Everything appears to be more or less back to normal today in this neck of the woods, with an almost full market and shops reopened. Lots of sirens still to be heard however – Creek Road and Evelyn Street sound very busy...
We reported that yesterday evening a number of people gathered for an informal street meeting at the junction of Reginald Road and Deptford High Street in response to the rioting. According to Brenda in Kim's there were a lot more than the 40 people we'd been told of, and they stayed until around 1am.
A group called DEPTFORD UNITED was formed from this meeting and they have now organised an 'emergency demonstration' to march this evening at 6.30pm from the anchor at the top of the street to Lewisham Town Hall. The Anti-Cuts folk from Social Centre Plus are marching "against all attacks on our communities, and the government and council cuts which leave our youth desperate and hopeless." All are welcome to join.
UPDATE 21.48: Meanwhile, Brockley Central has an interesting post on how Eltham people have responded to the riots. Eltham remained untouched, but due to the gathering of people ready to defend it, Greenwich council has announced closure of town centre pubs "so as to deter outside groups from diverting police resources."
What bloody use is a march to the town hall by the usual suspects?
ReplyDeleteTrots jumping on the bandwagon innit.
ReplyDeleteI thought the point of last night's street party was to show support for the people who live up above the shops who were in danger of losing their homes to arson, so I agree, Anon, a march seems pretty pointless...
ReplyDeleteThat march was nothing to do with being anti-riots. They were actually chanting 'blame the government, not the kids' which many locals felt meant the marchers supported rioting in order to get what they wanted, as other slogans were no peace until justice. Anon above is correct-largely the Socialist Party. As the march walked past the Islamic Centre on Rushey Green the locals inside has armed themselves with bricks and shovels, fearing it to be National Front or BMP, as a BBE had gone around earlier claiming this is what the group was. The crowd of marchers then decided to turn on the police, who were trying to disarm the Islamic Centre occupants and tell them what it was actually about, and chanting 'keep your hands off our kids' which only further fuelled the Islamic Centre occupants, making them feel afraid and making the marchers look threatening. It also wasn't helping the police calm the situation. Bunch of clueless, selfish people who don't realise how they are terrifying a community by gathering a large group of people all chanting how wonderful some riots are, to a group of people who have all had their shop windows smashed by vandals looting.
ReplyDeleteCall me a pedant but their Twitter tag #weareunitedyourinvited put me right off. Twitter don't do apostrophes? It's "You're invited", as in We are and You are.
ReplyDeleteAnd secondly who's united about what? I'd say we were all united against arson and scaring the shit out of people, but that's about it.
I'm united in principle against capitalism as are the marchers, but I wouldn't join those fuckwits in such a stupid little march to the local town hall when the problem is global and the entire country is experiencing a class war and finally discussing the problem of disenfrancised youth – this is a great chance to open people's eyes to the evils of materialism, but not by doing a Jarrow march. UK Uncut tactics are better.
Thanks, Anonymous, for your description of last night's events. I thought this march was rather inappropriate and very badly timed. Easily misinterpreted and a waste of police resources.
ReplyDeleteIf you are correct, it turned out to be as ill thought out as the actions of Eltham residents whose supporters from other areas ended up fighting the police over who should police their own area.
The Sikh vigilantes were also a problem for the police. But the initial reaction of all to protect one's property and community in the absence of the police is at least understandable.
(Obviously after Saturday and Sunday night, a different response was required from the cops, and the Welsh contingent should have been racing down the M4 on Monday).
In Deptford our high street saviours fucked off on foot to the town hall instead of sticking around to do the job (probably only one or two of them actually lives here).
Interestingly, they chose a meeting place on Monday night for a street party that was actually highly protected, since the guys at the butchers opposite were heavily armed (not guns, I hope) if anything happened. Why did they choose that place and not down at the crossroads at the very heart of the street, notorious muggers paradise (the trouble started at William Hills in the north end).
Annoyingly they said meet outside Ladbrokes. If they were truly local and part of this 'community' and really anti-capitalist they would not give Ladbrokes the oxygen of publicity by even mentioning their name.
More annoyingly, I heard they billed the thing as a "peace march" but didn't seem to have involved anyone else in the 'community' in it (like the churches who they probably have an allergy to).
Reclaiming the streets is one thing, telling everyone it was a "peace march" was another, but marching to make a political point (that I'm sure many people concur with) while everyone especially the police are still on high alert and people are still frightened, could have waited.
Not being funny but this lot are so woolly that they had to get Solidarity Federation with the help of Black Bloc to do the breaking in when they took over the Job Centre. They pretended to be part of the community but like Mushroom says most don't live here. At the Job Centre they had three anarchists squatting overnight looking out for the place, everyone else went home to their nice flats somewhere else.
ReplyDeleteIn other words they work side by side with the people who looted and rioted at the student marches, and who are highly likely to be at the frontline of any looting and arson going on now.
It was totally weird that the Social Centre Plus let the anarchists in, since most people were in favour of protecting the state against the Tory's dismantling, whilst the anarchists want to smash the state and have everyone endlessly discussing in meetings what the next move is (in a pseudo democratic way) whilst reserving the right to act on impulse without consulting anyone but their mates.
Look at the targets in Deptford High Street: all corporate chains (even H Samuel is quite a big chain though the shop on the high street is small). 'Friends' of these 'veggielantes' (thanks Anonymous) were probably not far away, if not spreading the message themselves during the riots. It's either them or the druglords running this show.
Vigilantism is just what the anarchists want. A collapse in capitalism is what a lot of us would like to see...but we were settling for modification. The rioters who get sentenced will probably be known as martyrs in years to come.
Sorry, thanks Honey Badger.
ReplyDeleteSorry but I keep hearing how the Tottenham riots started cos of the death of one bloke at the hands of the police. I want to point out that there was a fucking big drugs bust in Hackney, mostly involving the Pembury Estate, on 3 August 2011.
ReplyDelete23 were arrested in dawn raids and "a large quantity of crack cocaine, a kilo of heroin, 45 mobile phones, 60 SIM cards, £8000 in cash and one imitation firearm." I can't say "why aren't they talking about this" because David Cameron has already nailed GANGS in his speech.
It's quite easy to imagine that this entire RIOTFEST started because there were some grumpy drug dealers in north London whose entire income for the next month or two had been BUSTED by the cops. No one will admit that, so I think it is true.
FREE STUFF by rioting! The entire drug network came together to supplement their income. Probably quite a few gangs had lost out on that Hackney bust.
It's an interesting lesson for us mere mortals. If the police have busted someone, all the little shits who work for the drug dealers have no income anymore, so they're all going to be out mugging people instead of just selling drugs. It means they end up robbing their own when any good Fagin would send Oliver uptown.
We should get warnings from the police when they've just put a gang leader away. Stay away from the HalfPenny Hatch.
I think the kids have had time to read up on stuff and listen to music that their parents and all those people working dont have time to read and hear and are quite political. They know who's running things but I think it's class over race, but they'll use race if they can. I think this is a reaction to the student riots, nothing was achieved then, so this time maybe something will be.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.eastlondonlines.co.uk/2011/08/twenty-three-arrested-in-dawn-raids-as-police-tackle-drug-dealing-and-firearms-crime-in-hackney/
ReplyDeleteYou're right, mushroom, no one will admit it.
ReplyDeleteBut if you ask whose interests the riots served you don't even need to know whether there was a direct causal link to the dawn arrests. You'll end up with very similar conclusions anyway.
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