Should we have predicted a riot?

There is no easy fix and no easy answer as to why the recent riots in England kicked off the way they did.

The riots brought out the worst - and the best - in people. What is it, that makes an individual give up his or her social responsibility and respect for others? Why did people throw away all their moral scruples for a pair of designer trainers, a box of mobile phones or even a pack of mineral water?

Where lies the excitement in throwing missiles at police cars, smashing a shop window and setting the corner shop alight? The very same corner shop where you buy your fags & mags and chat with the owner?

Part of it is down to group mentality, like fish in a fish shoal. The dictionary says:

"Swarm behaviour, or swarming: A collective behaviour exhibited by animals of similar size which aggregate together, perhaps milling about the same spot or perhaps moving en masse or migrating in some direction."

That pretty much says it all. But at what point did people - of all races, sexes, ages and walks of life - let the swarm behaviour take over their social instincts and morals?

Sadly, the debate so far has been very polarised. You either blame the society, culture and/or the government and point at the underlying reasons as to why it happened. Or you blame the individual, their parents and ask for tougher sentences, rubber bullets and longer prison sentences. Adapt the former view and you are classed as a left-wing, liberal idealist with no sense of reality. Adapt the latter and you are a right-wing, conservative traditionalist who believes discipline and deterrence are the only ways forward. I believe there is no black and white analysis to be had. It is, indeed, complicated.

As much as I condemn the appalling actions committed by these individuals, I still believe everyone is a product of his or her society. We all started off as newborn babies, but for some, the environment was not as socially nourishing as it was for others. For some, the world consisted of things. Comforting things. 'Dummy' replacements. Toys. Bags of crisps and Play station. If all you have ever been offered by your parents are things, rather than their time and love, then 'things' will become important to you.

If you have never had a book read to you, never been taken on a visit to the museum, been offered help to explain that algebra homework or had a chance to go on holidays where you meet other people, experience different cultures - then the perception of the world is bound to be different. So yes, I do think a lot of the riot behavior stems from inequality. It is easy to blame the parents but - what were these parents offered by their parents? Also, it has to be said, the society we live in now is not the same as it was, say 30 years ago. On the other hand, not all the rioters were children. In fact, not everyone was even rioting as such. It all started off as a reaction to the shooting in Tottenham, but - somehow, that feels a long time ago now.

A question was raised during the recent BBC Question Time: "Why is it, these riots never happen in countries like Sweden and Norway?" Someone replied: "Equality. It's down to equality."

I feel that really IS one of the fundamental reasons. When part of a country's population has been bereft of the possibility to achieve what they want because of social and economic inequality, there will be consequences. Instead of aspiring to become something, to get out of life what they want, people will become fed up. Fuelled with low self esteem, bitterness and anger with just about everything and everyone, these individuals collectively make a dangerous mix.

If an opportunity arises to get that pair of designer jeans which has just suddenly become available in front of your eyes - with no police to catch you - then you grab them. In fact, you might as well grab the whole rack.

As much as I find the looting morally wrong, I can sort of understand the reasons for it. What I can't quite apprehend is the lack of respect for one's own community. How can you deliberately rob and set fire to someone's corner shop, risking the lives of everyone living in the flats above? If someone was angry with society as a whole, I would expect him or her to attack Westminster, not Hackney. That puzzles me. I can only assume it was that "swarm behaviour" taking over. No 'inner' moral barrier to stop , to say "Hang on, this is wrong."

I do not want to blow my own Swedish trumpet too much and we are far from perfect in Sweden either, but having lived in both countries I do feel there is a difference. The relevance in bringing the Swedish model up is the fact that we have yet to experience something like this in Sweden and I doubt very much we ever will. Undoubtedly, there is still a lot to be done to achieve increased equality in Sweden, but I dare say we have come a lot further than the UK in this respect - with regards to both class and gender.

We don't do titles. Uniforms, suits & ties are not that important. We have a relatively well working social 'rescue net' which catches vulnerable individuals before it's too late. Not always, mind you - but most of the time. We say parents - not 'mums'. A 'page 3' in our few tabloids would be stopped by our discrimination laws before it got a chance to cause public outrage. I could go on.

I firmly believe that the likelihood for riots to happen is relative to the degree of equality a country can show for herself. It takes generations to change and is sadly not a quick fix.

If nothing else, the riots made a lot of people stop and think. We opened up and shared information to support each other. It made communities stick together and stand strong, offer amazing help and support, building new bonds which, I am sure, will last forever. There are so many aspects to discuss, too many for one single blog post. I feel another one coming on...

