Riot going on now in Bristol - Stokes Croft
- Thread starter BigTom
- Start date
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
I so wish that I could have got a pic of the line of riot police facing down Stokes Croft directly beneath this at one stage last night:
you'll get your chance, i'm sure
taffboy gwyrdd
Embrace the confusion!
Substantive first hand account here, apols if we had this already.
http://bristol.indymedia.org/article/704197
http://bristol.indymedia.org/article/704197
http://thecommune.co.uk/2011/04/22/the-first-funky-riot-in-bristol/
not read it yet but presume the funky bit is in reference to the saxamaphone
That's very good and a good summary of the varied groups who live around here and who were all represented to some extent last night
There are some inaccuracies in that both in terms of events (eg there was only one abandoned cop vehicle) and also geography. He refers to 'Stokes Croft High Street' - Stokes Croft IS the name of the road. The areas in question are Kingsdown on the western side of the road and St Pauls on the eastern side
taffboy gwyrdd
Embrace the confusion!
A Facebook Post giving some back story and retort to some predictable conservative critique:
I'm from there and I can tell you that literally every possible means of making it difficult for Tescos to succeed in ruining one of the most culturally exciting areas of Bristol has been pursued. From bombarding the council with thousands of letters, to squatting the property Tesco were planning on occupying. Since it has opened there have been regular cake stalls outside for non-customers providing information on why Tesco are so awful and why the small local business which it will ruin are better.
While it is true that it is a shame people choose to shop in supermarkets, you must admit we are not left with much choice. For example, within a mile or two of the Tescos we are discussing there are also: two other small Tesco stores and a huge one, two medium sized somerfield/co-ops, a co-op petrol station, two Sainsbury's, and a Spar. To give a bit of history to the Stokes Croft area, for years it was blighted by huge, empty buildings which were falling apart but which people were forbidden from doing anything with by their owners. There has also been a lot of homelessness, drug addiction problems in the area, too. The Bristol homeless medical service is right near by for a reason. However, a few years ago people began squatting some of these buildings, turning them into art galleries, dance and art studios, meeting spaces, cafes, and, of course, places to live.
It is these groups who have run the anti-Tesco campaign. The "consultation" process was a sham. I have to agree with Steve, that it the nature of these things. Tesco look set to threaten and corrupt what has been one of the most exciting, well-meaning and beautiful community projects I've seen. Check it out: http://www.prsc.org.uk/
The police have always sided with Tesco throughout the campaign. Finally, they tried to break in to one of the squats nearby and people got understandably pissed off, particularly since in the confusion it was not clear what was going on.(What do the police expect when they turn up in droves to kick people out of their homes?) As far as I can tell very little of the property of innocent people has been damaged, unless we think Tesco are innocent. Violence is always a shame, but in thise case, as usual where the police are involved, it was not one sided. It must also be seen in the context of a wider attack on innocent people, not by rioters but by police-and-state-backed-corporations.
I'm from there and I can tell you that literally every possible means of making it difficult for Tescos to succeed in ruining one of the most culturally exciting areas of Bristol has been pursued. From bombarding the council with thousands of letters, to squatting the property Tesco were planning on occupying. Since it has opened there have been regular cake stalls outside for non-customers providing information on why Tesco are so awful and why the small local business which it will ruin are better.
While it is true that it is a shame people choose to shop in supermarkets, you must admit we are not left with much choice. For example, within a mile or two of the Tescos we are discussing there are also: two other small Tesco stores and a huge one, two medium sized somerfield/co-ops, a co-op petrol station, two Sainsbury's, and a Spar. To give a bit of history to the Stokes Croft area, for years it was blighted by huge, empty buildings which were falling apart but which people were forbidden from doing anything with by their owners. There has also been a lot of homelessness, drug addiction problems in the area, too. The Bristol homeless medical service is right near by for a reason. However, a few years ago people began squatting some of these buildings, turning them into art galleries, dance and art studios, meeting spaces, cafes, and, of course, places to live.
