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Massive Attack’s Robert Del Naja has shared his thoughts on the recent riots on his blog.
Can't decide if this statement is an example of dickishly clumsily conjoining parallel arguments to justify his worldview or a naive over-sophistication of a bunch of brats with bedazzled BlackBerry's who've bought into capitalism so deeply that they feel they can never match the reality presented to them by marketeers and music vids. Whatever it is, the following statement seems a bit confused and unnecessary, especially to have been press released.
Media reaction to the riots...in context
With the complicit support of the government, the banks looted the nation's wealth, while destroying countless small business' and brought the whole economy to it's knees in a covert, clean manner, rather like organised crime.
Our reaction was to march and wave banners and then bail them out.
These kids would have to riot and steal every night for a year to run up a bill equivalent to the value of non paid tax big business has "avoided 'out of the economy this year alone.
They may not articulate their grievances like the politicians that condemn them, but..this is absolutely political.
As for the 'mindless violence'…is there anything more mindless than the British taxpayer quietly paying back the debts of others while contributing bullets to conflicts that we have absolutely no understanding of..
It's mad, sad and scary when we have to take to the streets to defend our homes and business' from angry thieving kids, but where are the police and what justice is ever done when the mob is dressed in pin stripe.
So, Robert, why were they looting PoundLand and burning down Whetherspoons and independent furniture stores, and not Canary Wharf?
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Yeah but...
Apart from the fact that he does appear to be attributing some political motivation to our be-hoodied friend there's not a lot I can disagree with there.
Take out this paragraph :-
'They may not articulate their grievances like the politicians that condemn them, but..this is absolutely political.'
And we're good.
Agreed
There was almost nothing political about the riots, just a lot of looting by a wide range of people with absolutely no moral compass, certainly a fair few adults and not just 'the yoof'. Yes, the bankers totally screwed us over but I personally felt that the fraudulent MP claims were even more galling. None of which produced a groundswell of popular protests and rioting by the common man! If it pleases Del Naja then we can all agree that there is a moral vacuum at the top and bottom of British society. What upset / angered most of us was how little regard there was shown for human life - some people lost their homes and were lucky to escape the flames, some people lost their livelihood, some even lost their lives - a mere detail not even mentioned in the press statement...
Since when
did the uninformed political opinions of Sean Adams consitute a news story? Don't you have a blog somewhere to put this on Sean?

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