London's burning and the lunatics are in charge of the asylum. Like so many others I watch as the police stand around, unsure what to do.
They know what to do when you are in an organised march. They know what to do when responsible working people take to the streets and march. They kettle them, abuse them.
The police had no notice of the recent riots. They did not know what to do. That is a poor reflection on the training, the cost and the overall intelligence of our police force.
You can blame it on organised crime, or youth unemployment, or school holidays, the recession, the EDL, rising inequality, anything you like, but the fact is that our society is getting lax. Shopkeepers did not bind together to protect that which was theirs. Of course most 'shopkeepers' were absent. The directors of chain stores and multinationals are not the type to get their hands dirty. They will claim on the insurance and not care that entire communities have been wrecked. This is 'society' at work. Society is so big that nobody cares anymore and there is no quick fix.
I have brought up 3 boys. I have been up before the headmaster on more than one occasion, I have sat in my own sitting room whilst the police paid a visit due to one misdemeanour or another. I have pulled televisions, complete with sockets, from the bedroom wall and given them away so that homework can be done. I have trailed them to stinking flats full of rubbish where good looking boys with glassy eyes stare emptily from pale faces bereft of reason. Where are the other mothers? Why are these children left to their own devices when clearly their own devices are not leading them in a good direction; why am I alone facing this waste of humanity?
Motherhood is challenging. You have to put yourself out. I have been to the drugs rehab centres, hunted through bedrooms every day for substances which have no place in my home. If my boys were out in these troubled times, I would not ring them, I would go straight out and bring them home, and they know it.
So whilst the teenage misdemeanours of my offspring are long over, I have to watch as others go so far over the brink that they burn down neighbourhoods, putting lives at risk and laughing all the way to eBay with their trophys of stupidity.
If they knew their mothers would march down the street and bring them home, would these children behave in this way? Not likely. Nothing is more embarrassing then your mother turning up to bring you home - at any age.