"London's Burning" (the political epithet, not the UK TV show)

Usage
"London's Burning" was a political media epithet relating to the inner London social anarchy from the mid 1970's to the mid 1980s. It is not related to the UK's TV show about London's firefighters. Left wing riots, squatters, anti-Vietnam War protests, bent cops, crooks, communist agitators, "Loony Left" councilors and Neo-nazi rioters all got involved in the crisis at various times.

Raceisum and Anti-Sematisum in the East End
Anti-sematisum, sino-phobia and Polonophobia were common place since late victorian times. Some of the then Jack the Ripper were wholy Anti-semitic in nature and Sir Oswald Moley's facist Black Shirts held sway parts of in the East End from the mid 1930s to the early 1950s.

The Windrush boys arrive
The British Nationality Act 1948 gave British citizenship to all people living in Commonwealth countries, and full rights of entry and settlement in Britain. Many West Indians were attracted by better prospects in what was often referred to as the mother country. Northampton and Reading welcomed them, but London and Nottingham hated them.

In 1958, attacks in the London area of Notting Hill by white youths marred relations with West Indian residents, leading to the creation of the annual Notting Hill Carnival, which was initiated in 1959 as a positive response by the Caribbean community. The continue to celebrate the festival to the resent day.

1970 Southall peace and unity march
A 25-30 strong Afro-Carrabian and Asian rally occurred near Ealing Broadway station in first week of May.

Clerkenwell squatter's camp
A tenement building in Clerkenwell Road was taken over by hippy squatters and daubed with graffiti in 17 August 1971. They tried to promote anarchist-leftism, liberal-leftism, dope, peace, anti-capitalism and personal freedom. Left-wingers had be active in the district since at leas 1993.

The 'steaming' of the Nottinghill Canaveral
The 1959 event, held indoors and televised by the BBC, was organised by Trinidadian Claudia Jones

Emslie Horniman's Pleasance (in the nearby Ladbroke Grove area, with Westbourne Park its closest tube station), has been the carnival's traditional starting point.

There was major trouble in 1976 and 1975 with pickpockets in the crowd and police's heavy-handed approach against the large congregation of blacks and it became "no-man's land". The 1,600 strong police force violently broke up the 1976 carnival, resulting in the arrest of 60 people. The mostly white police then udersadibly bullied, got paranoid about, lied about and racial smeared it for many years. A change of policy came after a confrontation with mostly Jamaican 'Steamers' (crowds off professional muggers, mugging entire clouds of spectators on mass) in 1987. There were a few other muggings, lesser steamings

The Special Patrol Group
The Metropolitan Police's Special Patrol Group (SPG) was a often violent police squad analoguse to the other forces' Specia/Flying Squad and was active from 1961 to 12 January 1987, then being replaced by  the Territorial Support Group. The SPG was accused of raceisum and abuse of the UK's sus laws.

The death of Blair Peach
Blair Peach was an active member of the East London Teachers' Association, a branch of the National Union of Teachers, and became its president in the last year of his life.

The 1980 Britsh Movement's London rallies
They held a roudy rally that ran from Paddington and Marble Arch. London, 1980. there were scuffles with police and some arrests.

Nicky Crane,Crane was jailed in 1981 for his part in an ambush on black youths at Woolwich Arsenal station. An old bailey judge described Nicky Crane as "worse than an animal" after his part in the May 1978 bus stop attack that invvolved assault on a unsuspecting black family in Bishopsgate.

The 'Loony Left'
They were Labour councilors, party associations and MPs who were considered to be-
 * Irrationally obsessed with minority and fringe issues,
 * Paranoid about racial and sexual "problems" that are wholly imaginary on their parts and that have no real existence (see- Bar, Bar, White Sheep).
 * Anti-Thacherite.

"Bar, Bar White sheep"


The 1986 incident concerned the possible ( and false ) coded racist meaning behind the necessary rhyme, which was originally made hundred of years ago  to mock a medieval wool tax. The original story reported a Parent/Teacher Association (PTA) ban at Beevers Nursery, a privately run nursery school in Hackney. Loony Left Hackney council then offered them offical support and thought they were ideologically right.

