Harsh?

[brispie]

Huge difference between rioting and next door being burgled.

I'm not sure if they all assumed that they'd get away with it. Possibly getting caught is part of the adrenalin rush surely. As my dad would undoubtedly have said if I'd have been involved and got caught 'You're an idiot for getting caught, I would have never let that happen when I was a lad.'

[Bernie]

I bet if you ask your dad he did some cuntish things in his day.

Nope, not at all. This isn't some Seamus Heaney-esque pean to the old feller but he really is quite an insanely straight arrow. Avoided trouble, never nicked anything other than a few apples off a neighbour's tree, for which he got a clip round the ear off a local bobby. He did carry a penknife, but only for sharpening pens. He could be bullshitting me like crazy I suppose but if you met him you'd probably agree with my take. Certainly my mum and all his friends seemed to have the same picture.

As I did and most people I grew up with.

I also grew up with some right paupers, in a post industrial (and even worse for where I lived) post-agricultural landscape with fuck-all opportunities. None of them were members of car-trashing expeditionary forces. A couple of them did do cunty things (a memorable one being lobbing a firework through some old codger's front door and setting fire to his curtains, which was fucking stupid to the border of evil) but I had the sense to remove myself from that situation after having tried to persuade them not to do it. That had nothing to do with any putative riding lessons - I would have been wearing second-hand clothes and shoes at the time, having walked a mile and a half to that village instead of being taken there in an F reg Morris 100 with rust and woodworm - and everything to do with having been brought up to respect other people, and expect fucking big consequences for being that stupid. I'm not saying this to make out I'm better than you, (even though I clearly was), but to point out that most people's cuntishness is not really related to whether they had ponies as a child or not. My stint at Posh Bastard school probably acquainted me with more future criminals than my stint at Fucking Psycho Cardiff Comprehensive. I didn't even start on the drug abuse until I met the posh bastards.

With a stretch inside this would have been less likely to happen.

Granted. But once again, the rules change a bit when we're talking about looting.

If the shopkeeper wasn't covered he's an idiot (or the insurance system).

Maybe, but he's still a hurt idiot, isn't he? What if he gets some back on insurance but his premium has now gone bonkers as a result of living in Hackney leading to the same financial embuggery?
It's daft to say burning someone's house down and nicking all their stuff doesn't hurt them, and I think you know this.

[ab]

What is the huge difference between rioting and burglary? Is it one that makes rioting and looting better?

Perhaps "The Man" in the form of Foot Locker as a victim is rather less appealing than a next door neighbour. Although on that basis, raping some bint who's had one two many WKDs and was wearing revealing clothing while seeing everyone else in the club seeming to cop off with someone is much less worthy of censure than going a bit too far on a date with someone you know and like.

If only the looters had watched Coronation Street they'd have realised what c**** everyone would think they were being after Becky Macdonald's treatment for nicking the cash from the safe in Dev's shop in the aftermath of the tram crash.

[brispie]

Sounds like your dad is a genuinely lovely man. Is he the one from Barrow Gurney?

Rural and urban changes a lot. I'm guessing that your pool of mates and associates wasn't huge? I grew up on an estate that had been built in the 60s. Loads of young families moved in around that time so I hung around with about 50 other lads of a similar age, at various times and occasionally all together. There was another similar estate on the other side of town. The middle of town on a Friday night was often a battlefield.

AB - The huge difference is that one or two people psych themselves up to carry out a burglary. If you see next door has been donw and you sneak in and nick something you are a cock.

If you've already committed and got caught up in rioting the adrenalin is pumping and things you wouldn't normally do suddenly seem acceptable. Most of them wouldn't have thought it through carefully, hence why they got nicked.

[ab]

It is different for some of the handling cases (eg the woman who decided she liked the look of a pair of shorts her housemate nicked - got 4 months but let out on appeal), but most of the looters were people who had gone out to participate in or watch the riots having heard some might be on.

I agree, obviously that going in and finishing off the job if your neighbour is burgled makes you rather more than a cock. You'd also be a cock if, on seeing the burglars arrive you thought "ooh, that looks exciting" and offered to join in with them. Which is basically what the looters did. Except that rather than being opportunistically cockish, most of them went out to where the riots were in order to see people doing stuff like that.

Either one involves being a complete bell end. Civilisation involves being able to have some control over yourself even if the adrenaline is pumping. Its why self defence is limited to what is reasonable in the circumstances rather than providing people who have a completely legitimate reason for using some violence complete carte blanche to keep on going until the assailant is dead.

[brispie]

....but I can kind of understand wanting to go and see what is going on with the riots and then getting caught up in it all. They went along because they thought it might give them that adrenalin rush. Of course, those adovcating that all the rioters should be sent to Afghanistan would argue that would sort their adrenalin rush urges out, but it wouldn't make them good soldiers.

[ab]

Perhaps they just wanted some trainers so they could go do some sport for excitement.

[markelt]

Maybe I am merkish on this but I think the fact that people are squealing about unexpectedly being punished for behaving like selfish, anti-social, destructive, thieving cuntsockets is entirely appropriate. I'd have had some sympathy for them if it was a display of rage about the unfairness of it all but it simply wasn't.

[Bernie]

Sounds like your dad is a genuinely lovely man. Is he the one from Barrow Gurney?

Ha! He drives me bonkers on occasion, but yeah, I suppose he is really. Not quite from Barrow Gurney but within easy cycling distance. I think my grandad used to work in the old quarry there.

Rural and urban changes a lot. I'm guessing that your pool of mates and associates wasn't huge?

True. We could probably muster about 15 at full strength. Nearly all armed with air rifles though! (and one or two with shotguns, potentially). You're right that townies are, almost to a man, scum. Couldn't tell a Beaufort from a Stockman...

[brispie]

Are they all squealing? I thought it was just angst rid middle class types like me?

Was he in the Wurzels, Bernie?

We stuck to cricket bats and and good old headbuts.

[Bernie]

He played in a band with Pete Budd. But I think he regarded the Wurzels as a bit of a betrayal of Adge Cutler's original vision.

[brispie]

I've never seen the Wurzels live. Even though I have had ample opportunity. This is partially because it depressed of what they were and could have been but for Adge's untimely demise. Moon over the Malago is genius.

[GlasgowTangerine]

Sept 2, 2011 14:46:41 GMT 1 Bernie said:

If the shopkeeper wasn't covered he's an idiot (or the insurance system).

Maybe, but he's still a hurt idiot, isn't he? What if he gets some back on insurance but his premium has now gone bonkers as a result of living in Hackney leading to the same financial embuggery?
It's daft to say burning someone's house down and nicking all their stuff doesn't hurt them, and I think you know this.

And that's without even taking into account whether or not his insurance reimburses the damage plus all the stock, plus x days of lost revenues. Insurance companies by a rule will pay as little as possible.

I don't know if anyone saw but there was a fund going on online a few days after the riots for some 87 year old barber whose shop had been damaged and he had no insurance.