Commentary
Tell me what you loot and I will tell you what you are—or at least, what your tastes are.
During the latest, but certainly not the last, riots in France, looting was widespread (unlike the riots of 2005, which were more purely destructive). And what the rioters looted, mainly, were sneakers and smartphones. These were their highest aspirations in life, the summum bonum of their existence.
During the riots in London in 2011, in the main shopping street of the suburb of Clapham Junction, every store was looted except the bookstore, which was left untouched. It’s unlikely that the rioters have developed a taste for reading since then; almost certainly, their tastes will have been fixed like a prehistoric fly in amber. They, too, sought sneakers and the electronic apparatus of entertainment, as if such entertainment were the main business of their lives….