Sony UK distribution centre burned to the ground

[David Kilpatrick]

This is horrible news - massive, mindless destruction and it's not over yet:

http://www.photoclubalpha.com/2011/08/0 ... -in-riots/

David

[mvanrheenen]

A real tragedy what is taking place in England. I can understand bystanders can get emotional after a lethal shooting by the police, especially if the situation or circumstances are unclear, but this is rediculous. How many innocent lives are destroyed by this mindless violence? Is this justice?

What I find truly appaling is some of my thickheaded countrymen who find it neccesairy to comment about that England will do anything to avoid a football match... It's times like these I feel ashamed for humankind...

For anyone here who (in)directly is affected by this situation: you have my sympathies.

It's a pity about the sony distribution center but property can be replaced, (ruined) lives
can't.

Mark

EDIT: I just read about the first death contributed to the riots...

[pakodominguez]

They had similar problems in France, 4 years ago? When young people from the poor suburbs burned cars every day for a month or so. I do understand that the crisis is hitting the poor and low educated people because the king of work they do were the first that were cut.

This summer the crisis show us that it never disappeared, and that the political class is living far away, in a world far from reality, somewhere in Tuscany :[

I know little about British politics, but in Spain or here on the USA, the alternative to the people in office is even worse! I'm probably going back to Peru... No, hold on, new president is an ex military, raised during the Fujimori's dictatorship, suspected of abuse on Human Right and...

No hope :'(

[pakodominguez]

Sony

We can confirm our DADC Distribution Center in Enfield, UK has been damaged by fire. No injuries to employees; the damage is being assessed.

https://www.twitter.com/Sony/status/100933583690141696

[Dusty]

No Pako, there is hope, but it's not tied to change, it's tied to returning to what works. Personal responsibility is part of the equation. Really most of it.

If I'm responsible for me, then I don't need to elect somebody who will give me something paid for by everybody else, I want someone in office who will help me protect what is mine. If I have it securely, then I know I can depend upon it for the future, for me and my family.

Now we elect politicians who will give us free college, because we're too lazy to earn it. And they make people who don't go to college (as well as those that do) pay for it. We give free housing to those who won't work, and the working class stiff pays for it. Have a baby and say "my baby daddy won't give me no money", and the government will. Then do it 4 more time with another 3 'baby daddies", and expect us working guys to keep shelling out the cash because you got enough elected officials to pass such stupid laws that condone irresponsibility.

The above girl was my neighbor - getting Section 8 (free govt. paid rent) and welfare by having 5 kids with 4 different men, none of whom she was married to nor would support their kids. She no longer my neighbor because she had too many kids for that house, so she got a "free" upgrade to a bigger house - and I'm paying for it. I now have 4 kids, and had only 2 when I bought my house, but if I want an upgrade, it has to come out of my pocket!

It's all part and parcel of the same thing, as Alexander Tytler once said: "A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover they can vote themselves largesse out of the public treasury. From that moment on the majority always vote for the candidate promising the most benefits from the treasury with the result that democracy always collapses over a loose fiscal policy, always to be followed by a dictatorship."

Dusty

[pakodominguez]

Now we elect politicians who will give us free college, because we're too lazy to earn it. And they make people who don't go to college (as well as those that do) pay for it...

Dusty,

I do respect your position, and I do believe in meritocracy -that is one of the reasons i moved to the USA. But: In most Europeans countries education is free (or almost) and not 100% of the students are lazy. It is just a different system and that works for them. The spirit of their system is equal opportunities to access to any kind of education. Then, of course, like any other system, some people take advantage of it. As well as people taking advantage of welfare

I spent 9 years in Paris, France and now, I'm about to complete my 8th year in the USA. I do prefer my life here in NYC. But I also prefer to see my taxes paying for free education (hay, I don't have kids yet, so my money is going to someone else kid's education...) universal social security and decent roads, and not for paying another useless war.

I think it is because we (our societies) lost that sens of 'equal opportunities' that we have this protest. When I read that Mr Cameron is coming back from his holidays and that Lords and Commons will stop their holidays for a couple of days in order to debate about this crisis, I wanna go there and protest against them: they don't have no more contact with everyday people, they became useless a while ago.

[Dusty]

I think that some don't realize that opportunity costs. I have as much opportunity as anyone to get into an Ivy League college - do excellent in school and find a means to pay for it if accepted. Why should I have to pay? Because it costs a ton of money! If I'm not willing to make every sacrifice possible to pay that cost, I don't want it as much as those that do. If that means that I sell myself into slavery (by taking out a 20 year loan to pay for it), than that's what it takes.

I sacrificed for several years to put my oldest into private school, while paying for, and getting nothing from, the public school system. I made that choice, and paid for it. Others are unwilling to do so. Some would rather buy new cars, or bigger houses. If we give people free college because "they can't afford it" are we willing to tell them they can't buy new cars or have cable TV? No! Because we have too many that think everyone should be able to have everything at someone elses' expense.

We just gave a bunch of middle-and upper class people a lot of money to buy newer cars, if they scrapped the old ones. People like me, who have a car that's too old for the program, get nothing, but get to pay for it! Why? Unions have a lot of political power, and they were being laid off due to GM & Chrysler defaulting. So, you and I get to pay for someone's new ride, and do they even think to offer those 'old' cars to those of us with even older cars? NO, because having them still in inventory means we won't be forced to by new cars as soon. It's near impossible to get a decent used car these days because of that program.

