Emma Berry

Posts Tagged ‘London’

Der Spiegal reports that the homeless have a new way of earning a living: As tour guides. Perhaps the leaders of the Occupy Movement can learn from their European cousins examples.  I have written to the Occupy Dallas group and sent copies to several other people, in my local community and national, regarding this possibility.

Maybe we could get funding from an organization like Oprah’s to help us.  Part of this program also could be to assist some of the homeless in learning marketable computer/writing/pr skills.  I would like as much as possible for these stories and photographs taken to be done by the homeless.  Others can train them, and we can loan them our cameras but let’s allow the homeless the dignity of telling their own stories.  Let’s don’t steal the thunder of their human potential.

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Here is what some of the homeless in London are doing.

“Wilding, who has strawberry blonde hair and alert eyes, earns money by selling the homeless magazine “Big Issue,” and with tours through the London Bridge area. It is a new type of walking tour, with the homeless explaining the city through their own eyes. Places that the tourists would normally just walk by take on new meaning. Every park bench and every bridge offers up a host of anecdotes. Even the delicacy paradise, the London Borough Market, which every good travel guide recommends, is shown in a new light.

“This is where I used to sleep sometimes,” says Wilding as she points to a corner of the marketplace. “In the morning, the market traders would make me a cup of tea.” A few corners further on, in front of an Asian chain restaurant, she points to waves in the concrete on the floor. “They put them up to stop us sleeping there,” she says. And even the park benches in the Lucy Brown Gardens were retrofitted to keep the homeless away — by putting a third armrest in the center.”

More at Der Spiegal

‘Riots Reveal the Decay of British Society’

After the fourth night of riots in England, observers are asking what is behind the wave of violence. German commentators argue that the unrest reflects a deep-seated malaise at the heart of British society. more… [ Forum ]

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iflizwerequeen comments:  There are many and obvious reasons for the riots (although most of which are not readily apparent to the rich) Racism sparked the riots but then there has been much additional fuel fed by the gap between the rich and the majority.  It is no accident that it began in London.

RACISM
The rioting was sparked by the fatal shooting by police of a 29-year-old black man, Mark Duggan, in the London area of Tottenham on Saturday under disputed circumstancesThe Independent Police Complaints Commission said Tuesday there was no evidence that Duggan had fired on police before he was shot. An inquest into his death began Tuesday, but it is expected to take months to reach a conclusion.

The initial rioting on Saturday appears to have been at least partially motivated by long-simmering resentment among the black community at heavy-handed policing.

HAVE AND HAVE NOTS–Social Distress in England is rampant all over Europe and is becoming so in the USA.

The message to the British underclass couldn’t be any clearer: Born poor, you will remain poor and that naturally also applies to your children and grandchildren. Your chances of winning the lottery are greater than breaking out of your class.”  If  you think the same is not true in the USA, you are asleep. The latest Wall Street corporate trends to keep people in their places include hiring only part-time workers at minimum wage rates–that way the corporation can be irresponsible and not pay any benefits–thus saving more money for dividends paid to wealth investors (the majority of our Congress who vote on legislation to enable such thefts).

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AND THE GOVERNMENT’S RESPONSE?

As riots spread to other impoverished parts of the country, Cameron confirms police have permission to use plastic bullets as part of the fight against society’s ‘sickness’

iflizwerequeen comments:

Sure, You betcha.  Nothing like plastic bullets to correct the poor’s “sickness.”  The final uprising against British colonialism has at last begun.  The last frontier of suppression by the rich.  If Cameron and his rich buddies think this will be stopped with water hoses and plastic bullets, they are wrong.

You can view the entire 2010 TAKES THE CAKE AWARDS that I created on December 31, 2010.  Since this is the end of March I thought I would post the ones for March of last year.  I’m behind on my Takes the Cake Awards for 2011, I’ll catch up this weekend.

March 2010

March, the month for primaries in Texas and the sound Republican thumping of not only Tea Party Queen Medina, but also Kay Bailey Hutchinson. Washington, D.C. became the first American city to hand out free female condoms in the battle against HIV/AIDS. French police shoot tear gas at protesters at oil company Total S.A.’s headquarters in Paris. [Total S.A. is a French oil company and one of the six Super major oil companies in the world. Total is currently the subject of a lawsuit in French and Belgian courts for using the Myanmar's civilian slavery to construct the pipeline.]

Believe me, the Wall Street rich will never stop their endless pursuit for free labor—the ultimate achievement of that goal, its logical conclusion, being slave labor. Ironically the person who has thus far come the closest to achieving that goal of building an empire solely on slave labor is a liberal, Adrianna Huffington. Her ship of fortune sailed right into the harbor of AOL propelled by the oars of hundreds of unpaid bloggers. And that maneuver, while paying nothing to the hundreds of bloggers, provided Huffington with a cash prize of over $300 million. Thus she achieved the wet dream of all capitalists—free labor.

TAKES THE CAKE AWARDS FOR MARCH

#1 Jobless Recovery – March of 2010 was my first recollection of hearing or reading that oxymoron. I wonder who dreamed it up. Jobless recovery—a perfect example of George Orwell’s Newspeak. One thing is certain; it was no one who actually lives on Main Street because if you are talking about economic recovery, there is no economic recovery without jobs in our minds. However, “recovery” implies that someone has recovered. Since people who live on Main Street cannot “recover” without a job, we can only assume that “recovery” refers to Wall Street and the rich. I guess from their point of view “jobless recovery” is not an oxymoron. They are raking in the dough again.

#2 Secretary of State Hillary Clinton defends the building a $1 billion embassy in London, the most expensive ever built. The plans even include surrounding it with a moat! Ms. Hillary Clinton claimed the funds for this were coming from the sale of other properties. Do any of these people in Washington DC occupy the same air space of reality as the rest of us?

#3 Glenn Beck in so many words admonished all the Christians in the USA to stop going to church. In one of his pseudo professorial hysterical Fox News ramblings he admonished his disciples: “I beg you, look for the words ‘social justice’ or ‘economic justice’ on your church Web site. If you find it, run as fast as you can. Social justice and economic justice, they are code words. Now, am I advising people to leave their church? Yes!”

[I googled “God and Social Justice” and got over 8 million instances on the Internet. That should just about take care of all religions. I suppose we are to replace our religion with Fox News and Glenn Beck. How can anyone in their right mind take this nut job with any amount of seriousness?]