Dark times

Tuesday, August 09, 2011


I cannot believe what has been happening in London (and now, worryingly, elsewhere). 

The images we are seeing are heartbreaking, terrifying and utterly depressing. I'm thinking of all of you who are there, and hoping you are safe. 

When will it come to an end? How do we, as a country, possibly come back from this?


{Edited to add: I wrote this at 1am this morning, when times were looking very dark indeed. They still feel pretty bleak, but if anything can bring us hope this morning, #riotwombles can.}

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5 boats moored

  1. Colin9 August 2011 at 09:03

    I've only been reading about this online rather than watching the news, so perhaps I'm not getting the same effect. There's no simple answer to your question about how does a country bounce back, inasmuch as there's no simple, single cause for why this happened anyway. I understand the locals are saying this is worse than the Brixton riots in the early 80s, which is saying something.

    What seems depressing is that so much of the focus of the rioters seems to be on looting. It's not like you can spin that away as being political in nature - much like the rhetoric of the 1992 LA riots being an "uprising" were undermined by people driving in from the suburbs to get computers.

    I remember that particular debacle well enough because I had to drive through it (during a lull) when the university asked us to evacuate the area. It felt afterwards like someone had torn the heart out of LA, but they seemed to rebuild and generally get on with it. I was long gone though. I suspect that Londoners have that same capacity (to rebuild, that is, not move a couple thousand miles away), but the politicians and the police are going to have some thinking to do.

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  2. Penny9 August 2011 at 11:23

    The whole thing is terrifying. I feel sad to be a human being today - we're fundamentally pretty dark. Banker's greed/looter's greed... it's a weird, sickening parallel.

    I hope it doesn't get any worse, and I hope my London friends stay safe. One of my best girls lives in New Cross and said she was watching people carrying looted TVs past her window last night. Makes it very real.

    Px

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  3. Lauren9 August 2011 at 13:26

    I'm not sure what to say other than I'm both worried and hopeful at the same time.xx

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  4. Anonymous9 August 2011 at 17:12

    Strangely enough, this is something I can really sympathize with as I felt very much the same way when our city went insane after the hockey loss in June. It really hurts to see people do that your city/country. But you will bounce back. The number of decent people will always outweigh the number of hooligans and they will set things right. So, so sad though.

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  5. nikki9 August 2011 at 20:53

    I was going to refer you to Nina (@greyandshiny). She wrote a really beautiful post about watching the riots happen around her, and the aftermath that brought hope to everyone.

    It's still the middle of the storm though. The calm will come soon.

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