Let Them Eat Cake

The quotation, “Let them eat cake,” has been attributed to Marie Antoinette. Apparently, this was her statement when she learned that the people were suffering due to widespread famine. The quote reflects the princess's obliviousness to the condition of the people; fast forward 2011. The political elite, the rich, elected officials, and police are not oblivious; they are just greedy, uncaring, and immoral, both in the United States and in Britain.

Following the murder of 29-year-old father of four Mark Duggan by police in Tottenham, North London on August 4th of this year, riots ensued that astonished the both Europe and the United States. These riots are a call to the working class and poor in Britain and here in America. 

The rich, the elected officials and the police who maintain the status quo thought it not looting to plunder public funds in order to bail out the banks but have used the state as a weapon and are levying the most brutal class justice against and the poor. This is a case of the have’s versus the have not’s, the super-rich against the super-poor. 

The Labour Party, Prime Minister David Cameron and his Conservative-Liberal Democrat government have used water cannons and plastic bullets in an effort to curtail what they are labeling as rioting. Unfortunately, they are not addressing the root causes, first by dealing with those who murdered Mark Duggan and then addressing the underlying issues: the social deprivation and inequality, extremely high rates of unemployment and unabashed police brutality.