An interview in a (South African) Sunday paper with a ‘hopping mad’Caiphus Semenya (the South African musician* was surprised to hear his music was being sampled in the ‘Murder to Excellence’ track on the Jay-Z & Kanye West’s Watch The Throne album — without him being consulted) got us curious about the song used. Turns out it is ‘Celie Shaves Mr./Scarification Ceremony’, of The Color Purple soundtrack which Semenya co-wrote with Quincy Jones, Harvey Mason Jr., Joel Rosenbaum and Bill Summers:
Get them, Caiphus.
In the meanwhile we’ll stick to Zuluboy sampling another song of his (‘Nomalanga’):
*If you’re wondering who Caiphus is: with his wife Letta Mbulu (fronting their family band) they built respectable careers out of Los Angeles in the 1970s and 1980s. (Click through for the videos of Letta on Soul Train with Caiphus on backing vocals and later in the early 1980s.) When he arrived in the US in the early 1960s, Caiphus started collaborating with Hugh Masekela and Jonas Gwangwa (listen to their Union of South Africa).
Call for Submissions from Writers of Color: Sundryed Affairs
We are currently open for submissions.
SunDryed Affairs is a new online collective of ideas, primarily by writers of color. We publish accessible nonfiction prose* of all genres, sub-genres, and non-genres, including, but not limited to: essay, memoir, satire, list, reviews, personal narrative, instructional manual, reportage, and letter. Subject matter is also open to the imagination.
There are no further guidelines for submitted work other than high-quality writing.
Please direct all inquiries to info(at)sundryedaffairs.com and submissions to Kyla Marshell kyla.marshell(at)sundryedaffairs.com and Anthony anthonydeanharris(at)sundryedaffairs.com. In your email, please include a) a brief bio and b) how you learned of SunDryed Affairs. Accepted work will be edited for grammatical correctness only.
*SunDryed Affairs does NOT publish fiction, poetry, drama, scholarship, or children's writing.
Visit sundryedaffairs.com for more information and to read our current issues. We publish new work twice monthly.
Contact Information:
For inquiries: info(at)sundryedaffairs.com
For submissions: kyla.marshell(at)sundryedaffairs.com or anthonydeanharris(at)sundryedaffairs.com
Contest does not accept work previously published or having received awards in other competitions. Notify us immediately if your work is accepted elsewhere.
Win cash, publication, and recognition!
$100 first place winners, $75 second, and $50 third
Plus publication in the Seven Hills Review
Contest Categories
Short Story 2,500 word maximum, any genre. Short Storyjudge: Mark Mustian
Creative Nonfiction 2,500 word maximum. Submissions in this genre could include (but are not limited to) memoir, food or travel writing, personal essays, new journalism, biography, nonfiction stories, and nature writing. The emphasis in creative nonfiction is on factually true yet elegant literary expression. Creative Nonfiction judge: D.K. Roberts
Children’s Picture Books for ages 4-8, with 2,500 word maximum. (Note: We offer children’s chapter book competition in alternate years.) Children’s Picture Books judge: Boots Hensel
Flash Fiction 500 word maximum, any genre. Flash Fiction judge: Philip Deaver
Submission title should be in upper left corner of your manuscript and page number in upper right corner of each page.
Author’s name is not to appear on manuscript pages.
Fee of $17 per submission, nonmembers. $12 TWA members with paid dues. Pay by credit card on a secure server. Your credidt card information is not stored.
You will receive an acknowledgment email that your manuscript is in the system.
A list of winners will be sent to all entrants via email and posted on the TWA Web site by Nov. 30, 2011.
Snail Mail Submission Guidelines
Submit three double-spaced copies, typed on one side of 8 1/2 by 11 paper.
Submission title should be in upper left corner and page number in upper right corner of each page.
Author’s name is not to appear on manuscript pages or on any materials attached to it.
To submit hardcopies: Send your submission/s and entry fee/s (payable to Monkey Puzzle Press) to: Monkey Puzzle Press PO Box 20804 Boulder, CO 80308 Attn: Flash Fiction Contest
All submissions must include the writer’s contact information on the first page: name, address, phone number, and e-mail address. Include a SASE if you would like a reply via USPS.
We won’t be judging stories based on any particular content or context, just send your best piece of flash fiction. For a flier, click here. For additional information, dig our website:
monkeypuzzlepress.com/magazine-submissions/
All entries will be considered for publication!
