my insurance goes up whatever happens

I don't believe shooting people is the answer to any issue / problem (unless they shoot first)

Its fairly common to have a riot exclusion in retail insurance stuff. Some will be insured, most I fear won't.

"Understanding why this happened is different to justifying it" on sky news - Good point, that.

Papers are reporting that Met must legally pay compensation from reserves. It'll still come from us eventually, of course, but the route is different.

That's good.

 

Mikee: I told Skynews to say that, as per my post earlier in this thread.

Sky news told me to tell you there's been sunshine across the UK today but it's a very different story tomorrow- quite wet and very windy.

 

Some very heavy bursts of rain, temperatures down to 9-14. There will be a gusty wind developing.

 

That's it from me, bye for now.

Tell Skynews to go suck a bag of dicks.

Better not be over Birmingham

http://www.okmagazine.com/2011/08/hulk-hogan-talks-london-riots-on-bbc-radio-ill-body-slam-the-youth/

That's the spirit Hulk Hogan

Again with good light/bad light! Who cares? I think burning down other peoples' shit shows them in a pretty bad light to start with but, again, that's not the point.

Also what Milko said.

Guns are fun, that's for sure. But I don't want people here owning guns. But then we don't have a history and culture of needing/using them to survive so it's hardly surprising. I think Manthorp summed it up well. But I'll add that it's a real shame that gun control is a partisan issue over there, it pushes the whole of your politics to the right by forcing people who only agree with Republicans on gun control to vote that way.

As for the fun thing... I'm pretty sure detonating nuclear devices would be fun and the media informs me that small ones can be made with household items. I can perfectly well imagine a culture where their use was culturally and historically ingrained. I wouldn't want one though, and I don't want other people having them. That's pretty much how guns look to us.

A gun and nuclear weapon are a pretty far stretch man.

But that's kind of the point I was trying to make. Guns don't just need to be used as a weapon they can be a deterrent as well. Kind of like the arms races were in the cold ward days.

If you know someone has a weapon, be it a gun or bomb you would be less likely to do something to that person compared to the person you were sure didn't have one.

Nope, I'd go for the one with the weapon, because:

1) if I didn't he might pull the weapon on me when I went for the other guy

2) once I beat him, I'd then have a weapon to use on the other guy

It's not really a far stretch for us. I mean gun to us is like nuclear device (I mean just a little one, like the battlefield nukes we all deny using in every modern conflict despite the suspicious radiation levels near the sites of explosions which look very much like small nukes) to you.

A gun's (handguns and assault weapons) only purpose is killing people. We don't like that, we just have an cultural block against things like that. I'd rather not go out each day with a tool solely designed for killing people because of what that would say about me. The selfishness/self-centredness that would represent. Historically we're less individualistic and a bit more communally minded over here and I think that matters too.

It's different over there - I also think the sneering attitude some anti-gun people have towards those who like guns is disgusting. We have to accept that it's a cultural thing and culture is a powerful thing.

But yeah, it's exactly like the arms race. I mean, if I'm in a fight and I'm in a situation where I value my safety over that of the person attacking me then if they have fists I want a knife/stick. If they have a knife I want a gun. But when everyone has a gun we're all just hoping no one shoots.



I'd rather they be less likely to do something because their culture dictates that hurting people is a bad thing to do. If we've lost that then I don't really think it matters what they come at me with. I still believe that hurting people is bad so I'd rather not be tooled up to hurt people.

Yeah all good points. And of course you hope to never have to use it. We've been through that before, you and I.

I'm very curious to see the final outcome of all of this.

Hmm, and I don't know that owning a gun makes me self centered. I certainly makes me feel like a provider or protector if need be.

Peter they'd just laugh at you and tell you to get a hair cut.

I don't mean self-centred in the every day way. I mean culturally. Your whole culture is about individual rights, individual freedoms, individual protections and private property. Your constitution defines a man as a legal entity with individual rights rather than a social entity with social rights and responsibilities. European culture is more on the social side, rights are defined more (up until very recently) from a social rather than individual perspective.

In America the hope is that if everyone takes care of themselves (and families) then everyone will be taken care of. Whereas in Europe it's more if everyone takes care of society then everyone will be taken care of. I'm not saying this is universally so but that was the general tone of continental vs. american liberal thinking in the 1700s when we were all becoming modern nations and I think it has informed our cultures and trickled down to colour how we think about these things.

Gotcha and agree 100%. If there weren't differences between us because of this it would be scary.

I think I am - I am (and have been) a lot more concerned about the things that might've led to this situation rather than the situation itself, but since it's now got to this point then shouldn't the response be firmer and stop it in its tracks, and then (ideally) really try to deal with the causes? As you said, what caused this is a slightly separate matter but the participants' actions are not excusable.