The Daily Mail writes...
The depressing growth of people with substance dependency on the streets of Brixton
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BristolEcho
Well-Known Member
How about not calling people "junkies"?
Er, thats the common parlance amongst people I know who are junkies
What does that even mean?
it means it reads like something you'd see on the Daily Mail website. slagging off area + wasn't like this in the good old days + glad I don't live there anymore.
WTF? I lived in Brixton for 20+ years. When I first moved there it was a wonderful community. I imagine the Mail response would be quite the opposite, which is 'oh I hear its got so much better in recent years' which you hear from white middle class colleagues.
edit: should add i lived with two self-confessed 'junkies' for much of that time, had to go pick up their methadone from brighton terrace quite often. grow up.
A380
How do I change this 'custom title' thing then?
Bang to rights. I liked their sub Captain Mainwering response about privacy after they were found to be as guilty as a puppy next to a pile of poo.
nogojones
spelling is overrated
Well spend your bonus in locally established restaurants and bars instead
jimbarkanoodle
Well-Known Member
Yeah, complete bullshit that it was 3 different people. I also doubt that in a group of people wanting to do something positive about their community they would disregard and ostracise someone due to race and class in an area such as Brixton which as we know is one of the most multicultural areas of London with a large working class population. Glad editor called them out.
It's rare I agree with pbsmooth but yeah, what a moved to the suburbs/home counties piece of shit comment.
Lol. Yep, I'm living in leafy Surrey now riding my lawnmower around my estate
(im in an area of east london which does have the feel of brixton 20 years ago)
Then you should know that what you described is not the majority of Brixton with it's long term committed communities from many different backgrounds.Lol. Yep, I'm living in leafy Surrey now riding my lawnmower around my estate
(im in an area of east london which does have the feel of brixton 20 years ago)
editor
hiraethified
If I had to leave Brixton, I'd probably be drawn to supposed 'dumps' like New Cross and Deptford because they had that same vibe for me.
Mumbles274
running from law and the press and the parents
While I can't attest to what Labour would do if they got into power. When they got into power before the money they pumped into social care saw drug services expand hugely. People were employed as drug workers across harm reduction, CJ and prescribing and while it didnt solve it all, there was a few years in the early 2000s where there looked like some evidence based hope. That's all been eroded under this government with cuts since 2008 year on year, with contacts being given to the lowest bidder. It's a fucking shit show, and it's not just Brixton.
RevolutionSound
Well-Known Member
Tbf, there has been an injection of money since the Dame Carol Black report. Too little too late though.
Mumbles274
running from law and the press and the parents
It's like me stealing £100 off you and then giving you a fiver
Gramsci
Well-Known Member
My local community leader in this video she made says its all about crack users ( her term) and the violence associated with them. That this is worse than ever before.
Well. I did live in Brixton a long time and still go through it regularly.
There was a serious issue years ago. The worst I found was the addicts tipping our bins on pavement to find anything worth selling. I did ask them to stop. I've never had physical violence from people who clearly have drug problems in time I was in Brixton. They were in such a sorry state they were not capable of anything that serious.
I am a reasonably fit male. Even if not a spring chicken. So less likely to feel intimidated.
My experience over years was that Police would push the drug addicts out of central Brixton and the problem would then be pushed to local estates. That is what people living on the big estates told me. The problem was pushed elsewhere for a while.
The other issue is not the drug users ( crack addicts) being intimidating or violent but the problem is the people hanging about selling drugs. Had this problem at Brixton Rec entrance recently. And the shops underneath, They have no respect and when asked to move do not. As this is place where people with children go.
I'm not comfortable with view that puts this all on "crack addicts" as being violent.
On way back home from Brixton tube was several times asked for money. One is person I see regularly. Whilst some are a bit insistent most are not.
I'm not comfortable with just pinning this all on addicts as the video does.
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Rushy
basically a scrotum
Today - The Today Debate: Are we failing victims of anti-social behaviour? - The Today Debate: Are we failing victims of anti-social behaviour? - BBC Sounds
Mishal Husain is joined by a panel of guests for the Today Debate.
www.bbc.co.uk
Worth a listen.
Not quite sure why we need to see someone’s bum but a write up along the lines of this thread.
southwarknews.co.uk
Brixton ‘twenty times worse’ than ’24-hour crack supermarket’ of the early 2000s, locals warn
Brixton is gripped by a drug-fuelled crime wave “twenty times worse” than the “24-hour crack supermarket” of the noughties, locals
southwarknews.co.uk
story
Changing the facts
I regularly walk down that street. It's a small group of regular street users who gather there daily.