Contest Judge: Nicholas B. Morris, author of Tapeworm
We start off with Nina Simone, concerts given upon leaving America, follow thru with Moroccan vocalist/songwriter Malika Zarra, and end up with a double dozen of interpretations of Stayhorn’s class "Lush Life" featuring Billy Strayhorn, Billy Eckstine, Kenny Clarke - Francy Boland Sextet, Danilo Perez, Leila Maria,Tito Puente, Nat King Cole, Sexto Sentido, Dianne Reeves & Russell Malone, Clifford Jordan, Bettye LaVette, Norman Connors with Spencer Harris, Joe Henderson, Jacintha, John Coltrane, Andy Bey, Calvin Keys, Franck Amsallem featuring Elisabeth Kontomanou, Dave Burrell, Jose James & Jef Neve, Gene Ammons, Archie Shepp & Siefgried Kessler, Sarah Vaughan, and of course John Coltrane & Johnny Hartman.
Simply put Nina Simone is black music’s most significant vocalist during the last half of the 20th century. Her work embodied the aspirations and experiences of legions of both fellow artists and audience members. During the critical Civil Rights/Black Power era, Nina defined what it meant to be a black artist and gave defiant voice to the militant expression of Black resistance to oppression and exploitation. Through songs such as “Mississippi Goddamn,” “Four Women,” and “Young, Gifted and Black” Nina Simone sang from inside the skins of frontline fighters for social justice.
Professionally, she started as a supper club singer. Her initial hit was a smoldering interpretation of “I Love You Porgy.” But as the times changed, she transformed. Aspects of her life that previously had been kept private were unfurled and flown like a battle flag. Of course, she paid a heavy price, a heavy, heavy price. The repercussions nearly drove her mad.
In her latter years she would sometimes rue the choices she had made. (See this short video interview) Nevertheless, the body of work she produced is unmatched by any of her contemporaries or, for that matter, by any who have followed her. Other singers may have made more money but none made more music.
Meet Aman Ali and Bassam Tariq, two Muslim American friends who are now in the second week of their road trip from Alaska to New York City. Last week, Ali and Tariq marked the begining of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan by setting off on their cross country journey, on which they’ll travel to a new Mosque each day.
They’ve kept a blog about their journey, writing, “the true stars of this project are the readers that have supported the initiative. In less than a month, readers gave more than $12,000 in online donations to this project to make this half-baked idea to go across the country a reality.”
So far, they’ve made their way out West and stopped along at mosques in Washington state, California, and Nevada. In one visit to a mosque in Corvallis Islamic Center, Ali and Bassam asked young Muslims what they would say to Mohamed Osman Mohamud, the young muslim Oregon State University student who was arrested last November for trying to detonate an explosive device at a Christmas tree lighting ceremony in Oregon. The result was a a mix of compassion, and frustration. “The biggest fear in fighting a monster is becoming a monster yourself,” one young man writes. “The path toward peace and prosperity is paved with patience.”
For more glimpses of their adventure, check out this beautiful video of their visit to a mosque in Washington:
We’re ending the day as often as possible by celebrating love. We welcome your ideas for posts. Send suggestions to submissions@colorlines.com, and be sure to put Celebrate Love in the subject line. You can send links to videos, graphics, photos, quotes, whatever. Or just chime in to the comments below and we’ll find you. Be sure to let us know you’ve got the rights to share any media you send.
JACKSON, Miss. — When Dr. Herman A. Taylor Jr. goes for breakfast in this city of 180,000, he orders carefully: granola, fresh fruit. "People look at what I put on my tray," he said on a recent morning at the Broad Street Bakery, a local cafe. "They wonder if I practice what I preach."
Around Jackson, where a common breakfast can be eggs fried in lard, Dr. Taylor, a University of Mississippi cardiologist, is known as "heart man." He is the director of the Jackson Heart Study, the largest epidemiological investigation ever undertaken to discover the links between cardiovascular disease and race.
From now until 2014, Dr. Taylor and his team will be following 5,302 black residents of three Mississippi counties — Hinds, Rankin and Madison — observing their lives and how their heart health is related to their environment.
For the study's participants, there will be periodic medical examinations and referrals for care when problems are detected. The ultimate aim of the $54 million investigation, Dr. Taylor said, "is to gain the information we need to stop an epidemic of cardiovascular diseases within the African-American community."
Q. The Framingham Heart Study, which tracked cardiovascular disease in three generations of New Englanders, is thought to be the most productive investigation in public health history. With Framingham's research continuing, why do something similar here in Jackson?
A. Framingham can't tell us everything. You can probably count the number of blacks in the original study on one hand. Well, maybe two. It's no one's fault. When that study was first begun in 1948, the town of Framingham was mostly populated by second-generation immigrants and Yankees. That's just what it was.
But if there are unique risks and environmental agents triggering cardiovascular disease in African-Americans, Framingham's data can't be that helpful.
