A more recent gem from the archives than we would normally mine, but with the
forthcoming government report into the riots — and with Fraser’s and
David’s recent posts — we reckoned you might care to (re-)read Harriet Sergeant’s
piece from this summer. It formed the centrepiece of an issue largely dedicated to those fiery disturbances, and which also included thought-provoking articles by Theodore Dalrymple and Ravi Somaiya. Here it is:
These rioters are Tony Blair’s children, Harriet Sergeant, The Spectator, 13 August 2011
On the third day of the London riots I received a telephone call from Mash, a member of a Brixton gang who I befriended three years ago. He was standing outside an electronics shop in Clapham, watching the looting. I could hear shouts, glass breaking but never a police siren. I urged him to go home. ‘Harri man,’ he remonstrated, his voice hoarse with emotion, “You don’t get to do this every day.
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