One which will talk about the role of Social Media in the riots.

Man & Woman

This year, I spent International Women's Day with 23 men from Middlesbrough. I can think of worse ways of spending it.

First of all, can I just make one thing clear. I am not a fan of "Special Days"- full stop.

I appreciate they have their purposes in that they focus people's minds on certain aspects, on charities, good causes etc.

But, I feel Mother's & Father's Day, Valentine's Day - are merely a commercial ploy to make us feel we have to buy cards and flowers. And feel guilty if we don't.

All these days... non-smoking day, hamster day, give-a-friend-a-hug-day (OK - just made those up) - who comes up with these ideas? Is there an international register to which you report them and pick suitable dates? A "Global Day Database"?

Anyway - back to Middlesbrough.

I sell a temporary flood barrier for a living. In fact, I am the UK Manager for the company.

Part of my job description is to provide training for staff who deploy this barrier in a flood emergency situation.

My client had hired me and my partner to come and train their staff. We have done this many times before, for various clients, so this was nothing new.

I usually start off with a theoretical presentation, in a class room. (Or a portacabin...)

After this comes the outdoor, hands-on part of the training, where the candidates are divided into two groups. I take one, my partner takes one. For the rest of the day and the following day, we do nothing but physical training in various types of barrier deployment, trouble shooting etc.

Now - my partner is a man and I am a woman. And in 99% of the courses, our candidates are men. This should not make any difference, but - I feel it does. And here comes my point:

From my perspective, it all starts in the class room. The looks, the expectations.. As a woman, I feel scrutinised. I feel I am either checked out for my technical knowledge and my engineering skills. Or I am checked out for the size of my breasts, slenderness of my waist or tightness of my bottom when I turn towards the whiteboard. This might just be in my own imagination, but - it still remains MY impression of the moment, how I experience it, judging from the looks I get.

My group listens intensively to what I have to say. We go out and they still listen to me explaining how the system works. After all - I do know more than they do in this instance. That is, sort of, the whole point of the exercise. I teach them - not the other way around.

As the training continues, coming into the second day - they all realise I know what I am talking about. I feel respected, I feel like one of them. We are equal. They can take me being the boss and I am not making a thing of it. I explain, I correct. They listen, they follow my advice, they learn.

After packing away, we say goodbye to each other, with the knowledge that they have learnt something they weren't aware of two days ago. They are happy and confident.

I am, too. End of a good day.

This day though, I realised I had forgotten to hand over a paper to one of them. Therefore, I enter their store area (imagine a part of a warehouse, in a big industrial yard). The two men I wanted to speak to are relaxing, having a little chat between them, before going home. The place is full of tools. It smells of oil and industrial dust. But the most striking presence are that of the naked women who decorate their walls, their lockers, their boards - their... everything. Tits & Ass galore.

They are 'reading' the Sun, whilst having a brew.

I can feel their embarrassment. Surprised by my 'visite impromptue', they quickly throw the papers underneath their makeshift table, hoping I hadn't noticed. In all honesty, that move was not very helpful, as they still would have had to spend a week to rid these walls from their decorative elements.

As a woman, I now feel torn between two worlds. I'm either the equal partner, knowledgeable about techniques and engineering matters and therefore accepted as 'one of the lads'. Or I am a titillating piece of meat, where tits & ass are the main attributes and where lamb shanks and pork cutlets are my main competitors. The Whore or the Madonna. Classic.

Strangely enough - I am the one who gets embarassed. Not in a prudish way, but because I feel 'ashamed' on their behalf. I emphatise with them. I feel their pain, their dilemma, how they also are stuck in this gender inequality which brings us nowhere.

I have been here before, worn the wet T-shirt. I have had trainings where one minute, I am 'one of the team' and where next minute, I am surrounded by hi-viz clad men who are dribbling over the nipples of some unfortunate teenage page three girl.

My Women's Day would be one where these roles had been reversed. I don't think men can fully understand how it feels - as a woman - to always be surrounded by naked women, thrown in your face at petrol stations, news agents' and book shops - making you feel inadequate.

Imagine for a minute it was the other way around. No, honestly - think about it!

What if men would see nothing but naked men (and no women), whilst queuing up to the Tesco till?

What if they had to work alone in a work place with mainly women, being examined from top til toe and not listened to until they had 'proven' themselves to show they knew what they were talking about? Only to be paid less at the end of the day.

