I wanted to add something to the debate and share a couple of things that I came across recently. The first was a letter in last Saturday's Guardian which was originally publisherd in The Spectator on March 30th. It was very anti Brian and was signed by a gentleman who styled himself 'Metropolitan Police (retired)' At first I could not beleive the letter was serious, it made some very bigoted remarks about Brian and said that his behavior 'should not be tolerated in a police constable, let alone the commander of a sink precint of the Met.' The whole of the letter made me furious but what made me especially angry was the 'sink precint' as a description of the Brixton area. It made me wonder if this is a view that is held by some still serving officers, possibly at a senior level. I have come to think that Brian's real 'crime' is that he is succsessful and that he and his officers have made life unpleasant for those involved in hard drugs, and they have moved to other areas like Islington, Chelsea and god forbid Westminster ! There have been a number of high profile muggings recently (Angela Ripon etc.) and if areas of London like Brixton are considered sinks, and the people in them written off as of being of little worth compared to those who live in the more 'civilised' parts of London, then what is happening to Brian seems to me to take on a more sinister aspect. I have lived in SW9 for may years and I love Brixton. It's a wonderful place, sure it has it's problems, but what inner city does not.
The other thing that made me think was a program on Channel 4 called 'Unreported Britain'. It was about 3 teenage boys who lived in Brixton and their views on why young people turn to crime. What struck me was how many single parent families there seem to be, with mothers struggling to bring up their children alone, and how without fathers many of the young people have no role models to look up to other than drug dealers. The drug dealers are admired because of the money they have, and the ability it gives them to buy all the symbols that mark them out a special i.e. clothes, cars, gold chains etc. It seemed to me that the police officers at Brixton by targeting dealers may at least help break a self perpetuating circle. But how do you deal with the materialistic nature of our society where people are judged by what they own or can buy, rather than their worth as a human being. One of the young guys interviewed on the program made the point that not all teenagers were the same and many were ambitious, hard working, and law abiding. But nobody wants to write about that. Nobody seems to want to mention the warm, friendly, inspiring, creative, colourful and caring Brixton and its residents.
Then as we all know Electric Avenue on a Saturday morning is just like a war zone - Yeah right.
