[Memnoch]

I kind of got really personally affected by this for some reason. I'm a fairly congenial, kindhearted person and I appreciate that there's a lot of inequality in our world and governments can and should do a lot more to integrate people who are underprivileged. But I don't have a lot of sympathy for morons who torch cars, burn neighbourhoods, shoot or throw Molotovs at firemen trying to do their bloody jobs and loot stores just because they're angry about inequality. The quote from one of the rioters: "I don't know the words to express my situation. I have only anger - and I know how to express that."

Rather than whinging and rioting try and bloody apply yourself. Don't drop out of school (I hear a lot of these communities have very high dropout rates even though the government provides free public schooling. That'll improve your chances of getting a good job. From what I've read about this here in Boston and spoken to French people in my class (and I encourage anyone who has contrary info to correct me) the French government pays for public housing as well? In fact most places in Europe have much more of a socialist mentality than places in the US (Australia is more than the US but not as much as Europe - not any more).

I suppose my views are tainted by where my family came from. My mother and father both came from humble beginnings. My dad was dirt poor when he was young. He came from a simple village in the provinces. My grandfather was a farmer. My mother also came from a poor family. Her father was a fisherman. There were times when they had to tape their shoes up because they couldn't afford to get new ones when they were at school. For notebooks they glued pieces of paper together and used that.

But they worked bloody hard to try and create a better future for us. My grandparents sacrificed so much to make sure their kids got an education in Manila, the education they never got. They all sacrificed (and in a third world country sacrifice doesn't mean not being able to buy that DVD you wanted, it means sometimes going without food for a few days because you just can't afford it). But they rose above all that by working their bloody arses off, so that they could in turn make sure WE (my sister and I) didn't have to go through what they went through. My father went from humble beginnings as the son of an illiterate farmer to Director of Finance for Procter & Gamble Asia Pacific. And he did it by sheer bloody hard work and perseverance.

I suppose those values of hard work, perseverance and refusal to admit defeat no matter what the external factors are were imprinted on us at an early age. Our parents taught us to NEVER take anything for granted. They also taught us that you may not get exactly to where you want, but you CAN change your life, even if the world seems like it's against you.

I don't deny for a moment the frustration and despair that some of these young people feel. I totally agree the govts should do more to provide education, opportunities, etc. But everytime I go to the Philippines to visit my folks I see people in even more hopeless situations. Some of them are my relatives. But they bloody try and DO something about their plights. They know that the Philippine government has no money to help them, to provide free schooling and housing. I myself am paying to send some of my cousins' kids to school.

Apply yourself even if the situation seems hopeless. Be a taxi driver. Work as a labourer. Save some money. That's where it starts - with attitude. Try and do something to change your life - don't expect the government to do it all for you. I'll wager that some of these thugs who are torching cars and looting shops while whinging about not having a fair go are ones who dropped out of school early and spent their adolescence hanging around street corners wasting their lives earlier on. It's right to try and effect social change in a non-violent way like Martin Luther King did - but try and help yourself as well.

Sorry for such a long and personal post but I just read an article about this in the Boston Globe then I came on here for the first time in a long while (been so bloody busy with uni) and read about this and it really touched a nerve with me.