I hope my fellow moderators will leave this note in the General Discussion section for the broadest visibility:
I want to make sure that everyone around the world knows that the riots last night are not something that should be associated with the City of Vancouver as a whole. The people who wreaked havoc on this city are not “Hockey Fans”, or “just a few drunks”. They’re terrorists and should be treated as such. There are websites looking for identification of those involved: Redirecting...
There were over 100,000 people out on the streets of Vancouver last night watching a hockey game and having fun. You can narrow the instigators down to less than 1000 people. I’d even go as far as saying that the number was under 500. That’s 0.01% of the people who just wanted to have fun, and take in a Game 7 of a major sporting event.
Please, do me a favor and look on this sad turn of events as what it is. An small group of terrorists that are trying to divide the world into a state of Us vs. Them. This could happen in your city.
Vancouver, as a whole, is ashamed of what happened. We had a group of cowards come into our home and tried to destroy it. The true community that is Vancouver is out today, cleaning up their mess (Strangers come together to clean up Vancouver | CTV News). We’re banding together and moving forward and I, for one, have zero tolerance for the a$$holes of our world trying to strip the humanity from our lives.
Detroit has had a few riots both for sports and bigger social issues, and I’m sure the vancouver=riot connection will fade long before ours (which was established decades earlier) ever does, so you can take solace in that at least.
Here in Chicago we riot when we win. Nothing says celebration like wanton destruction and gun play. If the Cubs win the series, I expect this place to burn to the ground.
I’m disgusted by it. Half of the people in the riots are watching, egging on the others, using their convergent devices to document the looting and violence. Senseless and shameful. I love visiting YVR and hope that the city and citizens do their best to clean up and rein in those responsible. Apparently its happened in the past when the Canucks have lost, and I would have thought there would be preparations for rioting.
Does ‘service design’ have any kind of role here, or is tear gas and riot police the best solution?
The please have apparently already identified some of the instigators as being the same people involved with the violence at the Winter Olympics - gee… what a surprise!
Very interesting to watch the backlash on social media against these idiots. I wonder if it’s still fun once someone on Facebook tags a photo of you lighting a police car on fire so your whole friend-list sees that you’re a douchebag…
As a resident of Montreal, I want to say that the many riots we’ve had (Canadiens losing, the Jack-Ass live show, police shootings, etc) really do represent the very odd nature of the city. It’s never boring.
Having said that, I think that should pass a law suspending the charter of rights and freedoms (Canadian equivalent of the US Bill of Rights) during the first fifteen minutes of a riot. I think a good flogging does discourage people who are intellectually incapable of understanding why they shouldn’t riot.
Lastly, this should really be in off-topic, there is no way it won’t spiral into a flame war.
This was a giant fail on the city’s part. Giant screen tvs for people to mob in downtown on the streets to watch. Talk about bright ideas. Especially when this happened back in 94’. Only one store boarded up windows. I think hoping for the best in people isn’t a great idea. Hope for the worst and if something good happens then everyone wins.
If the screens weren’t downtown there would have been a much smaller group of people gathered. Allowing police to react and be much more effective. Prevention was the key here.
Vancouver did the same thing when they lost in 94’1994 Vancouver Stanley Cup riot - Wikipedia
I agree, a small percentage of people made the whole city look bad but the police should have been better prepared to cut it off early.
The fans in the building were loudest when they were booing the Bruins ceremony. Maybe when they get to the finals again in 16 years they will be better prepared.
What happened after the game in Vancouver was unfortunate but should have been better prepared for. Its always amazes me what a few a$$holes can do to bring normal society to a halt, but cities need to plan for the worst. Having lived in Boston for about 6-7 years I’ve seen the city get better and better at preparing for post game celebrations and yesterday was another great example. After the celebrations/riots after the RedSox series win in 2004 the city and police have worked very hard to prevent large crowds from forming and restricting access to certain areas. This year they were expecting the worst and ended up closing streets, limiting parking, limiting access to certain areas, and got the bars to not serve shots after the first period and to not let anyone in after the second period in the area near the TD garden. It seemed like overkill but after the property damage and the tragic death of a college student in 2004 the preparations were a good idea.
I don’t want to toss Vancouver in with the whole Pacific-Northwest, but there is a bit of history with the Battle for Seattle too. Maybe there is a demographic reason. Young people without careers? Young jobless men are usually at the heart of these things in other countries (ie, the non-chill ones).
He argues that we’ve culturally allowed this kind of activity because we are constantly telling people that if they hold anything back, one day they will go out and become a serial killer. Therefore, “broz”, as were described in that post, feel free to let loose every so often. Just to “blow off steam”.
As for Bettman, he is turning it around. He may have taken the Jets and Nordiques away, but now he’s bringing the Jets back! Go Gary!
