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Anti-racist uprising in Oldham

brian | 27.05.2001 19:03

The New York Times, Sunday May 27 reports on a major upheaval in Nothern England, describing over 500 youth fighting a pitched battle in the streets with riot clad cops. Any Indymedia reports or interviews on that came down?

According to the Times report ( http://www.nytimes.com/aponline/world/AP-Britain-Riot.html) the fighting began after a group of white youth attacked the home of a south asian family in the North England town of Oldham. Youth from the community responded with an attack on a bar frequented by whites in the community. Agence France Presse called it

"one of Britain's worst outbreaks of racial violence in years, hundreds of youths clashed with police in Oldham on Saturday night and Sunday morning."

Is there any further reporting or background info from the independent media?

brian
- e-mail: brian@freespeech.org

Comments

Hide the following 16 comments

Shhh! We're having an errection

27.05.2001 19:53

We simply dont need any reality right now,spank you very much.
How am I supposed to manufacture consent if theres ruckus and riot?
Its not like we can put them all on rotting hulks and ship them off to another planet.
I dont know how to pay them to shut up as a succession of manmade disasters just struck.
Im even thinking of turfing out the Queen,She wont last a new york minute when we all go euro.They have standards.
The too hard baskets full Im afraid.
It would take a violent revolution
to change my mind.

toady blare
mail e-mail: www.morons.org


Molotovs for robocops

27.05.2001 20:55

Efficacy of sticky(just add a little styrofoam)molotovs.
Proven in new field trials.
Well if the riot P.I.Gs cant be telled apart,why not fry up the plastic peanuts?

off the pig


Background info

27.05.2001 22:21

Tension in Oldham has been getting worse for a while now, with the police failing to take any significant action about racial harrassment and far right agitation. When this latest NF meeting culminated in attacks on Asian shops and racial insults, several hundred Asian youths decided they'd had enough and attacked the pub where the NF had met and the cops that had defended them.

Despite what you might have heard, this is not an anti-white uprising, but it does appear that there are some feelings of hatred towards ordinary white people among the Asian community and some fools put bricks through random windows of people's homes. Overall though the events have been encouraging, with most anger focused on the cops. What happens in the near future is unpredictable, but unless working class people in Oldham start working together against fascism and the pigs there is likely to be more segregation and that can't be healthy.

Links for more info:

Anti-Nazi League report of Oldham clashes between NF and anti-racists/Asian community on May 05:
www.anl.org.uk/news.htm

Lib Dem Simon Hughes accuses Hague of provoking racial unrest:
 http://politics.guardian.co.uk/election2001/story/0,9029,497403,00.html

Independent On Sunday coverage and background info (best by far):
 http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/story.jsp?story=74845
 http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/this_britain/story.jsp?story=74918

BBC coverage (surprisingly good):
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_1354000/1354363.stm
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_1354000/1354486.stm
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_1354000/1354777.stm

Lemming
mail e-mail: lemming:@grandtheftcyber.com


Love Thy Neighbour

27.05.2001 23:00

There was no mention of this in the 'news' to my knowledge, although there has been incitement of rascism against Asians in the area. But the Times is trying to exaggerate a skirmish into a major race riot and fan the flames of a race war. Don't take the bait, don't stoop to their grotesque, fabricated agenda.

Sanctimonious


Race the trump card?

27.05.2001 23:49

In the past few years there has been a very conscious move of our society towards political correctness and accepting all cultures that come into this family. Personally I think this has been done with all too much force. The politians run to condemn racism, but it seems to be more about what they can get out of it (ie votes), than what the people in this country can get out of it.

It's perfectly good that new labour can give the impression that they are all for fairness and equality, but the fact is, this is not a fair society. Generally speaking, we don't care or share in this country, we jealously possess and protect the things we own. Which is why there is still inequality and alienation, arguably more so than 10 years ago.