Q. Is there a special problem with heart disease in African-Americans?
A. For the nation as a whole, death from cardiovascular disease has declined since 1963. Yet, if you look at African-Americans in regions like Mississippi, mortality from heart disease is flat, or trending upward. This is particularly true for women. A middle-aged black woman in Mississippi will have four times the risk of death from cardiovascular disease than a white woman elsewhere in the country.
We have reasonable guesses why this is so. We think obesity is hugely important. We also think that smoking, inactivity, high blood pressure and access to health care figure into the problem, too. But we have to pin it down. We need more information on things like social support, anger, hostility, optimism. There may also be some unique buffers against stress within our community — like religion and extended family.
When you do a study like this, you want to figure out what's killing people. You enroll a large number and follow them. Over the years, some people will get sick; others won't. So the job is to try to determine the difference between those who got sick and those who didn't.
That's how Framingham worked.
Q. Why do a health study in Jackson?
A. What did the bank robber Willie Sutton answer when asked why he robbed banks? "Because that's where the money is!" Mississippi is where the heart disease is. We have the highest rates of it in the country.
Q. You've just finished collecting your base line data. Have you found anything interesting? A. Very high levels of obesity, higher than the national average. African- American women lead the way in obesity nationally, and our numbers here are significantly higher than that. The rates of diabetes and hypertension are quite high.
Interestingly, alcohol consumption among the women is much lower than average. There are some other findings, but we'll have to hold off on announcing them until they are published in professional journals.
Q. Are you looking at the unique stresses that African-Americans experience — racial discrimination, for instance?
A. We have questionnaires that zero in on discrimination. But we also look at the response, how you cope with it.
Also, a lot of the areas where blacks live are economically depressed. One of the things we're looking at is, What kind of access do you have to a healthy lifestyle?
Can you get out of there to walk, do exercise — or is the level of violence in your immediate surroundings so high that this would be a risky proposition? We look at how many grocery stores are in a certain area. Do you have to rely on the corner market with its jars of pickled eggs and pigs' feet on the counter?
Q. Is the traditional diet of Mississippi a problem related to heart disease?
A. Yes. In the traditional diet, the fat and calories are astronomical. They add up to our being the fattest state in the union. The soul food diet needs a lot of tweaking if it's ever to be remotely healthy.
There was a study of blacks and whites in a Georgia county in the 1960's. It showed that even given the traditional diet, blacks had a surprisingly low rate of coronary heart disease. The big difference: they were sharecroppers, people who did physical work. They didn't have nearly the access to bad things all day long that people have now.
The problem today for people living under stressful conditions is that harmful stuff is sometimes a cheap way to take a load off their lives and feel less stressed. I think that drives a lot of eating and smoking.
Q. Do you think that some people are going to hate your message of heart health?
A. Some will think we're further stigmatizing a group with a lot of problems already. But if you have conversations with African-Americans from the South, they already suspect that a lot of things they love are no good for them.
Q. Do you try to intervene in the lives of the people you're studying?
A. We're an observational study. But we have to be careful. If you don't share helpful information because you don't want to interfere with the natural history of their disease, then you're on a slippery slope. That was the rationale behind keeping information from the sick in the Tuskegee study.
People around here remember that. So, of course, we take an active role in spreading the word about prevention.
Also, when one of our medical exams shows something of clinical importance in a participant, we contact their physician. If they don't have one, we have a group of local doctors who've volunteered to take them on.
Q. Did you grow up in the South?
A. Near Birmingham. My mother was a teacher; my father a steelworker, active in his union.
During my childhood, I think there were two big influences, beyond my family: the incredibly heroic acts you saw from individuals like Martin Luther King, and the space program. I wanted to grow up and help my people. I also dreamed about science. For me personally, the wonderful thing about working on this study is that it's a way for me to do both.
Here’s a new Trailer for The Interrupters, a new Documentary Directed and shot by Steve James, best known for “Hoop Dreams,” “The Interrupters” takes a look at a gutsy, activist component of the Chicago Project for Violence Prevention. “The Interrupters” gets its name from a specific set of organizers who perform conflict mediation as part of CeaseFire, an initiative of the Chicago Project. The focus of CeaseFire is street violence, which organizers try to stem through outreach workers and so-called violence interrupters who literally put themselves in harm’s way.
If law-and-order conservatives seek to address crime with stiffer sentences and ever more prison cells, which cosmetically reduce crime statistics at the cost of long-term social devastation, liberals often insist that nothing can be done about crime unless something else — unemployment or inequality of education or the fractured African-American family — gets fixed first. CeaseFire essentially takes the position that violence is both a cause and a symptom of social dysfunction, and that every time Matthews or Williams or Bocanegra gets in somebody’s face and stops a shooting, it’s another step toward a more normal society. (Via The DaliyBeast.com)
British police have been described as "impotent" by some European papers
When there is an outbreak of violence, reactions are often formed by long-held political beliefs. There is point-scoring. There is some schadenfreude.
