The riot on Friday night outside a hotel in Knowsley, Merseyside, accommodating asylum seekers was not only an intrinsically appalling outbreak of racist disorder. It was also a case study in the way in which extremist ideology and activism operate in the digital era.
The trigger — or pretext — for the violence outside the Suites Hotel was a video, widely circulated on social media, in which a man in Kirkby appeared to make inappropriate advances towards a teenage girl. On Thursday, an individual was arrested on suspicion of a public order offence; following advice from the Crown Prosecution Service, no further action was taken, and police report that the investigation is “ongoing”.