It's bad but it's not anything like as terrible as that article suggests. I lived in downtown Brixton for many years til 2012 when I moved up the Hill. When the Windrush Square development was going on the dealers and users moved from there into our street. We had dealers and users on our doorstep for a while.
There were plenty of incidents (including defecation, open daytime drug use, finding a dealers stash of rocks hidden in my front garden, and a kitchen knife) but nothing that made me feel personally besieged or attacked or in danger. Even when they quarreled outside my front door I didn't feel victimised. I just asked them to move and they did.
My point is that I really don't think it's worse than it was. I think the Brixton demographic has changed, expectations and attitudes have changed, and the way the area policed may have changed.
That crack down on crack houses thing led to several house raids and gun sieges in my street and nearby. Those were far more disruptive to my daily life than the drug stuff was.
I'm not defending the drug use stuff. But it's stupid to think that it will magically go away if there are more cops around.
Back then, I spoke to the cops pretty frequently. The drug stuff in the street did annoy me, because it was constant and there didn't seem to be any policing at all at all. They told me they couldn't do anything because
- It was the busiest ward in the UK, with not enough police or funding
-arresting rarely led to conviction and even when it did, they were back on the street in no time, using&dealing exactly as before.
They said they policed the ward like a clock face: this section got attention for a while, then the next section, then the next til they were back at the beginning again. It gave each area a break for a while. And the street crime just moved on to the next patch, just as the cops did, round the same circuit.
No idea if this was true, or if so if it's still the case.
Street users and dealers are part of our society and our community. Until/unless the problems and issues are sorted out at the grass roots level they'll always be with us. That's a far deeper more fundamental issue than just policing the way it impacts on homeowners. Once again, property is the thing that motivates action.
And incidentally, whenever I've had reason to interact with these users (either on Rushcroft Rd or on Windrush Sq or round the back of the St Matthew's church : it's the same people) they've been polite and not problematic at all.
I'm not romanticising or downplaying it. It's not great, and when I had to deal with it I didn't like it. I'm saying it's not the dire dreadful disaster suggested in that article.
It's bad but it's not anything like as terrible as that article suggests. I lived in downtown Brixton for many years til 2012 when I moved up the Hill. When the Windrush Square development was going on the dealers and users moved from there into our street. We had dealers and users on our doorstep for a while.
There were plenty of incidents (including defecation, open daytime drug use, finding a dealers stash of rocks hidden in my front garden, and a kitchen knife) but nothing that made me feel personally besieged or attacked or in danger. Even when they quarreled outside my front door I didn't feel victimised. I just asked them to move and they did.
My point is that I really don't think it's worse than it was. I think the Brixton demographic has changed, expectations and attitudes have changed, and the way the area policed may have changed.
That crack down on crack houses thing led to several house raids and gun sieges in my street and nearby. Those were far more disruptive to my daily life than the drug stuff was.
I'm not defending the drug use stuff. But it's stupid to think that it will magically go away if there are more cops around.
Back then, I spoke to the cops pretty frequently. The drug stuff in the street did annoy me, because it was constant and there didn't seem to be any policing at all at all. They told me they couldn't do anything because
- It was the busiest ward in the UK, with not enough police or funding
-arresting rarely led to conviction and even when it did, they were back on the street in no time, using&dealing exactly as before.
They said they policed the ward like a clock face: this section got attention for a while, then the next section, then the next til they were back at the beginning again. It gave each area a break for a while. And the street crime just moved on to the next patch, just as the cops did, round the same circuit.
No idea if this was true, or if so if it's still the case.
Street users and dealers are part of our society and our community. Until/unless the problems and issues are sorted out at the grass roots level they'll always be with us. That's a far deeper more fundamental issue than just policing the way it impacts on homeowners. Once again, property is the thing that motivates action.
And incidentally, whenever I've had reason to interact with these users (either on Rushcroft Rd or on Windrush Sq or round the back of the St Matthew's church : it's the same people) they've been polite and not problematic at all.
I'm not romanticising or downplaying it. It's not great, and when I had to deal with it I didn't like it. I'm saying it's not the dire dreadful disaster suggested in that article.
story
Changing the facts
Something that does seem worse is the small but not-zero number of drug zombies I've seen in central Brixton. Don't know if it's spice or fentanyl or tranq or whatever.
But again, my issue here isn't about how it impacts on me or anyone else seeing it (they're not on main thoroughfares obvs) but rather the implications for those caught up in the darkness of self obliteration.