All of this has been there but also, this time, a recognition that Britain's problems are widely shared.
Some of those who have opposed the current European creed of austerity cuts see the trouble as the inevitable rage against deprivation and a bleak future.
Others see the unrest as part of a gang culture that has taken root in the past 15 years, even while more money than ever before was being pumped into public services.
Certainly Europe has been watching. Its papers and TV channels have devoted enormous coverage to the riots.
"Disunited Kingdom", said the headline in the French paper Liberation. Le Monde's front page was "England in flames".
Liberation, a left-leaning paper, made a wider point: "The riots in London are a serious alarm call for the UK but also for all mixed and unequal Western societies".
L'Express, too, asked "London today, Paris tomorrow?" The paper went on: "We have the same type of youths who are poorly integrated, unemployed and victims of the economic crisis."
'Awesome fear'
For some of the rioters looting was a gang activity and was bragged about over other rival gangs
Indeed having covered the unrest in the Paris suburbs, or banlieues, there are similarities - but there are differences.
Most of the violence in 2005 was confined to the large estates that ring the French capital.
In London, rich communities live alongside poor public housing. In that sense, said one French paper, the "scenes from London inspire an even stronger, awesome fear".
Both in France and the UK - for all the efforts, the funding, the public inquiries - integration for many minorities remains elusive. Some minorities prefer it that way, but many feel outsiders in the society they have chosen. Others feel excluded from the more fulfilling jobs.
Some of these tensions reflect a Europe where 24 million people are without jobs.
When there are new arrivals, they often compete with those already struggling on the margins of society.
I remember a visit to Barking and Dagenham, where some of the fiercest opponents of more immigrants were African migrants who understood that their toe-hold on society would be threatened by newcomers.
In truth, many European societies are struggling with integration, and it is made much harder at a time of economic downturn.
'Katrina moment'
In the European coverage little attention is given to gang culture, where young people find their identity in a gang.
For some of the rioters looting was a gang activity and was bragged about over rival gangs. In some instances there are reports of rival gangs working together.
Gangs, of course, reflect social and family breakdown. Why it has mushroomed in London - even when significant funds were being invested in the public sector - will, I am sure, be long discussed. It was also the case that many local authorities employed advisers designed to improve community relations.
In one article entitled The riots of Paris and London: A tale of two cities, Bruce Crumley wonders what the lasting impact will be. "It numbs the mind to contemplate what kinds of new attacks on multiculturalism will surge in Britain once the waves of nightly violence subside."
He says that after the French riots in 2005, Paris was able to to promise more money for the suburbs and the replacement of the worst housing projects but, he notes, David Cameron has no money.
The German magazine Der Spiegel says that "some Londoners are fleeing to the continent on Eurostar".
Somehow I doubt this, but the paper describes a police force that "appears to be impotent". The TV images reminded the correspondent of Mogadishu, and he says the riots are David Cameron's Katrina moment - a reference to George W Bush's lack of grip after the hurricane hit New Orleans.
Austerity without hope
There are frequent references to the Olympics in a year's time and the perceived damage to "Britain's international reputation".
In a more reflective tone, a Spanish paper questions whether representative democracy is incapable of dealing peacefully with the growing unrest.
All over Europe cuts are being made to the public sector, to benefits, to social programmes. The safety net is being weakened. Europe's much-vaunted way of life is changing. All of this is happening at a time of shocking youth unemployment. Over 40% in Greece, over 43% in Spain, over 60% in Naples, the city I am writing from.
Parts of Europe are undergoing a cultural revolution. The old Europe with its extensive welfare programmes is in jeopardy.
There will be much to argue over. Do benefits weaken or strengthen commitment to society? After all - despite all the educational support and welfare programmes - a persistent underclass remains, often alienated from society.
Last year when I was in Dublin, Bill Clinton was there. He spoke of the dangers of implementing austerity without offering hope.
That's what struck me about the European coverage of Britain's riots: A recognition that for much of Europe these are challenging times where growth is elusive and where funds will be leaner than in the past and where even for the educated young there is little prospect they will share the same way of life as their parents.
A jazz singer who scolded rioters, a Polish woman who jumped from a burning building and a Malaysian student who was cruelly mugged have become the three captivating stories of the UK riots. Pauline Pearse has become a massive hit on YouTube and been dubbed “the heroine of Hackney”, while Monika Konczyk’s brave jump has become the iconic image of the riots. Meanwhile, Ashraf Haziq, who was robbed after being attacked is receiving hundreds of tweets in hospital, after a special hashtag was created in his honour.
