There are limits. Big-shouldered sequin jackets *shiver!*
I swear, it's ridiculous. Massive recession, energy crisis, Conservative government cutting public projects at the same time as reducing policing (because no one has ever been upset by hard times in the past), racial elements to the thuggery, a police mistake that could be a genuine mistake but made grim by the lack of response ... I mean, who could have imagined any of this could go bad?
I am beginning to contemplating setting a point at which I pack up and get the fuck out of here. The now-canned but at-one-point-imminent Identity Card BS had me contemplating my options, but that was mostly a matter of principle.
This is not exactly just up the road from me, like for a lot of other people, but it's still making me question my commitment to sparklemotion staying here.
OMG YES! There is a radio station in town here that does an all 80s weekend and they say like it something super special. Don't they know that the only thing good about hearing a song from the 80s is the "Wow I haven't heard that in years!" Factor, which is completely lost if it's heard every effing weekend. Worse, they'll play it in regular rotation during the week too. Drives me bananas. /rant
If it gets rid of flares, hipster-cut jeans with attendant muffin tops, highly dodgy fluffy hedghog haircuts and pseudo-beehives, and polyester dresses and shirts in industrial green, goose shit yellow and pumpkin orange prints, I'm all for living in the 80s for the rest of my life. Mind you, I reserve the right to point and laugh at shoulder pads, the 80s equivalent to stuffing your bra in my opinion.
How can you malign a decade that gave us Back to the Future, Bros, Wham, corporate hair, poodle perms, pastel power suits, Banarama, The Cure, Mel & Kim, Dynasty, Moonlighting......oh wait. That's why.
Shooting a suspect you are meant to be arresting is always a mistake, which is why the first police step after a shooting is always an inquiry. Sometimes it's a justified mistake, sometimes not, that's up to the inquiry.
I suppose the Olympics are ahead of schedule and all those labourers will need work soon ... Hope everyone gets this out of their system before next summer.
The officer who fired the lethal shots has been quoted as saying that he was not fired upon, but rather that he opened fire because he believed he was in danger from a lethal weapon.
I have immense sympathy for the fact that it is always easy for things to go horribly wrong the minute you have guns involved, and I feel very sorry for the policeman involved, because regardless of what happened, I think he is probably having nearly as bad a week of it as the Duggans.
The Met seriously fell down on their own procedures and rules when they did not inform the Duggan family and left it for them to find out from the news. They have admitted as much today, which I think would have happened without the protests, though perhaps not as quickly. (The riots and looting, which are inexcusable, are not really connected to Mark Duggan, save by the flimsiest of excuses.)
And it can be a mistake to shoot people who are shooting at you. There was a case in Australia since I have been living here where a mentally deranged person had a handgun, but the house in which he or she (cannot recall now) was holed-up was otherwise empty, the area was cordoned off, and the police had a perimeter far enough back that they could wait it out. They shot instead, and were found to have made the wrong decision by the inquest that followed (I am fairly sure the disturbed person survived, but as you can see, my memories of the event are very hazy.)
They are reporting rumours. At least, the Gruniad is. It is reporting stuff that it believes has been leaked to it. That may prove correct - but it is certainly not fact.
Just now the IPCC felt compelled to deny at least one of those circulating rumours - the gun was a real gun, not a replica.
At the moment, there is no official report, though the Guardian has a rather good crime desk and their only mention of the fake gun rumour that I know of has been to say that it was a fake fake gun, as it were.
The Guardian can be a very good paper but, like all the other papers in the UK, it has a particular political agenda and prefers stories that pander to it.
If these reports turn out to be wrong, it can always say it was misinformed - and will, if it bothers at all. If they turn out to be correct it will pat itself on the back so hard it will fall forwards.
More seriously, I don't believe any of it at the moment. I will not be totally shocked if the Guardian reports are true, but I will be even less shocked if they prove false.
What I do know is that, if the other guy has a gun, you shoot to stop, which means shooting at the chest, which often means killing. This is true of every police force in the world. Standard practice. Only way to stop them doing it is to throw down your gun, stick you hands in the air, and yell "Don't shoot! I surrender!"
Hm. Your commenters distracted me from the fact that my 80s were always unlike what people now refer to (80s were punk and punk rock and hard core and the best brit pop, now whatever they play now) and oddly enough focus on politics: will the increasingly destructive and only bad-for-the-poor riots end in Cameron's downfall in the end? Or will it just produce better music (see all the anti-thatch greatness)? Doubt it.
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blamebrampton) wrote2011-08-09 09:20 am
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I swear, it's ridiculous. Massive recession, energy crisis, Conservative government cutting public projects at the same time as reducing policing (because no one has ever been upset by hard times in the past), racial elements to the thuggery, a police mistake that could be a genuine mistake but made grim by the lack of response ... I mean, who could have imagined any of this could go bad?
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To them it's just stealing in front of the police, who can't do anything.
It'll take until somebody gets killed before they all shit themselves and stay at home with their mummies.
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This is not exactly just up the road from me, like for a lot of other people, but it's still making me question my commitment to
sparklemotionstaying here.no subject
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How can you malign a decade that gave us Back to the Future, Bros, Wham, corporate hair, poodle perms, pastel power suits, Banarama, The Cure, Mel & Kim, Dynasty, Moonlighting......oh wait. That's why.
;)
E
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I have immense sympathy for the fact that it is always easy for things to go horribly wrong the minute you have guns involved, and I feel very sorry for the policeman involved, because regardless of what happened, I think he is probably having nearly as bad a week of it as the Duggans.
The Met seriously fell down on their own procedures and rules when they did not inform the Duggan family and left it for them to find out from the news. They have admitted as much today, which I think would have happened without the protests, though perhaps not as quickly. (The riots and looting, which are inexcusable, are not really connected to Mark Duggan, save by the flimsiest of excuses.)
And it can be a mistake to shoot people who are shooting at you. There was a case in Australia since I have been living here where a mentally deranged person had a handgun, but the house in which he or she (cannot recall now) was holed-up was otherwise empty, the area was cordoned off, and the police had a perimeter far enough back that they could wait it out. They shot instead, and were found to have made the wrong decision by the inquest that followed (I am fairly sure the disturbed person survived, but as you can see, my memories of the event are very hazy.)
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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-london-14459516
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Both they and the BBC are reporting the reports, not the actual report, so all this is subject to change, of course.
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Just now the IPCC felt compelled to deny at least one of those circulating rumours - the gun was a real gun, not a replica.
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If these reports turn out to be wrong, it can always say it was misinformed - and will, if it bothers at all. If they turn out to be correct it will pat itself on the back so hard it will fall forwards.
More seriously, I don't believe any of it at the moment. I will not be totally shocked if the Guardian reports are true, but I will be even less shocked if they prove false.
What I do know is that, if the other guy has a gun, you shoot to stop, which means shooting at the chest, which often means killing. This is true of every police force in the world. Standard practice. Only way to stop them doing it is to throw down your gun, stick you hands in the air, and yell "Don't shoot! I surrender!"
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