But again, my issue here isn't about how it impacts on me or anyone else seeing it (they're not on main thoroughfares obvs) but rather the implications for those caught up in the darkness of self obliteration.
A380
How do I change this 'custom title' thing then?
This ^^^
You can't police your way out of a public health issue. All the police can do about street drug use and street drinking is move it around to give other people living in the area a bit of respite every now and again. But, with a few notable exceptions here and there clinging on to their funding by their finger tips, this seems to be all we are doing as a society now.
story
Changing the facts
By the way, for context:
Those Rushcroft Road flats were squats, social housing and long term tenants on rents they could afford. Then the council sold on every single property to private investor(s) and the flats were done up and sold on.
Locals will remember how that made some of our friends etc homeless after long tenure or secure squats.
Those Rushcroft Road flats were squats, social housing and long term tenants on rents they could afford. Then the council sold on every single property to private investor(s) and the flats were done up and sold on.
Locals will remember how that made some of our friends etc homeless after long tenure or secure squats.
story
Changing the facts
The evictions were nasty
www.google.com
www.google.com
www.vice.com
brixtonblog.com
www.google.com
Former squats on Brixton’s Rushcroft Road now on the market for up to £3,000 per month
The Evening Standard is reporting that some of the former squats on Rushcroft Road in central Brixton are now on the market for a spectacularly unaffordable £3,000 per month. The mansion blocks wer…
www.google.com
After the evictions. A walk down Rushcroft Road, Brixton
After the sickening violence of the mass evictions this morning, there was a strange calm in Rushcroft Road late this afternoon.
www.google.com
The Truth Behind the Battle for London's Housing
Foreign sheikhs, angry squatters, and impoverished councils all play a part in the mess that has become London's housing market. Not only is it difficult to access social housing, but a new report suggests that rent is now unaffordable for two thirds...
www.vice.com
Violent scenes in Rushcroft road as up to 75 squatters evicted: Video and pictures
Violent scenes erupted in central Brixton today as dozens of bailiffs moved in to forcibly evict squatters from their homes in Rushcroft Road. Up to 75 people removed from six blocks of flats. The video below captures the moment outside Clarence House when about 20 bailiffs cleared protestors to
brixtonblog.com
Photo report – Police and High Court Enforcement Officers evict Rushcroft Road squats in Brixton, Monday 15th July 2013
This morning, a large operation involving the the police and High Court Enforcement Officers saw around 75 residents being evicted from their homes in Rushcroft Road, central Brixton. Here’s …
www.google.com
editor
hiraethified
It's definitely the grimmest it's been in a long while but trying to draw up comparisons with 22 years ago seems a pointless exercise,
Drug use has definitely become more open in central Brixton - I see some thoroughly depressing sights in the early hours - but things are nowhere as bad on my estate as they used to be. My block once had two crack houses and there were so many people injecting heroin outside that they put 'sharps boxes' on the wall by the garages.
They sold most but not all. They kept at least one of the Victorian blocks for social rent. Some of the blocks contain long-term residents ie. 30+ years that bought their leaseholds many, many years ago when they were mega-cheap.
but is that one part of the story? tighter control of property leads to more open street drug use.
story
Changing the facts
This is kinda my point. It’s different but not necessarily worse. IMO.
When Paddick was the local chief, remember that experiment with allowing cannabis dealing to be more visible? So the police could (theoretically) concentrate on the harder stuff? There was a lot of complex fall-out from that. For instance we had an increase in crack and heroin users selling fake grass in the street to finance their own habit, and consequently loads of people coming in from elsewhere to buy street deals of cannabis, which increased street dealing. You’d be hearing them all singing their wares all the way along the street around the Tube station.
And my observation and impression at the time was that crack and heroin kinda moved into the space vacated by more secretive weed dealing and became more obvious, more open. At least it did to me.
But they did have crack houses and empty properties back then, in which to use, so weren’t forced onto the street. Gentrification has taken away those places, forcing the users onto the streets.
We also had some half way houses in central Brixton, which no longer exist (or at least much reduced in number). Inevitably, some of the tenants were using while living there.
Another thing that may have caused some changes is that some youngsters now disdain and eschew drug use. They don’t even drink. Obvs this isn’t universal, but where in the past it would be super-unusual for a young’un to refuse drugs, it’s more common now.
I’m not saying it’s not grim editor and I may have a different understanding now that I’m not living in downtown Brixton, but to my eye it doesn’t seem worse, although it does seem different.