So, with this in mind, the petty and possessive nature is likely to influence anyone born here, regardless of their race. What the bbc termed 'third generation asians' have increasingly become influenced by the rot that is being experienced by the whole country. And inevitably, some of the more stupid, less caring people in any society, will get the wrong idea about who is to blame and will start causing friction with each other, which sooner or later turns into petrol bombs and casualties.

The fact is, these people are just not happy and so they are looking for people to blame. I blame the governments and busineeses, but a white racist might blame a pakistani and vice versa. I think in recent times with the massive coverage of the Stephen Lawrence murder and other incidents, with the huge importance placed on good race relations and the huge stigma now of being labelled racist, people have been feeling threatened and I personally sometimes have found myself walking on eggshells around people with different colour skin to me, in case I am labelled a racist for something I might say.

Now, I have no racist tendancies at all, but because of this constant social pressure *not* to be racist, I find myself noticing people's skin colours more than ever. This does not look to me to be a good way of intregrating a society.

Just a thought anyway... never intended it to be this long.

townie
mail e-mail: cant_cope@hotmail.com


according to the tv news in America

28.05.2001 00:50

The rioting started after a NF march into an Asian area of Oldham. The skins started vandalizing and breaking the shop, and cops just watched, not intervening. Asians started to attack the skins, and it grew into a full blown riot.

The other notable facts were that only 15% of Oldham are Asian, and the skins were organizing around the fact that a white had been allegedly brutalized (and killed? maybe?) by an Asian.

A skin was interviewed briefly, his accent was so thick that ABC provided subtitles, and he attributed many problems to Asians.

This sounds a lot like nazi tactics even in the US. They fixate on minority-on-white crime and say that it's a sign of social decline, indicating that the minorities have "forgotten their place" and a threat to some imagined nationalistic birthright. They get people fired up, and then have a demonstration.

Here (in California) the nazis don't have much support, and the anti-nazis are a little more popular, so the nationalists have a rally and don't attack anything. They wait for anti-nazis to attack first. In other states and in rural areas, they still can vandalize and terrorize people.

Before anyone starts going off on the "we should all become colorblind" rhetoric, remember that coordinated anonymous vandalism that's racist is an effective form of terrorism. It's unacceptable. If the cops aren't fighting it, can you blame the people if they take it upon themselves to deal with it. And can you blame them for considering the cops their enemy?

johnk
mail e-mail: johnk@woodstock.com


.

28.05.2001 02:19

Whats clear amongst this whole debate is this: assessing people on the basis of their skin colour is wrong and just bloody stupid. Judging people by other petty factors is equally dumb, but skin colour or 'race' are 2 of the worst targets for abuse, since we can't change our geneology.

But the same logic applies to attacking police because they are police, or attacking suits. It is lazy and stupid generalisations that started this whole mess in the first place and the sooner we transcend this and start to accept every person as an individual, the sooner this crap will all be over and we can all concentrate on making the world good again.

townie
mail e-mail: cant_cope@hotmail.com


More mainstream media links

28.05.2001 03:15

Here's the Guardian's coverage of the events in Oldham. Read it online and save 45p.

www.guardian.co.uk/racism/Story/0,2763,497637,00.html
www.guardian.co.uk/racism/Story/0,2763,497644,00.html
www.guardian.co.uk/racism/Story/0,2763,497643,00.html

Lemming
mail e-mail: lemming@grandtheftcyber.com
- Homepage: http://www.guardian.co.uk


bradford

28.05.2001 11:34

Dont forget they had a pretty big riot in bradford not tool ong ago.. maybe a month I cant quite remember. also supposedly racially motivated.

ou


Fuck the Erection

28.05.2001 11:55

CBS news summed it up last night, race, law and order and immigration are 'election issues,' so they had to have an incident to point at... Oldam, NF have been antagonising Asians for months, it culminated in an attack on a family, and the Asian youth rose up. More power to the Asians for WHIPPING police ass, and they did! But this isn't a race or immigration issue, these are third generation Pakistanis, born here!! It's an election issue, and that's why it's been instigated, from the highest echelons of government.

Agent Provocateur


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