England, a bizarre melange of anarchy and police state
Bookworm on May 09 2008 at 12:45 pm | Filed under: Britain, England
While the ordinary English resident freely ignores the fact that his every move is being monitored by CCTV, so that crime remains unaffected by the government’s watchful eye, police are hard at work treating as hardcore criminals people who drop apple cores — an unsavory, untidy act, perhaps, but not one that would seem to require arrest, fingerprinting, and DNA gathering. England has become a very bizarre country.
3 Responses to “England, a bizarre melange of anarchy and police state”
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Howdy Bookworm,
Thanks for the link!
Since we are on the topic of DNA gathering, and I know that you’re a lawyer, this is a bit of an interesting read.
This is a bill that President Bush signed into law last week. A legislative fait accompli at this point.
This focus on littering (apple cores) is really hard to square with a recent article on British tourists that are amazed at how much safer they feel in American cities despite our “outrageous guns and violence”.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/from_our_own_correspondent/7359513.stm
Brits arriving in New York, hoping to avoid being slaughtered on day one of their shopping mission to Manhattan are, by day two, beginning to wonder what all the fuss was about. By day three they have had had the scales lifted from their eyes.
I have met incredulous British tourists who have been shocked to the core by the peacefulness of the place, the lack of the violent undercurrent so ubiquitous in British cities, even British market towns.
“It seems so nice here,” they quaver.
Perhaps the problem is that CCTV on every street can only assist the police AFTER crimes have been committed, leaving the citizenry helpless. In addition, perhaps the police are lazy in following up on serious filmed incidents because it takes so much work. So the people rely on government to keep them safe, but the predators know they will rarely, if ever, be caught, despite the cameras.
This reminds me of the parked-car burglaries in parking lots and on streets. One would think that this crime is more serious than highway speeding, yet our police system (at least here in Texas) couldn’t care less about car burglaries and the smashed windows and stolen items and chaos that results. The police do not lift a finger in response to car burglaries. Ever. I bet if the burglary were on CCTV they still would not lift a finger. It’s a question of police determination, or its utter lack, to me.
Not at all. The English government is simply attacking those who cannot defend themselves.
Just don’t pay the tickets. Oops. I didn’t say that. Policemen do still have a brain you know.