Law and Disorder

 

 

 

The streets where Jack lived were a law unto themselves. People did, basically, as they pleased, living on reputations, backed up by threats and acts of violence and intimidation, but very little else. Wealth was measured in terms of criminal activity-the more you stole, the richer you were. The strongest led the packs of those who wished to be strong, while the ‘weak’ just survived as best they could, often to the whims of the anger, indifference or/and good will shown by those who ruled over them. Those who chose to reject this hierarchy of crime and violence also held little status and, as such, ran the risk of becoming a ‘random’ victim and would be advised to become anonymous to minimise this risk.

Meanwhile the rats danced in the streets of anarchy; basking in the raptures of its chaos. Always ready to scurry back into their holes at the sound of a siren or glimpse of a uniform. Silence was their weapon. An impregnable wall of silence- to break this silence was to be a grass and a grass’s punishment was exile from the hierarchy, at best, or a violent death at worst. No individual was more important than the cultivation and preservation of intimidation and fear that maintained the status quo within the forgotten peoples’ community.

Besides, a negative reaction to authority was second nature to Jacks people- and many others like them. It was a street law of hatred, distrust and paranoia that had passed from generation to generation, father to son, mother to daughter, like a precious family heirloom. Often there was nothing else to give. As lineage self- perpetually instilled these opinions into fertile and impressionable young minds, the gap between law and disorder became harder to bridge, with neither trying to bridge it. The contempt, from both ‘sides’, becoming more, and more, reinforced with bedtime tales of miraculous crimes and daring escapades. The social status of the individual increasing on these merits and the amount of time they’d spent in jail, while those in authority gained commendations and congratulations for taking away the freedom of those who never really had a choice. For being the only way they knew how to be.

Whether or not either side truly wanted a solution was a moot point. All trust had died long ago, in another time. With limited options in health care, employment and education there were really only three options left for them to take. A life on, diminishing, state benefits- an unskilled, labour job that paid little more- or to give themselves options. It became easier to sell their wares of drugs, stolen goods and illegally imported alcohol and tobacco than to struggle just to survive surrounded by wealth, that there was no access to, opportunities reserved for the ‘elite’. Ghettoised, marginalized and forgotten- loan and hire purchase debt mounting, as the poor struggled to accomplish that, which the media promotes as a pre-requisite to perfection, position and desirability. The only adventures left to stimulate fertile young minds was the buzz of intoxication, the adrenaline rush, and stress release, of violent confrontation or to take what they had been shown to be enviable. Families would mourn the tragic loss of their children who perished, high on alcohol and drugs, speeding away in a stolen car from the long arm of the law that regarded them as scum, but little ever changed. Leisure time, still, consisted mainly of alcoholism, recreational drug use, solvent abuse and mindless violence. Still, they aspired to’ pop stars’, sports celebrities, actors and other, self interested- media promoted ‘personalities’ who still offered them various forms of escapism and the promise of self-improvement.

 As each individual realised the improbability of ever achieving these pre-determined standards, however, all of their drive and passion had been redirected to things that are far more realistically achievable. Insular and un-cooperative nihilism was the only response they felt they had left to give. (Even those who chose to obey the law had to at least bend the rules to survive within a stigmatised culture of high crime rates and un-employment and low standards of health and academic achievement. It was easy to break the law, there were that many of them.)

Their self-sabotaging behaviour, manifest in the image of aggressive resentment and reckless abandon, served to qualify the only opinions that had been heard: the voice of the minority in authority. Ultimately, Jacks people would become tagged, tracked and coded, much like the products that they had dreamt of possessing that had, ironically, driven them to the behaviour that the authorities used to justify these draconian measures.’ Crime Concern’ was the pretext in justifying the close circuit cameras that kept an ever watchful eye on the people who lived on the estate, 24hours a day and 7days a week. They were all suspects until they could prove their innocence- over and over again. This message was reinforced with dawn raids on suspected drug dealers’ homes, ‘stop and search’, undercover work, ‘name and shame’ and street patrols of armoured vans equipped with mobile c.c.t.v.

‘We’re watching you’, it was proclaimed to all; there was no longer any reason to consider mitigation of such a display of power. Without any accountability to think of, procedure became an order of arbitrary actions, only to be taken seriously under scrutiny - investigation rendered obsolete when they could pull anyone in the area without cause and deploy all means necessary to find the ‘truth’. Why read ‘rights’ when there aren’t any and why worry about being exposed by a stereotype of the scandalous, (especially when you’ve got so many colleagues who will provide an, ‘eye-witness’, account in testament to your innocence)?

