Home Secretary Suella Braverman has told the Metropolitan Police to “hunt down and lock up” those responsible for the latest shop looting campaign in London’s Oxford Street.
One would think that such a strategy is obvious for police, given that to do so is surely their job? This would overlook the fact that the Home Office, and essentially the entire government, long ago became a poorly run PR campaign for politicians desperate to appear ‘tough’ in a bid to confront the least possible embarrassment in next year’s General Election.
Perhaps the Home Secretary has also forgotten that it is her job to ensure there are enough police and penalties on hand to stop such crimes from occurring in the first place? In a 2012 report, even The Guardian admitted that longer prison sentences really do cut crime.
As usual when such havoc is unleashed, not only do we assume few perpetrators will be adequately punished, we must prepare for a flurry of progressive commentators bashing out nicely worded explanations of why they should not be.
Arguments may include-but will not be limited to-the following:
- Claims that the genuine affront to justice is a result of financial hardship which could surely blight us all;
- It is our duty to feel sorry for the misguided criminals, more so than the innocent victims;
- Points (1) and (2) must mean perpetrators ought not be punished—or not very much, and instead plied with money or activities to provide them with something else to fill their time (e.g. swimming pools, mental health hubs).
Nor were the recent looting scenes the overblown rarity many such voices would like us to believe.
According to the British Retail Consortium 850 incidents of abuse or violence in take place in British shops every day, and in the year leading up to April, retailers lost a record high £950 million to shoplifting and theft, up from £663 million the previous year. No doubt Britain is in the throes of a deep economic malaise, but very few people could be persuaded to join in a violent heist of expensive gadgets out of mere economic stress.
A more unspoken, and therefore more dangerous, poverty is ravaging our streets and plundering our wealth: one of the soul and mind.
Theodore Dalrymple made this very point in 2001, at the height of our establishment’s blinkered Blair fervour. Despite having worked as a doctor in hospitals and slums across the world, he had: “little hesitation in saying that the mental, cultural, emotional, and spiritual impoverishment of the Western underclass is the greatest of any large group of people I have ever encountered anywhere.” I doubt his view has softened over the intervening 22 years.
In 2001, there were 44 crimes a year for every police officer compared to just three in 1931, despite the misery of the Great Depression. In 2022 it was over 47. The breakdown in order is a feature and not a bug of the British experience.
What the deluded ranks who jump to the defence of thugs fail to understand is that in their bid to appeal to all, they are guilty of the most damaging class condescension.
People rooted in upper middle-class fashions, who make up the bulk of our elite, now feel embarrassed by suggesting certain standards of behaviour are accessible to people of different wealth, status, or cultural backgrounds. Naturally, these intertwined expectations include respect for authority and honesty, the sanctity of marriage and family, and respect for work and education.
They are happy for their own families to reap the benefits of at least some of these dusty old prejudices, but heaven forbid they be encouraged in Barking or Blackburn.
Thus the almost exclusive domination of our judiciary, journalism, and politics with these revolutionaries, which has continued to become yet more obvious since the deliberate destruction of our best schools, end up enforcing no standard whatsoever, apart from the latest modish tyrannies, out of an urgent anxiety to avoid offence or perceived snobbery.
This is why a video of an autistic teenager being verbally harangued and arrested by West Yorkshire police, allegedly for a passing remark, has gone viral, but convicted rapists and murderers walk our streets without fear.
Britons undoubtedly live in relative luxury, both historically speaking, and compared with many tyrannical and impoverished regimes thriving today. But just because things could be worse, it does not mean they could not be far better. Whether it be blatant government lies or the consequent proliferation of unpunished crime, our nation has a lot it could improve on.
The Poverty Ravaging Our Streets
Home Secretary Suella Braverman has told the Metropolitan Police to “hunt down and lock up” those responsible for the latest shop looting campaign in London’s Oxford Street.
One would think that such a strategy is obvious for police, given that to do so is surely their job? This would overlook the fact that the Home Office, and essentially the entire government, long ago became a poorly run PR campaign for politicians desperate to appear ‘tough’ in a bid to confront the least possible embarrassment in next year’s General Election.
Perhaps the Home Secretary has also forgotten that it is her job to ensure there are enough police and penalties on hand to stop such crimes from occurring in the first place? In a 2012 report, even The Guardian admitted that longer prison sentences really do cut crime.
As usual when such havoc is unleashed, not only do we assume few perpetrators will be adequately punished, we must prepare for a flurry of progressive commentators bashing out nicely worded explanations of why they should not be.
Arguments may include-but will not be limited to-the following:
Nor were the recent looting scenes the overblown rarity many such voices would like us to believe.
According to the British Retail Consortium 850 incidents of abuse or violence in take place in British shops every day, and in the year leading up to April, retailers lost a record high £950 million to shoplifting and theft, up from £663 million the previous year. No doubt Britain is in the throes of a deep economic malaise, but very few people could be persuaded to join in a violent heist of expensive gadgets out of mere economic stress.
A more unspoken, and therefore more dangerous, poverty is ravaging our streets and plundering our wealth: one of the soul and mind.
Theodore Dalrymple made this very point in 2001, at the height of our establishment’s blinkered Blair fervour. Despite having worked as a doctor in hospitals and slums across the world, he had: “little hesitation in saying that the mental, cultural, emotional, and spiritual impoverishment of the Western underclass is the greatest of any large group of people I have ever encountered anywhere.” I doubt his view has softened over the intervening 22 years.
In 2001, there were 44 crimes a year for every police officer compared to just three in 1931, despite the misery of the Great Depression. In 2022 it was over 47. The breakdown in order is a feature and not a bug of the British experience.
What the deluded ranks who jump to the defence of thugs fail to understand is that in their bid to appeal to all, they are guilty of the most damaging class condescension.
People rooted in upper middle-class fashions, who make up the bulk of our elite, now feel embarrassed by suggesting certain standards of behaviour are accessible to people of different wealth, status, or cultural backgrounds. Naturally, these intertwined expectations include respect for authority and honesty, the sanctity of marriage and family, and respect for work and education.
They are happy for their own families to reap the benefits of at least some of these dusty old prejudices, but heaven forbid they be encouraged in Barking or Blackburn.
Thus the almost exclusive domination of our judiciary, journalism, and politics with these revolutionaries, which has continued to become yet more obvious since the deliberate destruction of our best schools, end up enforcing no standard whatsoever, apart from the latest modish tyrannies, out of an urgent anxiety to avoid offence or perceived snobbery.
This is why a video of an autistic teenager being verbally harangued and arrested by West Yorkshire police, allegedly for a passing remark, has gone viral, but convicted rapists and murderers walk our streets without fear.
Britons undoubtedly live in relative luxury, both historically speaking, and compared with many tyrannical and impoverished regimes thriving today. But just because things could be worse, it does not mean they could not be far better. Whether it be blatant government lies or the consequent proliferation of unpunished crime, our nation has a lot it could improve on.
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