It is these groups who have run the anti-Tesco campaign. The "consultation" process was a sham. I have to agree with Steve, that it the nature of these things. Tesco look set to threaten and corrupt what has been one of the most exciting, well-meaning and beautiful community projects I've seen. Check it out: http://www.prsc.org.uk/
The police have always sided with Tesco throughout the campaign. Finally, they tried to break in to one of the squats nearby and people got understandably pissed off, particularly since in the confusion it was not clear what was going on.(What do the police expect when they turn up in droves to kick people out of their homes?) As far as I can tell very little of the property of innocent people has been damaged, unless we think Tesco are innocent. Violence is always a shame, but in thise case, as usual where the police are involved, it was not one sided. It must also be seen in the context of a wider attack on innocent people, not by rioters but by police-and-state-backed-corporations.
Divisive Cotton
Now I just have my toy soldiers
Why were they trying to clear the place at 9pm in the evening? They usually do it first thing in the morning
Excellent summary, both of the character of the area and the No Tesco campaign from start to its current position
Another small point that needs to be made to those who don't know the area - Stokes Croft lies at the bottom of one of the main routes into the city centre from the affluent northern suburbs. Literally thousands of people will commute in and out of the city every day through Stokes Croft meaning that the area is crucial to many people's image of the city. Currently this means they see an area which is simultaneously scruffy and down at heel but also full of a life and community spirit which is not in tune with the way the city fathers would like people to view Bristol. The sanitisation of the area is an issue which has troubled planners for years. It looks very much to me as though those sanitisation efforts have just been cranked up a few notches.
Although I have several issues with what is reported in The Guardian (not least the continuing focus on Tesco and Tesco alone being the cause of the riot), I am somewhat relieved at what Claire Milne from the No Tesco campaign is quoted as saying:
Not exactly an endorsement, but given the pressure that's usually heaped on to condemn events like these, it's a pleasant surprise to find what amounts to a shrug of the shoulders and a 'told you so'
Not exactly an endorsement, but given the pressure that's usually heaped on to condemn events like these, it's a pleasant surprise to find what amounts to a shrug of the shoulders and a 'told you so'
ViolentPanda
Hardly getting over it.
BigTom
Well-Known Member
Yeah, I'm not from Bristol but plenty of friends from/live there and Stokes Croft is somewhere I know from walking through it and eating around there with my friends.. very much a place I felt made Bristol feel like somewhere I might want to live if I ever felt like I needed to get out of brum.
BigTom
Well-Known Member
http://foolishfires.tumblr.com/post/4835013618
another account, seems similar in tone to that facebook one that Taffboy posted up
another account, seems similar in tone to that facebook one that Taffboy posted up
Thora
Differently Ethical
ddraig
kicking against the pricks...
lovely comments here
http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/news...-targeted/article-3479322-detail/article.html
are you DogWalker Geri?
http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/news...-targeted/article-3479322-detail/article.html
are you DogWalker Geri?
Mr.Bishie
pickled egg
Via Twitter - Interviewing chief constable of A&S police. I wonder if he saw the sign?
http://twitpic.com/4nz90a
http://twitpic.com/4nz90a
JHE
.
All local residents, many local residents or just some rather odd local residents and their chums from Montpelier? Is there any reason to think the opponents of Tesco are representative of people in the area?
It would be good to have more democracy in planning decisions - perhaps by means of referendum in the relevant ward or wards.
From that article:
Roger Cole, who ran an organic food shop in Stokes Croft, said: "A lot of people feel we should protest until Tesco goes away. This campaign is already costing Tesco a fortune coming here in the teeth of such opposition, and hopefully sooner or later they will get fed up."
Ah, a petit bourgeois purveyor of crank food fails to compete effectively against a large company and so turns to vandalism as a business strategy! Great!