On Monday, footage of a young man being comforted and then robbed, only moments after he was attacked led to widespread condemnation. Observers said the attack was one of the most callous actions by rioters:
On Wednesday, media organisations tracked down the 20-year-old victim Asyraf Haziq, a student from Malaysia. Abdul Hamid, who shot the footage from his flat, has told of how the drama unfolded:
“It was sickening to see him lying there so helpless…But then for these people to come along when he was in that state and mug him was ridiculous.I wanted to go down and help but I was terrified that I would get beaten up as well. There were about 50 or more of them," said Abdul Hamid, who shot the footage from his flat.
Friends of Asyraf Haziq have been posting images and videos of him recuperating from his ordeal, after he came to worldwide attention. Friends have also started a hashtag #getwetllsoonashrafhaziq in his honour:
One friend, Zaharah Othman, posted a video of Asyraf in hospital and wrote:
Asyraf Haziq is in safe hands now, Alhamdulillah, and awaiting surgery on his broken lower jaw. I visited him yesterday with Datuk Mukhriz, Dr Noorzalina, Mara director and UMNO London chairman, Dzuhair Hanafiah. Pray that he has a speedy recovery. Insyaallah. Asyraf is the student in the youtube video clip attacked and robbed by the mobs in Barking.
Footage of a woman passionately appealing for an end to the violent riots has now been watched over 1.6m times. Today, after two days trying to track her down, she was named as Pauline Pearce (45), a jazz singer, community radio activist and grandmother:
The iconic image of a woman leaping from a burning building in Croydon prompted a media campaign to identify the “mystery woman” and reveal her dramatic story. The picture, which was reproduced on several international frontpages, captured the chaos that befell many areas, and has helped shape a narrative about the people crying and shouting as they watched their apartments burn.
Headlines such as these have been running:
But tonight the Guardian newspaper named the “mystery woman” as Monika Konczyk.
Friends have told how they rescued Monika Konczyk from her smoke-filled flat in a moment that has become the defining image of the riots. The terrified Polish woman, who only arrived in Britain in March, was shouting for help from her first-floor window as the fire that destroyed the neighbouring Reeves furniture store threatened to engulf adjacent buildings.
Friends have told how they rescued Monika Konczyk from her smoke-filled flat in a moment that has become the defining image of the riots.
The terrified Polish woman, who only arrived in Britain in March, was shouting for help from her first-floor window as the fire that destroyed the neighbouring Reeves furniture store threatened to engulf adjacent buildings.
The now famous picture taken by photographer Amy Weston on Monday night. Photograph: WENN.com
Apparently defying orders from police not to get any closer to the blaze, friends said they ran through thick smoke and intense heat to the Victorian terrace on Church Street and laid mattresses and pillows on the ground for her to land on.
Onlookers shouted "jump, jump" as Konczyk, 32, was coaxed out of the sash window, sliding down the awning of the discount store below and then jumping into the arms of a Romanian man called Adrian. Police in riot gear also moved in to help.
According to Vaz Juresco, owner of the neighbouring Pain Divine tattoo parlour, Konczyk was unable to escape down the back stairs like other residents because the building had rapidly filled with thick smoke.
"You have no idea – the smoke was like a thick cloud," said Juresco. "It wasn't just ash but hot rocks and bits of brick. They were spraying out like a shower."
In the smoke and confusion there were conflicting accounts of who caught Konczyk. Several onlookers believe a riot policeman caught her when she jumped, but Adrian insisted he caught her.
He said she was weeping with shock but was not taken to hospital and instead was met by her boyfriend and taken to stay with her sister. Konczyk, who is from Koronowo in Poland and was working in a local Poundland, was described as fine but too shaken to talk.
"We are neighbours. Nobody is a hero," he said.
But the rescuer was critical of the authorities and claimed that after she was brought away from the scene by a group of police there was no one to check on her. "I caught the girl. Afterwards nobody was asking if she was OK or calling an ambulance."
Konczyk's friends said she was still too traumatised to talk about her ordeal. She may change her mind when she is told about the PR companies and picture agencies touting to represent her and the media organisations offering money for her story.
The ruined remains of the Reeves building were demolished in an hour-an-a-half as local residents struggled to come to terms with the disappearance of a family firm that has been trading since 1867. One woman was in tears. "All my furniture came from that shop," she said.
After 36 hours waiting in nearby hotels, where they were placed by Croydon city council, other residents were allowed through police cordons to inspect the damage to their homes. One man was still wearing the clothes in which he fled the fire: one training shoe and one sandal.
Businesses on the street where Koncyzk jumped remained closed, some having suffered badly from smoke damage. Naveen Khosla, owner of Barker's pharmacy next to where Konczyk jumped, said he was concerned for his customers, who included the elderly who would not have got their medication. "My priority in all of this now is patient care," he said. "We are letting down the elderly patients who are homebound and the disabled who can't get out."
