneducated person of a certain race from a certain area who wasn’t disciplined properly or sent to bed early enough.  Read through some of the stories and watch some of the videos and you’ll see it’s not easy to generalise who these rioters are, aside from the fact that it is mostly youth.  If these youth have no sense of community…then why not? What the heck has got them there?

So at the same time as wanting to see every last b%#*ard caught and severely punished…. I also want to understand how such a situation came about. What has been going on in our society that this even became a possibility?  And what can we do to stop it happening again?

I have no suggestions for how they should all be punished – but I know they should. And I have no reasons for how this happened – but I know they exist.

One amazing thing for me has been to see how communities get drawn together. Like after the Christchurch earthquake and in the wake of death (aha! I knew I could fit it in somewhere) and destruction when I felt more fiercely Kiwi than ever….I feel so crazily proud and protective of London right now.  This morning I checked twitter for overnight updates about what had been going on in Putney (my local area that had riot warnings last night). Half of what I read were people banding together and commenting how amazing it is to see the local community all coming together to support each other and watch out for each other.  It makes me want to walk up into Putney and hug random people on the street.  I won’t though.  But I quite like the idea.

Last night, though bad in other parts of the country, it seemed very quiet in London….so maybe the worst is over here. I hope so.

So those are my thoughts.  To all my friends and family round the world who have been checking in – thanks for your concern. Love you all loads.

As always, feel free to comment below if you have something you’d like to say.

Kristie

xx

and…by the way…

Tagged as: London riots, UK riots