Getting politicians back to the people, yes! Term limits, make sure they cant stay forever. NO Congressional perks, like free, gold plated health care. Buy a policy like I do. NO retirement, Social Security like everyone else. Cut their salary to 1.5 times the average wage, not 4. And put in more of them, not less! We used to have one Rep for every 40,000 people, not it's one for every 690,000! No wonder they're out of touch! Also, get rid of all the big money in campaigns with a simple law - you cannot contribute any money to a candidate you are not entitled to vote for. No corporate campaign funds, no union funds, no lobbyists. Only We The People have a First Amendment right to free speech, not artificial entities.

There's plenty more, but it all starts with making everyone pay their own way, and be responsible for their own actions.

Dusty

[bossel]

They had similar problems in France, 4 years ago? When young people from the poor suburbs burned cars every day for a month or so. '(

Still following whats going on here ? It was two teenagers running away from the police, passing a high-voltage cabin and tried to hide in there. Some say, it's an accident and why did they run away, some say the police hunted them to death. And then riots.

As for the taxes, yes we all complain, but it's nice to have schools, hospitals, streets and some security if you loose your job. Some pay more and others profit more. There is certainly abuse - but we find this in all classes of society.

Everybody has his own preference as to that. I prefer to pay for health insurance and unemployment insurance and I am happy to loose that money, staying healthy and with a job.

I spent 9 years in Paris, France and now, I'm about to complete my 8th year in the USA.

It's now 12 years for me in France and since a few weeks I am officially a French!

[mvanrheenen]

If I have to choose between working hard and paying my taxes and not have to rely on a scam to get by, I'll pick hard work and taxes anytime!

In the Netherlands, the senate is a center-right winged band of capitalists, xenophobes and scared compromisers. Guess who is paying more and who is getting richer...

[bossel]

They just showed the burned down Sony in the French news

[Atgets_Apprentice]

This has little to do with politics in the UK, or civil rights, or who is in poverty or underpriviledged. It may have started as a protest about a police shooting, but the spread is all about looting. The "Riots" are purely a distraction to allow the robbing to go on, as the Police and Fire Service have to contend with the missiles and burning cars and buildings, allowing the ones with the shopping carts to wheel off their Plasmas unhindered.

The police will continue to be outflanked by the "rioters", as they are outnumbered*, and you can bet your life that the only time that water cannon and baton rounds will be deployed will be when the unrest gets close to Downing Street or Buck House.

They could impose Martial Law, but they'd have to pull troops out of Afghanistan to have enough to cope.....

*Outnumbered until they take Police officers from areas unaffected by unrest, which will leave THOSE areas vulnerable.

[Greg Beetham]

What I can’t understand about it is, what happened to law and order? Why was the general population abandoned by those responsible for protecting them for three days? And I’m not blaming the police totally either, the political side is just as responsible, basically asleep at the wheel.
I don’t think there is any excuse for the recent behaviour by the perpetrators whatsoever; the army should have been called in to put an end to that rot on the first night because it amounted to anarchy basically. I just saw some tugboat commentator on a TV news program here proclaiming that they were ‘marginalized’ and ‘underprivileged’ and needed to be understood and assisted….what a total load, they were cowardly feral vermin indulging in opportunistic looting and pointless vandalism, trashing and burning other peoples possessions and livelihoods and putting lives at risk; therefore basically surplus to requirements.
The only way to contain that situation was to leave those responsible in no doubt about the response their endeavours will bring, on the spot with extreme prejudice, in other words treat the situation as a terrorist threat and respond accordingly with whatever force required.
Think I’m a bit harsh? Well I don’t thinks so, too my mind there is almost no difference between a venomous urban feral and a terrorist.
I hear what you say Dusty loud and clear, there are sections of the community who think they are entitled to a free lunch at everyone else’s expense. Have a look at Greece as a shining example of a land of the free lunch; it’s an economic basket case and they still think someone else should pay, this time the rest of the European community.
I do think that a free government school system up to high school level is a good idea in principal as long as society gets a return from the investment and produce students that have some potential for being productive members of the community, not semi literate dropkicks who roam the streets doing drugs and crime instead because learning school stuff is too hard.
Greg

[artington]

Without wishing to politicise this site, the topic has been raised and this is an interesting petition for those of us who are UK tax payers

http://epetitions.direct.gov.uk/petitions/7337

[bfitzgerald]

Being from London myself I cannot say I am that shocked by all of this...it is sad to see though.
I'm not entirely convinced it's correct for the politicians to simply dismiss it as "thugs and criminals" I won't condone what is going on not at all but there are social issues here..which will be ignored completely by the Government. Yes some are thugs and people who have no respect and taking advantage of the situations..but there is a groundswell of anger in Britain from many people.

It's not completely unheard of for there to be riots when a conservative government is in power actually rather normal though the spread of violence is far beyond London and in many other cities this is worse than it has ever been.

[David Kilpatrick]

Our lads from the Scottish Borders police have been sent down to help. Holiday for them, normally they have to deal with seriously drunk rugger players twice the size of these urban runts.

The warehouse was almost entirely CDs and vinyl records, and the entire stock of dozens of independent record labels has been destroyed - including some of the rubbish the average looter probably considers to be a soundtrack to their adventures, sadly not limited to that.

What's amazing is that apparently one looter was seen emerging from Tesco with one large bag of Basics Basmati Rice, value all of £1.99. For that they may go to jail, almost as good as kids who stole a loaf of bread 150 years ago and found themselves on a convict ship to the colonies.

We do have some ships left, not many, but maybe Ark Royal could be rescued from mothballs. Any colonies out there want some of this lot?

David