Deliveries had to be suspended during two days of disturbances earlier this week and a nearby pharmacy which was dispensing medicines for patients of fire-damaged Barker's had to close early.
Three men have been run over and killed as they protected property in a second night of violence in Birmingham.
The men aged 31, 30 and 21 were hit by a car in Winson Green. They were taken to City Hospital where about 200 people from the Asian community gathered.
Witnesses said the men were in a group protecting their community after riot police were called into the city.
Police have arrested a 32-year-old man who is being questioned on suspicion of murder following the deaths.
Haroon Jahan, 21, Shahzad Ali, 30, and Abdul Musavir, 31, were taken to hospital but died from their injuries.
West Midlands Police Chief Constable Chris Sims said the incident happened when a group of males had been gathered close to a petrol station in Dudley Road.
"At some point, and in circumstances that as yet I can't fully explain, a vehicle has been driven into that group of males, which tragically has led to three of those men losing their lives," he said.
All three were from the Asian Muslim community, he said.
'Covered in blood'
Referring to the arrest he said: "He has been arrested for murder because the information that we have at the moment would support the idea the car was deliberately driven."
Click to play
Tariq Jahan: "My instinct was to help the three people who had been injured. I helped the first man, then somebody told me one of them was my son".
Prime Minister David Cameron called it a "truly dreadful incident" and offered his condolences to the men's families.
Tariq Jahan, whose son Haroon Jahan was killed, said he was nearby when it happened.
"My instinct was to help the three people, I did not know who they were but they had been injured.
"I was helping the first man and someone from behind told me my son was behind me.
"So I started CPR on my own son, my face was covered in blood, my hands were covered in blood.
"Why, why?"
He said his son, who was a mechanic, had been trying to protect the community as incidents were taking place elsewhere in the area. He said a petrol station along the road had been attacked.
"He was a very good lad, a good man starting at the beginning of his life and had his whole life ahead of him," he said.
"I've got no words to describe why he was taken and why this has happened and what's happening to the whole of England.
"It makes no sense why people are behaving in this way and taking the lives of three innocent people."
Witnesses to the incident said the three victims - two of them brothers - were part of a group protecting shops from looting.
Kabir Khan Isakhel said: "People came out of prayers [at a local mosque] and they were protecting the area.
"They were standing on the side of the road and the car just came and ran them over."
Mohammed Shakiel, 34, a carpenter, said the men "lost their lives for other people".
'Car came flying'
"They weren't standing outside a mosque, a temple, a synagogue or a church - they were standing outside shops where everybody goes.
"They were protecting the community as a whole."
The road in Winson Green has been closed off to collect evidence
West Midlands Police said: "Three men have died following a road collision in the Winson Green area of Birmingham which detectives are treating as murder.
"Three men were taken to hospital where two later died from their injuries. A third man was in a critical condition but confirmed dead at around 6.30am.
"West Midlands Police have launched a murder inquiry, arrested one man in connection with the incident and recovered a vehicle nearby which will be examined by forensics experts."
Mr Sims said he wanted to ensure the incident did not lead to a wider level of mistrust or violence.
"At these difficult times, people across all our communities must trust the police to protect them," he said.
A community meeting has been held in Winson Green with police and Ladywood MP Shabana Mahmood attending.
'Mix of voices'
Residents called for police to protect them and Ms Mahmood said it was important people did not take matters into their own hands.
Speaking after the meeting, she said the families of the young men were "absolutely devastated".
"There have been a number of meetings with local community members and there will be more later on," she said.
"We must not allow anyone to panic - we should give the community some space to grieve."
She also said the police should be given space to carry out their inquiries and appealed for calm.
Derrick Campbell, of Race Equality Sandwell, appealed to people not to take the law into their own hands.
"The police are here to take charge and are doing their job," he said.
"I would appeal to all to please remain calm - we must cease the violence and please do not turn this into something that it is not.
About 200 people from Birmingham's Asian community gathered outside City Hospital
"This is an accident, by the sounds of it - we certainly haven't got any more information more than that but we must remain calm and wait for the investigation to be concluded."
The Bishop of Aston, Andrew Watson, said he had attended a meeting with local MP Shabana Mahmood and 40 Muslim men from the community.
"There was a mix of voices," he said.
"Some were saying we mustn't rise up but there was some talk of reprisals. The community is in shock.
"The meeting helped, it was good the MP responded so quickly and we could talk to the community."
Officers have appealed for witnesses or anyone with information to come forward.
There was looting in Birmingham city centre, Wolverhampton and West Bromwich on Tuesday night.
Police said there were 163 arrests on Tuesday evening and Wednesday morning up to 03:00 BST. That brings the total number of arrests in the West Midlands to about 300 since the disorder began.
