UK Riots - Your Opinions?

[Reyson]

I should be put in charge. Then again, maybe not.

[Meph]

On that point, by making education harder and harder to afford, the British government is clearly not helping things, I guess...

But... education is free. Unless you mean the funding the schools get?

[Reyson]

On that point, by making education harder and harder to afford, the British government is clearly not helping things, I guess...

But... education is free. Unless you mean the funding the schools get?

Is decent education free?

[Meph]

Yes. Private schools tend to produce the same grades as state schools.

It depends on the individual schools, though. In the run-down estates, primary schools tend to be rated 3 or 4 by Ofsted (with 1 being best and 4 being worst). Ofsted are the government's independant office that deals with education.

[Unas]

Universities are far from free, from what I understand, and that's what I'm referring to.

Because, I don't know how it is in England, but in France most of the stuff you do before university level is learning about some basic tools (as in language, math, etc.), but the logic / argumentation behind is very simple. It's not before high school - and it's supposed to get stronger at university level - that you get challenging stuff requiring you to build a line of reasoning, examine whether it's logically correct, and express it in an understandable way.

This is what trains one to think, and if you take that away from people, they are more likely to behave as sheep following the flock.

[Meph]

Oh, I see. The idea, here, is to get people to be thinking like that before university. It works in good schools.

Off-topic: But it turns out that university tuition fees aren't actually that bad. It will cost more to pay for something like a TV license each month, and most people aren't going to have to pay all of it back.

[Ami]

Shouldn't this be in the Social Politics Thread? Someone able to use a computer instead of a 3DS please merge this in.

[Reyson]

Shouldn't this be in the Social Politics Thread? Someone able to use a computer instead of a 3DS please merge this in.

You're using a 3DS? Anyway, I agree with Unas's statement on the last page. Armed forces and tear gas. Although, I probably would just have had them all shot.

[Meph]

Shouldn't this be in the Social Politics Thread?

It could be, but I think enough has been said for it to warrant its own thread.

[Ping']

Shouldn't this be in the Social Politics Thread? Someone able to use a computer instead of a 3DS please merge this in.

You're using a 3DS? Anyway, I agree with Unas's statement on the last page. Armed forces and tear gas. Although, I probably would just have had them all shot.

> Sarcasm I suppose...
Anyway, I understand his reasoning, but being a pragmatist I would be careful of the unintended consequences of too violent a repression. Overreaction on the part of the government has been shown to cause sensible, decent citizens - people who otherwise would've been on the side of the "law", as it were - to turn against the authorities. Then what started as mindless riots becomes a legimitate protest (usually when riots like that happen there were actual reasons to protest underneath, stupid people act stupidly all the time but there needs to be a certain sociopolitical climate for riots to spread), chaos settles in and next thing you know you get thrown out of office... So I would worry a great deal about how the government's actions would be perceived. It would have to be both efficient and proportionate. Ending the madness (because that's what it was, I think we can agree on that) should be the primary goal. Police brutality of any kind should be swiftly and sternly punished and the civil liberties of ordinary citizens should not be infringed upon unless absolutely necessary (that means no anti-social media measures in particular).
Needless to say, that's not exacly the way things played out. But it could've been much worse.
In any case, my sympathy goes out to all those who've been victims of all this one way or another... Things seem to have settled down a bit, hope it stays that way.

[Mimi]

Shouldn't this be in the Social Politics Thread? Someone able to use a computer instead of a 3DS please merge this in.

You're using a 3DS? Anyway, I agree with Unas's statement on the last page. Armed forces and tear gas. Although, I probably would just have had them all shot.

> Sarcasm I suppose...
Anyway, I understand his reasoning, but being a pragmatist I would be careful of the unintended consequences of too violent a repression. Overreaction on the part of the government has been shown to cause sensible, decent citizens - people who otherwise would've been on the side of the "law", as it were - to turn against the authorities. Then what started as mindless riots becomes a legimitate protest (usually when riots like that happen there were actual reasons to protest underneath, stupid people act stupidly all the time but there needs to be a certain sociopolitical climate for riots to spread), chaos settles in and next thing you know you get thrown out of office... So I would worry a great deal about how the government's actions would be perceived. It would have to be both efficient and proportionate. Ending the madness (because that's what it was, I think we can agree on that) should be the primary goal. Police brutality of any kind should be swiftly and sternly punished and the civil liberties of ordinary citizens should not be infringed upon unless absolutely necessary (that means no anti-social media measures in particular).
Needless to say, that's not exacly the way things played out. But it could've been much worse.
In any case, my sympathy goes out to all those who've been victims of all this one way or another... Things seem to have settled down a bit, hope it stays that way.

Same here. Riots really don't have much meaning to them.

[Unas]

Anyway, I understand his reasoning, but being a pragmatist I would be careful of the unintended consequences of too violent a repression.

Yeah, that's kind of why I only mentioned tear gas.
This would have the effect of forcing groups to disperse, with very little collateral damage. I mean, if an innocent person gets to breathe tear gas, she's likely to get better after a few minutes/hours, so that's a small price to pay for breaking the riots.
It's not on the same level as shooting at them.

[Broocevelt]

Anyway, I understand his reasoning, but being a pragmatist I would be careful of the unintended consequences of too violent a repression.

Yeah, that's kind of why I only mentioned tear gas.
This would have the effect of forcing groups to disperse, with very little collateral damage. I mean, if an innocent person gets to breathe tear gas, she's likely to get better after a few minutes/hours, so that's a small price to pay for breaking the riots.
It's not on the same level as shooting at them.

That would indeed be way better
I mean, as long as they don't start bashing down the first person they see, it should be fine
(I'm referring to Spain's pacific protests and the reactions armed forces have, but oh well)