 They were cutting corners- letting the cameras and informants do the groundwork, then coming in heavy and hard against a community of people they had no relationship with and saw as a ‘problem to be solved’. The people were as afraid of the police as they were the street gangs of criminals and the drug financed crime syndicates.

Mediators’ attempts to create a positive dialogue from a neutral platform, (which they hoped would become the catalyst by which positive change could be made and sustained), had failed with neither ‘side’ wanting to approach the ‘negotiating table’. A rigid adherence to the histrionics of reactionary law-makers; the risk of being known as a collaborator, or an informer, as well as the mutual suspicion of coercion and/or entrapment would prove to be the relative motivational factors when giving explanation for the difficulty in facilitating any positive communication.

Police visited local schools in a vain attempt to stop the cycle of animosity, distrust and hatred that threatened to engulf the minds of ever younger children as the cycle spiralled ever larger throughout the community as- more rights infringed upon, another false arrest, another allegation of brutality, another high speed chase that ended in death, all fuelled its momentum. The police were met with initial trepidation, then with mockery and contempt. The officers’ ‘normality’ serving only to prove to them that they were nothing to fear and this, in turn, fuelled the resentment of those who wished to command respect on the merits of the authority that the uniform represented and sought to uphold.

 Community workers were jeered in the street as ‘lackeys to authority’ and, on occasion, attacked to enhance a reputation or/and as reprisal for being suspected of passing on information. Anyone from outside of the area was met with scrutiny and suspicion.

 The council accepted extra state funding in return for using the area to house political refugees, asylum seekers and to secretly re-locate sex offenders. They revealed these agreements without any prior consultation and then announced them in the same breath, as if sex offenders and refugees were one and the same. It certainly suggested the same status.

 The community became more divided than ever, only those minorities of ‘naturalised’ status ascended within the hierarchy of hate as they unleashed their own ‘fury’ and sought to separate their own identities from the stigma of being a refugee, ‘foreign’ or ‘immigrant’ and to also substantially reduce the risk of a mistaken assault. The refugees were the newest intruders to an area that consisted of everything its inhabitants’ would ever have. They were convinced that these people, who had, in their minds, no right to be there, would take it away. Newcomers were all suspected of and questioned about being sex offenders- the suspicion was projected to the refugees who appeared and disappeared, relocated intermittently- without petition- between communities, cities, countries and detention camps, to and from the area in large numbers, adding weight to the protective stance of the indigenous and ‘integrated’ populace.

They weren’t willing to take the risk that the sex offenders had indeed been ‘rehabilitated’. How did anyone know that the refugees weren’t ‘perverts’? (After all; what did anyone know about these peoples’ pasts? They could be anyone, terrorists, war criminals, paedophiles, murderers or rapists, were the whispers at the bar).

The stakes grew higher. Racially and politically motivated attacks, random vandalism and damage to rival and targeted property, muggings and inter-ethnic fighting became commonplace as the diversity of the ethnicity, cultures and religions, introduced to this contrived, but not considered environment, conflicted and as the violence escalated, (increasing violence encouraged the use of continually more dangerous weapons and extremist ideologies were promoted as radical and desirable answers to social problems, by extremist political organisations and pressure groups hoping to recruit the local population in combating a struggle, created by politicians in the first place), the streets were no longer deemed safe to patrol on foot.

Patrol cars would drive slowly around the area as darkness descended, causing the inhabitants to stop what they were doing and huddle together in groups for increased security- a united front against a common enemy. They stood, looking nonchalantly at one another and feigning conversation- careful glances, whispers and gestures determining the proximity of the slowly passing squad car- engaged in a battle of wills as they shared a cigarette, acting unconcerned as they leaned against walls or became ‘animated as they tried to appear self assured and innocent, but, in reality, they were all ready to run at a moments notice.

Those in the vehicle shook their heads in disappointment that the rabble didn’t have the intelligence to put up a more convincing charade. They’d seen it so many times- it was infuriating! They knew that the b******s were guilty of something or other and if, by chance, they weren’t they knew they would be, eventually. It was inevitable. Then they’d be there to clean up the streets; washing away the blemish that tainted their image. It was the only way to deal with these people. There was just no talking to them; no compromise was possible.

 

 With this firm conviction they would drive away, leaving the flies to buzz around the s**t until they eventually, inevitably, became entangled in the ‘spiders web’ of the law that they had left behind. They drove away the representatives of a society, which regarded Jacks people as a threat and a problem to be eradicated, irrespective of their situation. They drove away the representatives of an authority that rejected all those who failed to live within its code of ethics, regardless of circumstance. They drove away, behind an impenetrable wall of silence.