Police have been investigating reports that shots had been fired in the Aston area of Birmingham.
“Why are we doing this? I lost my son. Step forward if you want to lose your sons. Otherwise, calm down and go home. Please.” Tariq Jahan’s son Haroon was killed in Birmingham on Tuesday night with two others as he tried to protect local businesses from looters. The three young men were rammed by a car as they stood in the street. A murder inquiry has been opened into the incident. It was the heartfelt words of a father in mourning, however, that struck a chord with many as Jahan appealed on Wednesday for an end to the riots.
So it has come to this. Outside, sirens doppler back and forth every few minutes. My street is one of the quiet ones. The looting is restricted to areas with high street brands.
The irony here is so thick it could cure anaemia. London is overrun by looters, smashing in windows, tearing open shutters and making off into the night with armfuls of tracksuit bottoms, DVD players and flatscreen televisions. The streets are strewn with hangers.
The purported flashpoint of this widespread disorder? The shooting of a young man in Tottenham, north London named Mark Duggan. He was shot by the police in what can generously be described as an opaque incident involving an exchange of fire that may or may not have involved the police accidentally shooting each other and blaming it on him. The people smashing into sports shops and electronics stores probably don’t even know his name. They’re too busy, in the words of this girl, “getting [their] taxes back”. With Duggan’s death fresh enough to be bandied about as a cause, the rioting could be somehow explained as a form of protest, an eruption of vitriol from the disaffected youth inhabiting the poorer districts of this city, struggling to find a role in society that won’t involve performing oral sex on disused railway platforms or stacking shelves at Tesco.
How is this anti-establishment sentiment made manifest? By what can only be described as violent shopping. Rampaging through the communities they grew up in, they take out their frustration at a lack of occupation or engagement on the shops and businesses that provide employment in their area, they smash-and-grab the luxury items which are supposedly the fruit of all the social climbing, work and effort our society enshrines. Their generation’s grand gesture of disobedience is straight-up Western-style consumer-capitalism, pure and uncut, direct from the amygdala. Take whatever you can get your hands on for yourself and trash the commons with impunity. They are not inhuman, they are not confused, they are not wrong – they’re us, except they’re doing it here and with no sense of irony. Protest 2.0, London-style.
In Cairo, during the uprising, it was the Egyptian youth who linked arms to protect the Museum of Antiquities, the cultural heritage of their long and respected history. Here in London, if any of these kids have been to a museum, it was after being dragged there by force during a field trip (if their school still had the budget or in fact a subject which included things you’d find in a museum). While there, they glumly trudged the halls, occasionally looking over the dusty artefacts of the past with dull eyes. After all, with a smartphone that has wi-fi and full colour interactive gaming, with Twitter, with Facebook, with Bebo, Myspace, Blackberry Messenger and YouTube, how the hell is a museum supposed to hold a young person’s attention unless they’ve been taught to respect and cherish a slow offering up of knowledge and beauty directly proportionate to the attention one pays? These people have been marketed at since birth. They have been groomed in a manner more insidious than the tactics of the most hungry-eyed paedophile. Their sense of self, their very existence, has been mediated by the economy into which they have been prepped for entry.
From personalised ringtones to Celebrity Big Brother, every possible act of engagement or empowerment has been a commercial transaction for them. Every sub-culture becomes an economic sector. Anything they were taught was only on the syllabus because of its utility in the “knowledge economy”. Who needs to know history or facts when there’s Wikipedia? Who needs maths when there’s a calculator? Who needs handwriting and spelling when there’s Microsoft Office and spell check? Who needs music or art classes when there’s no demand in the marketplace for those skills? Or should I say skillz?
They have been raised as consumers, not as citizens. Consumers have gadgets. Consumers have the respect of business and government because their jealously guarded (and coveted) money is the closest thing they will ever possess to the keys to the kingdom. Even the university education which their parents received for free or for £1000 a year will now cost them £9000 a year if they can get into a university with what little useful knowledge the state allows them to have for their parents’ taxes. After all, don’t we need competition to deliver the best results to the consumer?
Given the opportunity to take to the streets, they come out in force as consumers, not citizens. Their protest is against their lack of spending power, their lack of a flatscreen television, the meddlesome need of government to extract taxation from them for services from which (if they reach their dotage) they will never benefit. They are the purest incarnation of our free market, consumer ideology. They are competing against the law for the best results a consumer can ever hope for, which is something for nothing. And they are winning.
While pundits are onscreen in the coming weeks for the mandatory hand-wringing, while Parliament is debating the inevitable emergency police powers which will bring water cannons and maybe even rubber bullets onto the streets of London, these consumers will be at home watching it all on their new televisions, comfortably toasty in their new tracksuits. They will be re-absorbing the narrative of their activity through the mediated world we created for them, a world which still does not contain a sense of genuine community, of productive work, of social justice, fairness or equality.