There's another Tesco Express opening soon just five minutes from where I live. I notice it every day on my way to work. When I see it I don't feel like those young rioters on Stokes Croft. On the contrary, I think: (i) some much-needed jobs will be created, (ii) it's good that the building which was empty and delapidated is now being done up and used and (iii) I bet the prices will be better in Tesco Express than in the mini-markets on the same road against which the new Tesco Express will be competing.
butchersapron
Bring back hanging
Fantastic - Laurie Penny is writing about this for the New Statesman 
agricola
a genuine importer of owls
It does amaze me how many people who might describe themselves as capitalists are in favour of what Tesco have been doing these past ten years, which is a pretty obvious and rather evil attack on various types of small businesses up and down the country, using the advantages that their size, their tax avoidance and the capacity they have to "influence" local and national (and even international) politics and politicians, allows them to get away with.
Lets face it, the people who will directly lose out by that store opening (and others like it) are the people who are actually working hard, running their own businesses, actually creating local jobs in the community, trying to better themselves - in short doing everything that this coalition insists we should all be doing more of, if only we werent all smackhead fatties drinking tins of special brew.
Geri
wasn't born to follow
Fantastic - Laurie Penny is writing about this for the New Statesman
Maybe she was there with Kerry McCarthy.
JHE
.
The companies against which Tesco will be competing around here, apart from other big retailers like ASDA, are the overgrown corner shops sometimes called mini-markets. If any of them fail as a result of the creation of the new Tesco there will probably still be a net gain in jobs and, though I don't suppose Tesco is a great employer, I doubt it is as bad as the crooks who run the mini-market competition.
It is rather sad that more than a century and a half after the Communist Manifesto was published some would-be socialists still haven't learned not to devote themselves to the interests of small businessmen. Where are the Marxists when they are needed to point out the petit bourgois nature of this anti-big supermarket stuff?
It is rather sad that more than a century and a half after the Communist Manifesto was published some would-be socialists still haven't learned not to devote themselves to the interests of small businessmen. Where are the Marxists when they are needed to point out the petit bourgois nature of this anti-big supermarket stuff?
BigTom
Well-Known Member
http://bristol.indymedia.org.uk/article/702451
Letter here says that there were 2,500 complaints and in a survey 93% said they didn't want tescos. Now I've got no idea about the provenance of said survey and I've not dug around on the PRSC site to try to find out more because I can't be arsed.
Somewhere else saw that the planning committee voted 3-3 and the chair got the casting vote noted that there would probably be an appeal and BCC would have to pay the costs for that, and then voted for tesco....
I'm not from Bristol, I don't live there. My feeling from the times I went down to see friends who do live there was that it was pretty well all the residents of Stokes Croft and beyond, the general feeling was that there was no need for a tescos there as there were already two near by, and a sainsburies down the road, that Stokes Croft is being gentrified and in doing so will lose what makes it an asset to Bristol, the tescos site was squatted with a social centre so it was being used before tesco moved in.
I was well aware of the campaign to stop tesco - which ran for two years I think - even though my connections with that area are pretty loose.
On the thing about jobs, tesco (and indeed supermarkets generally) cost more jobs than they create and move money out of the local economy..
re: jobs:
re: prices:
from http://brightgreenscotland.org/index.php/2011/04/10-facts-about-tesco/
My browser is giving me grief trying to open the PDF sources that are linked to in that article
ericjarvis
give a feck for the feckless
So far as I am aware not one single Tesco Express that I know of replaced an empty shop, they were ALL independent shops that Tesco bought up. I'm sure they have built some on empty sites, but it doesn't seem to be the norm. So what actually happens in most cases is that NO jobs are created. No new resources come into the local community. However the choices of local people are reduced still further.
Judging by much of the comment elseweb on this there seem to be a huge number of people who basically condemn anyone who differs from them in any way, and who would be perfectly happy with no choice at all provided everything they see is branded with a logo they recognise from TV, and nobody is asking them to do anything difficult such as thinking.
Judging by much of the comment elseweb on this there seem to be a huge number of people who basically condemn anyone who differs from them in any way, and who would be perfectly happy with no choice at all provided everything they see is branded with a logo they recognise from TV, and nobody is asking them to do anything difficult such as thinking.
Similar threads
- Poll
