Reading The Riot Act

Literary Nonfiction. Canadian History. BC Books in BC Schools pick. Reading the Riot Act is a phrase that has entered the popular lexicon, meaning the action taken by authority figures when they perceive that their charges are getting out of hand. The act itself is a seldom-used piece of legislation actually designed to prevent a riot from taking place. Supposedly, the mere mention of the Riot Act is enough to bring hardened miscreants bent on destruction to their collective senses. But if a riot has started, it's already too late to read the Riot Act. Every city has its distinct history of rioting--the Rocket Richard riots in Montreal, the Christie Pits riot in Toronto, the Winnipeg and Regina riots, even the Shakespeare riots in New York where rival factions rioted over which actor was the better interpreter of Shakespeare's work. READING THE RIOT ACT is a popular history that rereads and rewrites the legacy of riots in Vancouver. The project was conceived following the city's Stanley Cup riots in 1994, when official reports and media coverage differed significantly from eyewitness accounts. Later, media reports on the APEC riots downplayed and obscured certain facets of the conflict. Seeking out sources beyond the official reports, Barnholden has compiled a record of participants and observers, allowing the vanquished to have their say. Barnholden shuns the simplistic bad apple explanation, and explores the deeper economic causes and effects of riots. This book contains some stirring narrative of conflicts that have defined the history of Vancouver.--Prairie Fire ...demonstrates that even unexpected, apparently spontaneous flarings are about something deeper, from unemployment pressures, freedom of speech and inhumane conditions in prisons all the way to racism and the disappointing performances by our professional sports teams and Axl Rose, the frontman of the notorious GM Place no-show rock band Guns'n' Roses... This tapestry is woven against a backdrop of class war, demonstrating that while the rowdies ground beneath the heels of the police are always the working poor, it's suspiciously rare that they take their grievances to the neighbourhoods of their bosses... Challenging the popular conception that riots are just the result of 'a few bad apples' sowing discontent, Barnholden advances the competing thesis that the entire orchard may in fact be infested with parasites.--The Columbia Journal Until Reading the Riot Act was published, the book containing the most detailed information on riots in Vancouver was the local police department's autobiography, A Century of Service (1986), which Michael Barnholden makes reference to in his own text. The difference with Reading the Riot Act is its focus and perspective, which presents riots as battles in the class war, as it aims to cut through the media distortion around such events and dispense with the 'bad apple' theory of their cause. It makes for a more engaging, accessible and believable read than the police department's book.--Max Sartin, The RAIN TAXI Review of Books

How often do you get to see a car tipped or stores looted? Seventeen-year-old Daniel gets caught up in a post-game riot, and then he and his best friend escape police by breaking into a store. They only intend to cut through to the alley, but rioters follow and trash the place. Daniel prevents an arsonist from torching the store; the next day he's a hero while his friend is outed as a rioter. Can Daniel save face, and will it cost him his friend?

USA Today Bestselling Author, Callie Hart, delivers a twisted and edgy new linked standalone dark romance tale, featuring a girl with nothing left to lose and a broken boy with a heart as black as his soul. Want something? Pax will take it from you. Love something? Pax will destroy it. Love him? Heaven help you. You'd have to be the stupidest person to walk the face of the earth. PAX I don't do complicated. I sure as hell don't do love. With graduation in sight, I've made it almost four years at Wolf Hall without getting tangled up in BS with girls. I especially want nothing to do with her: Presley. Maria. Witton. Chase. The timid little mouse with the red hair, who can't even look my way without hyperventilating. She's nothing to me. Beautiful, sure, but I've had plenty of beautiful women. I'm perfectly content ignoring her... ...until her life is suddenly in my hands. PRES I've loved him from the moment I laid eyes on him. The cruel, inked anarchist of Riot House. He's wicked, and he's cold, and there's nothing good left in him. I fear him almost as much as I crave him. With only a few weeks left until graduation, all I have to do is keep my head down, and then I'll be free; I can leave Mountain Lakes and my obsession with Pax Davis in my rearview mirror. But the demons I've been hiding for years now are growing restless... ...and Pax is thing that will keep them at bay. This is not an act of kindness. Not an act of love. Not an act of forgiveness. You'll find no redemption here. This is the final riot. ACT ACCORDINGLY. RIOT ACT is a 137,000-word standalone book in the Crooked Sinners Series and does not end on a cliffhanger. This book contains dark content that may be considered a trigger for some readers, and as such is recommended for readers 17+

Vogler (law, U. of Sussex) develops a new perspective on the development of the state in England by examining its response to severe internal threat over an extended historical period. Based on original research into 10 major incidents of civil disorder from the Bristol riots of 1830 to the inner city disorder of 1981. Distributed by Taylor and Francis. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

Typed in this February 8, 2002 by Jonathan Walther. The source was cap V, volume XIII, pages 142 146 of the ``Statutes At Large'' series, printed in the year 1764. Also indexed as ``Anno primo GEORGEII I. Stat. 2. C. 5.'' Many sources on the Internet claim the Riot Act was passed in 1715; according to Statutes At Large it was passed in 1714. The confusion may be caused by the fact that the Act took effect in August of 1715. This is, of course, the famous Riot Act that gave rise to the expression "Read them the Riot Act!". CAP. V.An act for preventing tumults and riotous assemblies, and for the more speedy and effectual punishing the rioters. I.Whereas of late many rebellious riots and tumults have been in divers parts of this kingdom, to the disturbance of the publick peace, and the endangering of his Majesty's person and government, and the same are yet continued and fomented by persons disaffected to his Majesty, presuming so to do, for that the punishments provided by the laws now in being.

This lively collection presents a multi-disciplinary, multi-perspectival commentary explaining the what, where, and how of the riots that the austerity-hit UK experienced during the long, hot summer of 2011. It looks beyond London and its Tottenham district where disturbances started, to locations such as Manchester and Birmingham. Parallels are drawn with Cairo during the period of the Arab spring, and even with the Star Wars saga. The book locates the riots in historical context by looking at the previous UK riots of 1981 and 2001, looking at how news cycles and concepts such as that of ‘moral panic’ have changed in the age of social networking. It is essential reading for anyone interested in contemporary debates in social policy, media studies, anthropology sociology, cultural studies, and human geography. This book was originally published as a special issue of the Journal for Cultural Research.