Dealing With the Renegades - Revisited

[LLETSA]

I live on the bloody Angell Town Estate, where do you think the looters come from, Mayfair?

Oh the Angell Town Estate. And the looters just happened to be on that bus.

 

[The39thStep]

.

Anyone interested in a response to the "working class morale " sapping "lumpens" rioting in LA 50 years ago, one that has arguably more to say about last weeks events than the OP in this thread ever could , check out Guy Debords at the time unattributed response to the Watts riots here :

http://www.cddc.vt.edu/sionline/si/decline.html

One of those terribly ambitious articles that 60 years later is frankly embarrasing

 

[love detective]

That's a very good and interesting article
i dont really think i can go whole-heartedly with the original article tho

Given the redline analysis fully endorses the IWCA article - how do you reconcile feeling comfortable with the former but not the later?

 

[Joe Reilly]

they never did though in fairness. id suggest that people are more likely to involve the police these days,

it does point out that is due to a reclassification - rior to NCRS minor injuries were counted as common assault although post NCRS any assault with injury would be categorised as ABH.

it can't be off the charts if there is no statistical precedent, there isnt a chart. id agree it does seem to be a problem at the moment, although in the absence of data its difficult to know how much worse, if at all, it has got. but since its an easily identifiable phenomena that seems a good place to start - how can we address that, can we be more effective than the police, if not is working with the police justified?

see, its getting tricky already

 

[Fedayn]

Given the redline analysis fully endorses the IWCA article - how do you reconcile feeling comfortable with the former but not the later?

presentation, style, content, words used etc. The IWCA article seems to go out of it's way to 'label' and condemn with an almost Blairite mesdsianic zeal (ironic given Blair was so hot on presentation and style). The RL article whilst ostensibly arguiing the same points is, imho, better written and as such less affusive in it's seeming desperation to attack and condemn. Surely, as an organisation that has ritually attacked Left groups for the way they write and articulate, amongst other things the IWCA can take things on the chin about their writing and style can't they?

 

[TopCat]

I was interested in Joe Reilly's assertion that one in four of the arrested rioters was a gang member. I assume that this figure was taken from the Evening Standards reporting this week? Whatever the validity of this police supplied "fact" it certainly made me interested in the numbers of people estimated to be part of gangs in London. I'm staggered by the (estimated) numbers.

 

[frogwoman]

presentation, style, content, words used etc. The IWCA article seems to go out of it's way to 'label' and condemn with an almost Blairite mesdsianic zeal (ironic given Blair was so hot on presentation and style). The RL article whilst ostensibly arguiing the same points is, imho, better written and as such less affusive in it's seeming desperation to attack and condemn. Surely, as an organisation that has ritually attacked Left groups for the way they write and articulate, amongst other things the IWCA can take things on the chin about their writing and style can't they?

Well, what he said really. I think the language used has a big part of it IMO, I admit like other posters to feeling quite uncomfortable with the use of things like "detritus of a failed social experiment" etc.

 

[love detective]

right so we are moving away from a criticism (and disagreement of) the substance & core & essential message of the article itself to the fact that some people don't like the specific language used to express that substance

so it's not the message, it's the way it's delivered?

It should be more polite?

 

[Fedayn]

right so we are moving away from a criticism (and disagreement of) the substance & core & essential message of the article itself to the fact that some people don't like the specific language used to express that substance

so it's not the message, it's the way it's delivered?

It should be more polite?

Yeah that's it?

What was that about predictable responses again?!

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Given that it's addressing a problem that pretty much everyone knows exists and that is spoken about by politicians of all hues including, at length, by Ian Duncan Smith, I would have thought that the language used to talk about such a widely recognised phenomenon is absolutely crucial. In fact I don't see how you can separate the language used by the article from the article's message - it is a part of the article's message.

 

[love detective]

Yeah that's it?

What was that about predictable responses again?!

In your own words

presentation, style, content, words used etc

Don't start greeting when I just regurgitate what you replied

 

[love detective]

Given that it's addressing a problem that pretty much everyone knows exists

Some of the more recent criticisms on here (smokedout etc..) have appeared to put forward the argument that the problem in fact does not exist or is too 'subjective' to actually define and find out whether it does exist

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Some of the more recent criticisms on here (smokedout etc..) have appeared to put forward the argument that the problem in fact does not exist or is too 'subjective' to actually define and find out whether it does exist

That's not how I read smokedout's position. I don't think he is denying the existence of a problem so much as wanting a bit more rigour in identifying exactly what kind of problem it is. Anyway, he can speak for himself. That's certainly my position, however.

 

[love detective]

That's not how I read smokedout's position. I don't think he is denying the existence of a problem so much as wanting a bit more rigour in identifying exactly what kind of problem it is. Anyway, he can speak for himself. That's certainly my position, however.