Here's me hoping we can abolish future Women's Days. In my world, we are all individuals - be it men or women. Enjoying our differences, our sexuality and loving each other - but on equal terms.

Mums & Dads

After having spent quite a few years in the UK, I have had plenty of time to ponder about cultural and social differences between my native Sweden and this country. One phenomenon that strikes me as occuring more than others, is the way family life is being described in media. The recent reports on swineflu have reiterated this. 

Whenever the word 'children' is mentioned, you can guarantee the word 'mum' is not far away. Be it discussions concerning upbringing, social welfare, teenage pregnancies or, as now, about the swineflu risk, for MUMS and younger children.

One wonders, aren't there any DADS involved, at any stage? Surely, they cannot all be single mums, can they? And, talking of divorce and splitting up - you hardly ever hear anyone mentioning single dads. School-runs are nearly always referred to as carried out by mums. Who takes the children to the surgery for vaccination on news reports? Who makes sure they do their homework and put them to bed? Mums. Mums, mums and mums.

My MOTHER-land Sweden is not always the most perfect country when it comes to social welfare and equality. There is a lot more to be done. Still, I do think it wins the battle of using the remarkable word PARENTS.

International Barbie-day

It might be the International Women's Day today, but that is just a mere coincidence. I was going to write this blog post in any case. And, as for the 8 March, I think every day should be a women's day. And men's day!

In this 9th year of the 21st century, Barbie throws her 50th birthday bash. I find it lamentable that she is still around, to be honest. She might just be a doll, but to me, she still constitutes the ultimate symbol of the degradation and sexualisation of women.

I used to play with my Barbie doll when I was a little girl - put clothes on her and comb her hair. In those days, we used to make our own clothes as there weren't that many 'pret-a-porter' versions on offer in the shops. However, I soon got rather fed up with her and discovered the 'trolls' instead. Now, any Swedish person will understand immediately what I mean by the 'trolls'. They were just that - trolls. Lovely little creatures which took up most of my best friend's and my own time.

My Barbie doll? Well, in my realisation that she was just a very stiff pinup, complete with inbuilt push-up bra and two very unnaturally long legs, I covered her face in paint and ended up cutting off both her nose and her long, red hair. (I wonder what Freud would have made of that.)

As children and a teenagers, me and my girlfriends were very much treated in the same way as the boys. I cannot describe myself as having been a Tomboy, but I never felt I couldn't do whatever the boys did - if I wanted to.
My teenage years proved no different. When having parties, us girls and boys used to buy, bring home, cook, eat food and do the dishes together - on very equal terms. This was not planned - it came natural in the 70s and was part of the fun.

With this background, it is therefore so much more disappointing to see the world becoming so inequal and hypersexualised. I feel sorry for anyone growing up today. Today's young people seem to assume - and accept - that women's role is to look sexy, read about being sexy, sing sexy, eat sexy and breathe sexy - as they have not really experienced anything else.
Is it just a coincidence that the word 'sexy' has now found its way into the daily language in circumstances which not necessarily have anything remotely to do with sex? I don't think that would have been possible in the 60s and 70s, somehow.

I am not a prude and I am not an old nostalgic. But I have a strong belief in equality in every sense, for everyone on this planet, be it women or men. I find it strange how we often, in this politically correct world, mention 'women' in the same breath as we do 'ethnic minorities' or 'the disabled'. As if us women - half of the world's population - would have to be treated in a special, 'womenly' way. Maybe we are on the way to become extinct?

I am hoping this testetorone-fuelled world will come to some kind of klimax soon. After all, most tendencies come and go in intervals during the centuries. At some stage, we might realise the nonsensical in providing children with G-strings. Hopefully, we will also see the obvious connection between late night rapes and lapdancing clubs. Or should that be 'gentlemen's clubs'..? Gentlemen who consider women to be something you bring to entertain, with the coffee and brandy are not gentlemen in my lingo.

I sometimes wonder if I am the only woman to feel disgust when entering a newsagent's or a petrol station. Why do we accept having women's privates thrown in our face when queueing up to pay for our newspaper or petrol? All you men out there - just put yourselves in our position. Fancy standing in a queue with nothing but men's private parts around you - and no women's.
When you step out in the world outside, it just continues...everywhere. On the radio, on telly, in newspapers and mags. So many women feel unhappy with themselves and feel they need to live up to these page 3 expectations.

No wonder then, it made me really happy to see a little girl on a nearby beach, some time ago. Incredibly as it may sound, she was frentically burying her Barbie doll in the sand. How refreshing. "There's hope for the future", I thought to myself.