Atherton Online

Well I'm sure none of us thought that on the night of Saturday 6th August rioting would begin in the Tottenham area of our Capital City & then gradually cause complete devastation across other areas of the country and spreading to our very own city of Manchester.
All starting after the shooting of Mark Duggan on the 4th August by a police officer, these English City widespread riots have been something which has severely rocked and winded towns and cities a like as well as the community within them. The fact that they seemingly began and started from out of the blue led to eventual shock and utter chaos throughout numerous communities. There has been no official announcement or statement to exactly why Mark Duggan was shot by the police on that night & I suspect nothing shall be heard until the current police enquiry surrounding the incident gets resolved. There are many unanswered questions by the MET police at this stage and I just cannot help thinking that the Police are not helping themselves in trying to rebuild the public man's trust and trying to put an end to any animosity which is facing them. I suspect the Police and the Government are now looking back at that faithful night and already coming up with things of how they could have done a much better job on that night... but the fact that remains what happened, happened. Whether they are labelling it an "Unfortunate mistake" an "accident" or otherwise & quite frankly they will have had no idea what was to break out just 2 days after that tragic Thursday night.

On the night that the Tottenham Riots began I can wholeheartedly understand the police when they said that they were "not prepared" for an incident of that sort. After all it isn't a regular occurrence in our country that downright troublemakers and stereotypical youths begin to go on the rampage. I was listening to the radio on that night, all of a sudden the regular programming was interrupted to bring some Breaking News in regards to a fire which had started and was causing the clear problems in regards to the traffic flow and the area needed to be closed. Within 60 short minutes of that first story breaking, the situation had escalated from one fire to around 6, reports of trouble, vandalism, violence all began to follow each other. One thing after another. It was completely unexpected. There was no indication to just how much the situation would eventually worsen and quite frankly looking back to what actually did happen is it any wonder the police were not prepared? I hear arguments from others stating that the police "should be ready for anything" but realistically this just wasn't the norm and we are NOT Iran. That being said that is were my sympathy begins and ends with the Metropolitan Police. The way the situation was handled from there on after was absolutely disgraceful and not only embarrassed us to the rest of the world but made me and I'm sure many others embarrassed again to be British! It took all the proudness away from The Royal Wedding in just a matter of seconds from when I saw a Police Officer standing just a few yards away from a disgraceful Lout and allowing him to loot a shop window right infront of him without taking any action what so ever. The Police undoubtedly showed themselves up and it proved to us all that this Country is in what can only be described as a "shambolic state" and quite frankly makes me nervous in knowing that I feel that The Police cannot protect me or anybody else in any way shape or form. They have no Emergency plans other than getting out a Riot shield and Baton for goodness sake! No sign of guns in any form (Stun gun or otherwise) and not that I am trying to turn the situation into some fictitious action movie but the reality is there was zero protection for anybody. What they NEEDED was again, Guns, the Army needed to be involved & also Water Cannons. Just something which showed us, the public that they had some form of protection and weaponry, anything. Looking back on events, were any of those used? no! they didn't want the Army involved because it "wasn't serious enough" and in order to use the Water Cannon they needed "24 hours notice!" absolutely ridiculous. This in the meantime whilst the flames were getting increasingly higher, the violence was worsening & the looting increasing.

A building is burnt down to the ground during the London riots

After the initial night of chaos, again putting the blame on the police they simply should have been more prepared in their own area. Instead they sent thousands of police officers into Tottenham, forgetting that their own town could be in danger and before you know it you have the trouble in the next London town of Ealing which was completely ram raided, then soon to be followed by Birmingham. More police had to then be sent to those areas, even some which had just been sent to Tottenham a matter of hours ago, complete unorganised chaos and that's just within the police force! The realistic severity with the London aspect of the riots is that towns and cities alike were completely stripped away... with long lasting, well established businesses also going up in a fog of bitter smoke & the only thing worth mentioning at the end of it all is the amazing community spirit. The day after the Ealing riots took place for example, the community were sweeping the streets and trying their best to repair the damage because those people have to live in the area and it really did mean something to them.

Manchester was the city to be hit on the Tuesday 9th August and in comparison to events in London, I consider ourselves to have got off surprisingly well. Trouble started to brew in Salford, with a gathering of youths, cars set on fire, a library, the shopping precinct and soon we began to see the first pictures of our own city riots unfold on the television. Manchester was the next to be hit which came as no surprise to many especially some people who were in the centre at the time and on the social networking site Twitter with the general consensus being that they could tell things where "about to kick off!" they weren't far wrong there either, the Metrolink service was stopped, shops were ram raided, the Arndale Centre was broken into & the most serious incident yet quite light compared to what London saw, being Manchester's branch of Miss Selfridge set alight.

The unintelligent little individual who was responsible for the above has luckily been charged but seeing our local city centre being turned into what can only be described as a "war zone" for a night was not only "disgraceful" and "unbelievable" but also "worrying" and for use of a better word... "shocking!"

I was on Twitter throughout the night and I was heartfelt to see that everybody within the Manchester community and elsewhere who were tweeting had the same opinion of the stupid people who were committing these crimes. That of them being utter trouble making little so and so's. I mean for goodness sake an 11 year old Boy in Essex was caught for being involved in a ram raid in the Essex branch of Debenhams! Ladies & Gentleman I introduce you to the next generation of our society. I found it no shock at all that when this very stupid little boy was on Television camera's coming out of court and then told the nation to simply " **** Off!" along with his Mother! who looked just as unintelligent at her age of I'm guessing 40 odd. Also Surprise Surprise no sign of the father... and this is more than likely the case with ALL of the looters from the raids. Broken Family's with their parents (more than likely just the mother) but overall the parents could not give a Four X about them nor what devastation they caused across Britain's streets. I come from a "Broken Family" myself and I would never think of doing such a thing, it just beggars believe that we live in a world with people of this sort whose brains are usually downstairs rather than in their head... or in-fact none at all!

I can only end by saying what I'm sure many others are thinking. "I hope this is the end!" thousands of people have been arrested for their part in the week's events which rocked the country and I can only hope that all caught to be involved are charged with the key thrown away and if there is no prison space left then get them flown out to Iraq and places alike and drop them from a great height.

I welcome you all to 21st Century Britain!