The comments I was referring to seem fairly straightforward in their meaning to me:-

i think is about personal perception

i'm not convinced there has been a massive increase in what the iwca's piece describes as a lumpen class

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Right, well he's questioning whether this is a new phenomenon and if not whether it is worse now that it was.

Again, I can't speak for smokedout, but it clearly isn't a new problem. Is it worse now than it was? Possibly, as a result of the pretty much permanently high new levels of unemployment that we've seen since 1980. Taking a long view, it certainly isn't worse than Victorian times, but it might be worse than, say, the 1950s. I don't know, though. I'd like to see more evidence of that. For instance, it could be that the size and activity of the 'lumpen' really is just a function of the level of unemployment (that plus the availability of a potentially attractive way of working illegally - namely drug-dealing). Just as you expect burglaries to increase as unemployment increases, so you also expect other forms of anti-social behaviour to increase.

btw I am absolutely not trying to imply any kind of determinism here. Not at all. But place x thousand people in a particular set of social conditions and you can expect y proportion of them to take certain options. That's all. At the same time, every one will be making individual decisions for which they can potentially be held to account. But the children of millionaires don't generally get given asbos. That's not because the children of millionaires are morally superior to the children of the poor.

 

[smokedout]

The comments I was referring to seem fairly straightforward in their meaning to me:-

i think is about personal perception

i'm not convinced there has been a massive increase in what the iwca's piece describes as a lumpen class

pretty straight forward to me too

 

[Fedayn]

In your own words

presentation, style, content, words used etc

Don't start greeting when I just regurgitate what you replied

Who is greeting? I never once mentioned 'polite', what was that about wondering if people are reading the same stuff as you? It is imho badly written, enthusiastically writing about these brutal lumpens in the same damning tones as Blair and Co. To me it doesn't read as well and as politically astute as the RL piece. Politically it's got a better pro-working-class position that some of the hysterical guff written as near paeans to the 'uprising'. But, I don't like the way it's written. Not something you need to get prissy about, but hey ho.

 

[smokedout]

poorly written perhaps as bait, to elicit the response expected and wanted, so that the writer can moan about it

 

[goldenecitrone]

So, is lumpen the new PC term for Chavs then?

 

[frogwoman]

not sure lumpen has ever been pc tbh

 

[love detective]

poorly written perhaps as bait, to elicit the response expected and wanted, so that the writer can moan about it

yeah that was the overriding political purpose of the article

 

[smokedout]

call me a cynic

 

[love detective]

Who is greeting? I never once mentioned 'polite', what was that about wondering if people are reading the same stuff as you? It is imho badly written, enthusiastically writing about these brutal lumpens in the same damning tones as Blair and Co. To me it doesn't read as well and as politically astute as the RL piece. Politically it's got a better pro-working-class position that some of the hysterical guff written as near paeans to the 'uprising'. But, I don't like the way it's written. Not something you need to get prissy about, but hey ho.

fair enough - you don't like the way it's written, you don't like the tone of it

that was my original point to you - you don't seem to disagree with the substance, just the way it's expressed - not something you need to go all rolly eyed about

 

[love detective]

call me a cynic

i thought you were smarter than that for sure

 

[Fedayn]

poorly written perhaps as bait, to elicit the response expected and wanted, so that the writer can moan about it

I doubt it, the article, politically speaking, has a far better outlook than most things written on the riots.

 

[Fedayn]

fair enough - you don't like the way it's written, you don't like the tone of it

that was my original point to you - you don't seem to disagree with the substance, just the way it's expressed - not something you need to go all rolly eyed about

It's too 'black and white' uses language that seems happy to 'divide'. I reckon it coulda been better written, the RL article I think says the same things better.

 

[The39thStep]

So, is lumpen the new PC term for Chavs then?

not one of natures most brightest are you?

 

[The39thStep]

Given that it's addressing a problem that pretty much everyone knows exists and that is spoken about by politicians of all hues including, at length, by Ian Duncan Smith, I would have thought that the language used to talk about such a widely recognised phenomenon is absolutely crucial. In fact I don't see how you can separate the language used by the article from the article's message - it is a part of the article's message.

Duncan-Smith thinks that lumpen anti social criminal elements are a threat to social solidarity in working class areas? Don't think so chum.

 

[littlebabyjesus]

Duncan-Smith thinks that lumpen anti social criminal elements are a threat to social solidarity in working class areas? Don't think so chum.

He wouldn't use those words. He would be more likely to talk about things like social cohesion or 'community values'. It's still talking about the same thing, just from a different perspective.

 

[The39thStep]

He wouldn't use those words. He would be more likely to talk about things like social cohesion or 'community values'. It's still talking about the same thing, just from a different perspective.

Isn't that the point? We are talking about it from an entirely different perspective.