Burn London Burn!
2011 London Riots


I live in a small place called Weeting in the U.K. My husband recently got stationed here. I have been here before as child and continue to love it. I wake up in the morning to the ray of sunshine greeting me in the summer. I can enjoy long refreshing walks into town and sit at the café for a sweet hot cup of coffee. I love going to the pub knowing everyone there and having a good conversation over a pint. I feel secure in the familiar faces I see every day. I try to stay away from Little America (what I call the three American Bases here) so I can immerse myself in the culture.

On the night of the riots I was playing my most beloved role, a tourist in London. I had been to London several times, and I didn’t imagine it being any different. I took the tube and enjoyed the faces all around me. I sat and at some point stood and drifted off into my imagination. I played a game, looking at people and trying to read them base on their cloths, actions and facial expressions. I got excited when a little baby came on the train, I would sit back and make funny faces at him, secretly giggling in delight when he smiled back at me.

I got off the tube to walk around. I felt like London was my home. The chaos of the busy walkers, loud talks and historical sites mixed in with the modern developments that sat like a painted picture in the background. I bought my favorite treat, spiced almonds from the street vendor and decided to check out the London eye and aquarium. I then settled to end my day with a nice plate of fish and chips, all while noticing the calm of it all tickle me with enjoyment.

I got home and heard the riots were going on that day in London. I said to myself I was in London and I didn’t notice anything. Then I remember London is a big city, but I still thought, could this really be happening? Riots are nothing new to Americans and I quickly remember being at the same place and time as the last Detroit riots. I thought to myself, people in revolt.

I love a revolution that brings about powerful change. The London riots started off with angry young people rebelling against the system that they felt oppressed by. Poverty fighting for a voice and not knowing how to express itself turned into nights of fear and violence. Everyone that was involved in the riots, for positive reasons and or negative ones, became victims of it at the end. What happens when you tell a group they have no voice?

I recently saw a Planet of the Apes remake with James franco. I have always felt that it brought out social issues that are very relevant. In the movie Franco's character is seeking a cure for Alzheimer's disease . He creates and tests several of his cures on Apes. In, short they become smarter and capable of doing everything including talking. There was no pause to think of the apes future. Where would they live and what would they do with this new found intelligence? Were these Apes now human because they could understand and learn at a greater compasity? At the end of the movie the solution was to destroy what man had created in the first place. The Ape's however had other ideas and wanted more. They wanted to experience life on their own terms. They wanted freedom.

I am by no means comparing the rioters to apes but isn’t that what happened. We tell our youth that anything in life is possible. You get your education and you will be able to find a good job, buy houses and provide for your family. Our we prepared when these things don’t happen?

We live in a society now where those who have degrees and training can’t find work. What about our high school grads who don’t make it or can’t afford college? How should they live there lives? We make excuses for poverty but there are no excuses when you can’t feed your children. When you look for and applied for every job but no one is hiring. Who hears those voices crying out in the night? Who saves the single mother in fear in her apartment of the gang volience that her childern are exposed too? Do we hear their voices?

I live in a small rural area but I don’t know if my neighbors are struggling to buy milk or feed their familes. I don’t see the struggle to survive every day. Most of us don’t. The world had little interest in the London youth until the riot broke out. We had no interest in the day to day lives of anyone more than 1 mile from us that wasn’t related . Now, we are volunteering for clean ups and noticing are neighbors more. All this makes me think that the youth have been put here to fail because of our past mistakes.

We create our democray and laws. We say that everyone has a fair shake in life proudly but that isn’t true? We let our schools fail our children, then blame it on the parents; Parents who are most likely having to work long hours to provide for their children, parents who may have no education of their own. Children should have a community looking out for them and supporting them, but they don’t. Let that child misbehave and all of a sudden we are a community again? We are worried about our youth? Did London here their voices or merely brush it under the rug of poor rebillous uneducated kids being trouble makers.

I don’t condone the riots at all, but I know it's deeper than just stealing and lighting a couple fires. In The Planet of the Apes, apes were given everything except a place in the world. Excpet a voice and a choice about their future. They were put aside after testing to be forgotten so that everyone could just move on. The problem was supposed to solve itself. Caesar, the main parimate charchter in the moive decided to find where he belonged on his own. He decided in order for him to have a life and freedom he had to escape the bondage he was in. Yes, Ceasar could talk but What would us, silly human, do with a talking Ape? We wouldn’t take him seriously. We wouldn’t let him have a voice in our congress or parliments so Ceasar had to gather his follow parimates and seek out freedom for himself.

As a soctiey we have to learn to give all our youth a voice. We can’t just leave it up to the rich, or upper crust ivy league students to repsent the youth. In order to have a real voice all our youth needs to be represented, including the poor, rich , the college educated and the high school drop out a like. We as a people need to listen. We are so afraid of what we can’t control. When that control is taken from us and turned into chaos, we all stop. We all decided okay now we will pay attention. We often wait too late. I know London and the surrounding areas will heal from this but my hope is we will all learn form this as well.