There's also the opposite point to be made. That a few who claim they just got involved on the spur of the moment will be shown by CCTV to have gone to more than one place to loot. They'll get treated the same as people who genuinely did just get a call from their mate that it was "going off down the road". If they want to avoid criminals boasting about how they pulled the wool over the eyes of the system, this is the right way to go about it.

We need to see more of this "70% had criminal records" stuff. I'd have one if there were frequent stop and searches where I live- for a couple of minor drug offences. How many of those offences led to cautions?

I despair, why not stop there? How about we stop social funds so they starve on the streets of Britain, how about we don't pay benefits to any criminal?

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/sep/0 ... k-benefits

I've gone past the point of anger with this government.

Will they:

a) Pull themselves up by their bootstraps, knuckle down and find a job?

or

b) Launch a wave of acquisitive crime just as we slash police numbers?

I'm leaning towards b somehow. The government seem blind to the glaringly obvious fact that many profoundly dysfunctional people don't actually have the faculties required to bring about the type of wholesale change that is expected of them - and that sometimes this is partly down to government policies not tackling social problems adequately. We're talking about people with virtually no capacity to regulate their emotions or grasp the implications of their choices. These aren't wishy-washy subjective notions, they can be readily and reliably demonstrated empirically by modern neuroscience. People raised in environments which are rife with neglect and/or abuse literally end up with damage hardwired in and are well placed to pass it on - these effects are permanent and can only be mitigated but not reversed.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Why-Love-Matter ... 1583918175
This is an excellent primer on the subject.

http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1847 ... RGWB7BN86W
This is an excellent sequel which links the neuroscience to public policy. It should be required reading for every politician - but the sizeable and ever growing body of scientific evidence would dictate very radical changes that none would countenance.

Bloody hell. The Mail seems to be actively trying to worsen relationships between the people of Tottenham and the rest of Britain, as well as a nifty bit of posthumous character assassination against Mark Duggan

Indy Media Blog report

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Where there is great doubt, there will be great awakening; small doubt, small awakening, no doubt, no awakening.

Bad news sells newspapers. They would love for there to be more more rioting and if stirring things up and cultivating us/them scenarios gets results they will do it. Textbook rabble-rousing.

That'll be rabble with wallets who go into paper shops and WH Smith to get the low down.

It's also a lot easier to catch someone on CCTV if they're known to the police.

Bloody hell indeed.... Lying mail/express scum.....

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You may say I'm a dreamer.... but I'm not the only one....

They bring it up again.....

Rioters came from 44 countries: 1 in 7 jailed after summer of violence was a foreign national

Mind you

'One-third of Londoners born outside Britain'

So Brits were the main problem, apparently, in London at least.....

Never mind 6 out of 7 of those arrested were Brits.....

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You may say I'm a dreamer.... but I'm not the only one....

If they're really foreign nationals, they can be deported fairly easily. What's the betting they're born abroad but perfectly entitled to live in Britain?

Like Prince Philip.

Of course the Mail would rather focus on those foreigners or scroungers than the severe inequalities faced by young people who took part.

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My blog: https://stevenplrose.wordpress.com/

The Standard helpfully told us that the rioters were 55% black or mixed race. Because of course, that's exactly the same.

The Minister for Children, Tim Laughton or something similar, has just brushed off some questions about policy by telling us "most of the rioters weren't children".

He might want to tell the rest of the government.

It was the gangs of course if you're Iain Duncan Smith. I'm sure the Conservatives are clearly confused at who to blame.

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My blog: https://stevenplrose.wordpress.com/

can you think of anyone less likely to understand gang culture than IDS?

I mean, apart from Gove.

That's a deep point, isn't it?

At what level does someone from their background ever come into contact with poor, under-educated, intellectually limited urban youths? How can they ever have any understanding of what it means to be black and poor in a society where self-worth is estimated by possessions and earnings? What do they know about people living in high rises, kids with non-nuclear families, immigrants from war zones like Somalia?

In fact, what do they know of our society? I complain that Gove wants to take us back to the fifties but that is actually where he lives...

(And I'd include a lot of Labour MPs in that, and most LibDems)

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Where there is great doubt, there will be great awakening; small doubt, small awakening, no doubt, no awakening.