Our government decries the violence on the streets of Brixton, Tottenham, Lewisham, Camden, Woolwich, Croydon and Birmingham while levying taxes for wars in Afghanistan, Iraq and Libya. Our deputy mayor is disgusted by the looting of electronics from Curry’s, electronics that have been made for slave wages in a Chinese factory rife with worker suicide and abuse, because that kind of throughput is more “efficient” (read “cheap”) than producing things ourselves using well-compensated labour. How dare they smash their way into a Tesco supermarket and steal food, while Tesco itself runs an approximate £2 billion profit margin annually while purposefully opening up “express” shops next to successful neighbourhood grocery stores, driving them out of business with tactics designed to bypass local objections? How can they set pubs on fire? How malicious is that? Those pubs sell beer from upstanding brands who buy barley from countries wracked by famine while our government bleats about food aid. Whence cometh such cannibalism? Where indeed could these misguided looting fools have gotten these kinds of ideas?
Did these evil thoughts filter into their minds by osmosis? Are they possessed by the Devil? Or did they grow up in single-parent homes on sink estates, surrounded by the remains that “wealth creation” leaves behind, dreaming of a way out? Did the debt-ridden financial system of this country drive both their parents into working long shifts with irregular hours to suit our 24-hour culture, leaving their children in the hands of everyone’s favourite babysitter and pacifier, the television? When Mummy’s hours were cut by Tesco after they put in self-checkout machines, did Mummy have to take a second job to make up the wages she lost?
However did these young people acquire such a bizarre combination of hatred and brand loyalty? How indeed.
As for where this unexpected outpouring of violence came from, the establishment need only cast an eye over the recent past. The dissenters in this country has tried every possible way of reclaiming power. We marched against the invasion of Iraq in our millions. We marched, petitioned and protested against war, against spending cuts, against privatisation, against crony capitalism, against bank bailouts, against globalisation, against corporate tax cuts, against job losses, against pretty much everything we wanted stopped. Did it change a damn thing? Did it stop our government from doing whatever the hell they wanted? Hell no. We even voted against all the major parties in the last election and ended up getting two of them in power instead of none.
In response to the latest raft of austerity measures, students came out and protested for a cause, en masse. It got messy, but hey, nothing like this. Response? Jowly outrage and zero engagement with the demands of the vox populi.
So now, after every avenue has been explored by the public consciousness of this country in an effort to make itself heard, it has come to this. Every one of these thieving magpies on the streets of London tonight is carrying with them a piece of our collective humanity. The frustration at not being listened to, which is even worse than not being heard. The anger at a system that functions in isolation, unaccountable, unresponsive and fundamentally undemocratic. The loneliness of having no community, of families working ceaselessly to meet their obligations as the rising tide drowns everyone without a yacht. The cognitive dissonance of having a millionaire Prime Minister tell us we’re all in it together before flying off to an arms fair in the Arab Emirates as a sales rep for UK Plc, only to now come home early from his family holiday to decry violence.
This is simply the newest manifestation of a festering sore as old as the hills, as untended as a gangrenous limb. There will be other manifestations, make no mistake. If the response of the power structure is to entrench itself, to bring in draconian public order measures and to ignore the underlying root of the problem, this will happen again, only worse and worse as time goes on.
If the individuals in a given society can be considered as parts of an over-arching holistic consciousness expressing itself above the level of personal human awareness, then the collective id of Great Britain just had a serious outburst.
It has been said that violence is the sign language of the inarticulate. If that is true, as I believe it to be, then how much more pronounced are the violent linguistics of the forcibly muted? That this violence turned inward towards the ranks from which it swelled is akin to the self-hatred of the alcoholic, beating himself up about being a drunk instead of laying off the sauce.
By what metric can we judge the behaviour of these people once the nature of our society is taken into account? What transgression can we hang on them which does not originate with our own behaviour, negligence or neglect? Having no sense of community? Having no moral compass? Wanting what they haven’t earned? Taking what does not belong to them? Exploiting the weakness of others through violence? Opportunism? Gluttony? Ignorance? Hypocrisy? Madness? Where can we draw a line that distinguishes their actions here from our collective behaviour as a society both here and in countless, far-flung places?
Whatever the conscious motives or underlying machinations, the metaphor of these riots is the real message, a message which we ignore or underplay at our peril.
Postscript: The word “shopocalypse” was coined by my friend George Arton and, in keeping with recent events, I looted it mercilessly. Shout-out to The West Londoner for keeping the news feed going all night.
For some of the rioters looting was a gang activity and was bragged about over other rival gangs 
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