It was originally reported by Bill Akass, then a journalist at the Daily Star, in the 15 February 1986 edition under the headline "Now it's Baa Baa Blank Sheep". Akass had heard of a ban issued, by nursery school staff, on the singing of the nursery rhyme "Baa, Baa, Black Sheep", on the grounds that it was racist and portrayed black sheep (allegedly code fore Blacks) as subservient to the people (allegedly code for the mostly White general public). The press then entered a political feeding frenzy for literally  anything  they could find that was a anti-Labour/left-wing in nature,  most of which was false! 


 * Baa, baa black sheep
 * Have you any wool
 * Yes sir, yes sir
 * Three bags full.
 * One for my master
 * And one for my dame
 * And one for the little boy
 * Who lives down the lane.


 * Baa Baa white sheep
 * Have you any wool?
 * Yes Sir, Yes Sir, three bags full.
 * One for my master
 * and One for my Dame
 * And one for the little boy
 * with holes in his socks!


 * Baa, baa black sheep
 * Have you any fear
 * No sir, No sir
 * God is near.
 * He never slumbers
 * He never sleeps
 * He is always looking after
 * this little sheep.


 * Baa Baa Pink Sheep
 * Have you any spots
 * Yes sir yes sir
 * Lots and lots
 * Some on my fingers
 * And some on my toes
 * And some on the end of
 * my pink fluffy nose.


 * Baa, baa black sheep
 * Have you any cotton
 * No sir, no sir
 * It's all gone rotten.
 * None for the master
 * And none for the dame
 * And none for the little boy
 * Who fell down the drain.


 * Baa, baa black sheep
 * Have you any wool
 * Yes sir, yes sir
 * Three bags full.
 * Thank you says the master,
 * Thank you says the dame,
 * Thank you says the little boy
 * who lives down the lane.


 * Baa, baa black sheep
 * Have you any wool
 * Yes sir, yes sir
 * Three bags full.
 * One to mend the jerseys
 * One to mend the socks
 * And one to mend the holes in
 * The little girls' frocks.


 * Bah, Bah, a black Sheep,
 * Have you any Wool?
 * Yes merry have I,
 * Three Bags full,
 * One for my Master,
 * One for my Dame,
 * One for the Little Boy
 * That lives in the lane.


 * White sheep white sheep
 * On a blue hill
 * When the wind stops
 * You all stand still
 * When the wind blows
 * You walk away slow
 * White sheep white sheep
 * Where do you go.


 * Baa Baa White sheep,
 * where's your little lamb?
 * She's down on the meadow
 * and she can't get home.
 * The water's very deep
 * and the hedge is very high,
 * poor little baby lamb don't you cry.


 * Baa Baa White Sheep
 * Look over there
 * See all the nanny goats
 * going to the fair
 * With white shoes and white socks
 * And white curly hair
 * See all the nanny goats
 * going to the fair
 * Baa Baa Baa.


 * Baa Baa pink sheep,
 * have you any spots?
 * Yes Sir, yes sir,
 * lots and lots.
 * One on my forehead,
 * and one on my tummy,
 * and one on my nose,
 * and that's NOT funny!


 * Baa Baa pink sheep,
 * have you any spots?
 * Yes Sir, yes sir,
 * lots and lots.
 * One on my forehead,
 * and one on my tummy,
 * one on my bottom,
 * and that's NOT funny!

Also see

 * 1) The Paris riots of the 1960s
 * 2) Italy's Years of Lead

Links

 * 1) http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Special_Patrol_Group
 * 2) http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Death_of_Blair_Peach
 * 3) http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Notting_Hill_Carnival
 * 4) http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Clerkenwell
 * 5) http://www.wikiwand.com/en/British_African-Caribbean_people
 * 6) http://www.bbc.co.uk/london/content/image_galleries/london_thru_lens_gallery.shtml?14
 * 7) http://www.wikiwand.com/en/British_Movement
 * 8) http://www.corbisimages.com/stock-photo/rights-managed/HU007879/british-movement-march-through-london
 * 9) http://bussongs.com/songs/baa-baa-white-sheep.php
 * 10) http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Black_sheep
 * 11) http://bussongs.com/songs/baa-baa-black-sheep.php
 * 12) http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Baa,_Baa,_Black_Sheep
 * 13) http://www.wikiwand.com/en/Loony_left
 * 14) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Loony_left
 * 15) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sus_law