London Riots Reflections

The article I read from the Newsweek magazine is "Why Riot Now?" and here, I am sharing my reflections.
Malaise among Britain's urban poor is nothing new. So why did it finally tip into widespread, terrifying violence?
As the article has said, street struggles are part of our modern history. For example the uprisings in the Arab world, the daily neighbourhood protests in China's major cities, Latin America's piqueteros (A group of people blocking a road or street with the purpose of getting attention over an issue). But why suddenly after so many years of not being heard the poor decided to start rioting?
The rioters in London mostly come from disadvantaged urban areas across Britain. Since their chances of being heard by the government is low, they decided to riotous violence to get attention.
The first reason why the riots started was because the people in London feels that the street is a space for political protests. I feel that this is a wrong way to think as a street is the connection between people all over the city and should not be used for getting attention from the government. By protesting on the streets, it would cause others inconvenience. If this protesters are unhappy about political problems, they should all the more work harder to solve their problems instead of destroying things which would hardly help them at all. After all, the government would not address the problems of every single one of the protesters right? So protesting is just a waste of effort.

The riot was also known to be sparked off by the unwarranted killing of Mark Duggan, a 29 year old man which was a father of four children. However, this reason was a less significant one, instead it is London's economic losses that have hit Britain's poor urban areas. Most of the rioters are youths, and it is explained by the fact that youth unemployment is the United Kingdom is 19% which is still rising sharply in disadvantage areas. I remembered hearing that a youth that took part in the riots confessed that he rioted because of financial problems, therefore looting things from the stores they could break into. I feel that although this protesters may be at their wits ends they should not destroy other people's stores as they may depend on their stores to make a living. By destroying their stores is only introducing more people to poverty and would not do good to anyone in Britain.

The riot was also caused mainly by the social media which have given even disadvantaged youths the power to raise a mob. These youths were able to communicate freely via Twitter to organise and plan their riots, to get more members. I feel that the social media should be more aware of what their users are posting about and should immediately stop them if they see a gathering of a large group of people discussing about rioting. For example, Facebook has a function to report a particular post which allows users to report an entry if they think it is offensive or inappropriate. If social medias were controlled, I believe the rioting would not be as serious as it is now. However this incident may serve as a warning to Britain that addressing these poorer people's problems are as important as addressing the influential people's problems and everyone deserves a chance to voice out their opinions.

Through the London Riots, I have also learnt to appreciate the fact that Singapore does not have such riots and we could walk along the streets without fear that we would encounter a large mob of people demonstrating violence. Also I feel lucky to be in a small country such as Singapore, making it easier for the government to address the problems of every citizen and no citizens would feel left out and want to start a riot. I am also proud of Singapore's citizens and law enforcers. The citizens are co-operative in adhering to the law and the law enforcers are efficient in enforcing law whenever necessary.