(Please note: This is a humourous piece, no attempt was made to start any trouble and the author in no way condones what happened)
Just like the scene in the Godfather where Clemenza (possibly) says to Sonny (or Michael, I’m not sure, it’s been a while) that a mafia war is needed every five years or so to sort out the bad blood, so Britain needs a good week of rioting to get things back on track. Its been nearly 30 years so we were due I think.
All in all it was an interesting week. We could focus on the negative – the destruction, the fires, the general level of shame brought upon a proud nation but on the other hand, the rioters and looters have a good time, a lot of people get new tv’s, the news has something juicy to report on, the public can tut and shake their heads at the state of the nation’s youth and all our insurance premiums go through the roof – swings and roundabouts really.
The riots started in London following a peaceful protest. The protest seemed very admirable and was over a real concern, not about say, losing game seven – I’m looking at you Vancouver.
Despite our international reputation as being reserved and stuffy, the British really do enjoy a good bout of civil unrest as long as certain conditions are met:
1 There is a big enough group of us so we can feel part of a team and the chances of being nabbed by the police diminishes the larger the gang
2 There is a sufficient supply of scarves, hoodies and baseball caps to hide our identities given that we have four CCTV cameras to every adult in the country.
3 It’s not raining
So it was a balmy summers evening when a critical mass or North London youths elected do their Christmas shopping early and have some impromptu automotive based barbecues. Naturally this received wall to wall tv coverage so when the chavs* and scratters** from other parts of the country realised what a cost effective way this was of obtaining Ipods, trainers and giant tv’s, 40 watt lightbulbs started pinging into existence above adolescent baseball caps for as far as the eye could see.
The two areas of the country that were expected to see trouble were Manchester and Birmingham – the next two biggest cities in the country. We knew this because it was being organised on Facebook and Twitter. Say what you will about the ignorant and mindless youths that perpetrated the chaos, if there had been a JD Sports or T-Mobile shop in the middle of Bagdhad, they could have co-ordinated the overthrow of Saddams regime in a night.
Now I live in the West Midlands, which the region that Birmingham exists in and which was expected to see an uprising in the unwashed underclass desperate to break some windows and acquire mass produced electrical items. Major unrest was expected in Wolverhampton, Dudley, West Bromwich and Telford, but sadly not my own home town - Stafford. Is it too middle class? Not ‘urban’ enough? Too many pensioners and not enough disaffected youth yearning for their voice to be heard? Surely not – all they needed was a leader, an inspirational figure to get them started. That figure would have to be me. Yes, I’m in my 30’s, no, I do not own a hoodie, no I have never broken the law and no, I do not have a posse but I’ll be damned if it was going to stop me.
The only problem I faced was how? Too young to have been involved in the riots in the early 80’s and too old to have given a monkeys about the student protests a few months ago, I was in no mans land. A quick google search for how to get things going from scratch didn’t help so I was going to have to improvise.
What follows is a brief account of my efforts:
7.00 am – Woke up feeling emboldened by the events in London the night before and went into my kitchen and put my fist through the microwave. Mrs Reckoning shot out of bed and expressed displeasure at this turn of events and packed me off to work with the telling off still ringing in my ears. She made some good points about how was anyone going to know that I broke my own stuff and that it was tremendously stupid and irresponsible of me. Irresponsible like a fox!
8.30 am – General disgust amongst my colleagues at the looting in London didn’t give me the groundswell of support I was anticipating. A few wellwishers enquired as to the injuries to my hand , explaining that it was all part of the cause and that we would be swimming in Rolex watches soon didn’t appear to be having the desired effect.
12.30 pm – A quick check on the BBC news website shows things have already started in West Brom. Mixed feelings on this, on the one hand, the talk of it spreading to my area were true but on the other, would my attempts in Stafford look like the work of a copycat.
5.00 pm – Hometime at last. Not expecting a warm welcome at home following the fist / microwave interface I decided to just get on with it.
5.25 pm – The looters in London cunningly targeted the giant Sony warehouse for their looting. Sadly Stafford does not have anything to compare so i am currently staring menacingly at the window of PC World. The only unrest I appear to be causing is through occasionally getting in shoppers paths as they try to enter the store. I apologise of course – manners maketh the man.
5.35 pm – Little if any support so far
5.40 pm – Realise that i have neglected to bring any items of clothing to cover my face and the CCTV cameras are legion on this retail park.
5.45 pm – After crudely fashioning a mask from my tie, I realise that I have been wearing my ID badge the whole time. I’m beginning to think this is a lost cause.
6.00 pm – Am quite peckish as it’s been a while since lunch. Decide to go home, stopping en route to get a new microwave. And some flowers for the wife. Feeling a little dejected that I couldn’t get anything started.
8.30 pm – Home and watching events unfold. In Manchester they have broken into the Arndale Centre and are having a crazy time. Similar scenes in Birmingham. A little relieved that nothing did kick off here, I couldn’t handle the pressure of leading that kind of mob. I’m more of a follower than a leader.
10.30 pm – Mixed feelings as I go to bed. It’s nice to live in an elderly, middle class town, but I don’t have any new Ipod, Flip cameras or 46 inch plasma tv’s.
Next time perhaps.
* Chavs (courtesy of urbandictionary.com)
Picture this a young lad about 12 years of age and 4 ½ feet high baseball cap at ninety degrees in a imitation addidas tracksuit, with trouser legs tucked into his socks (of course, is definitely the height of fashion). This lad is strutting around, fag in one hand jewellery all over the over, outside McDonalds acting as if he is 8 foot tall and built like a rugby player, when some poor unsuspecting adult (about 17/18) walks round the corner wanting to go to mcdonalds for his dinner glances at the young lad, the young lad jumps up in complete disgust and says “Whats your problem? Wanna make sommin of it? Bling Bling” when the adult starts to walk towards the young lad, the young lad pisses himself and runs off to either his pregnant 14-year-old girlfriend or his brother in the army crying his eyes out.
My mate has become a chav what can i do? answer is shoot him before it is too late
** Scratters (courtesy of urbandictionary.com)
| Miserable ignorant track-suit wearing trash exemplifying the shit-encrusted population of the British Isles. Abusive dole-scum. The reason today's elderly would rather starve away in their own homes than take a 50-yard trip down to the shops. See also scally and scut-dog. Scratters will shortly be prevalent in the UK due to their spectacularly high teenage pregnancy rate combined with the abundance of cheaply-available KFC. |
No comments:
Post a Comment