Britain’s men won a surprising bronze medal in the team gymnastics competition, and were unlucky to not claim the silver medal after an appeal from the Japanese team meant the home nation were downgraded from second spot.

The result was completely unexpected – Britain’s men have not even qualified for the final since 1924 and just making the final itself was seen as a big achievement.

They shocked competition favourites such as the USA, Russia and Germany and took the bronze in controversial fashion, perhaps marking a change in fortune for Team GB.

A strong all round performance from Louis Smith, Sam Oldham Kristian Thomas, Max Whitlock and Dan Purvis  saw them battling with Ukraine for third place as they went in to their final apparatus, the floor.

Whitlock, Purvis and Thomas landed every move of their floor routines to secure Britain the bronze.

But a surprising twist of events saw Japan, who looked comfortable in second place, make a succession of errors on the pommel horse.

Japan moved down from second place to fourth, leaving Britain and Ukraine in the medals, but they questioned the points awarded to their final gymnast on the horse and made an official inquiry.

Their successful appeal put them back into their deserved silver medal spot as China comfortably won the gold.

But it was Britain’s medal that was the biggest talk of the day and the home nation will look to gain from the result which could spur on the rest of the team after a start which many have perceived as slow.

Cyclist Lizzie Armitstead won Britain’s first medal, a silver, in the women’s road race on day two, after favourite Mark Cavendish missed out on the men’s equivalent on Saturday.

Rebecca Addlington added the second medal on Sunday with a bronze in the 400m freestyle, the event she won four years ago in Beijing.

But it had been anticipated these medals would be just two of many by this stage in the Games for Britain, who had high hopes as they chase a demanding target set by UK Sport.

With a few medal hopes not living up to expectations thus far, many believe Team GB have not risen to the challenge, but the pressure of a home Olympic Games cannot be overstated.

It felt like Cavendish had won the Olympic road race before the Tour de France was even completed, whilst Tom Daley was expected to bring back a medal – no questions asked - in the diving, an event which can be swung with one tiny error.

Daley came fourth in the 10m synchronized diving as he partnered Pete Waterfield on Monday, but still has a chance in the individual event.

Elsewhere the sailors seem to be struggling for form in an event the home team was looking to dominate and a few medal prospects, especially in the swimming, have not made the most of their opportunities.

The triumphs of the home nation are vital to the success of the Olympics and these Games have the potential to be one of the greatest the world has ever seen so the nation will be hoping that the unexpected success in the men’s team gymnastics result will be the much-needed boost for the rest of Team GB.

Image Courtesy of   Sergei Bachlakov / Shutterstock.com

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A British Labour Member of Parliament has been arrested after a brawl in a House of Commons bar. Witnesses said that Eric Joyce, who represents Falkirk in the House of Commons, entered the Strangers Bar shortly after 10 pm local time and immediately began to complain that it was “full of Tories.”

According to the Evening Standard, Joyce appeared to be intoxicated, and was behaving boisterously. When he was asked to quiet down, he lost control of his temper and lashed out at other guests.

Joyce is said to have headbutted Conservative MP Stuart Andrew, and the Daily Telegraph reports that he may have hit as many as three Labour MPs. Andrew suffered a bloody nose in the attack, and may end up pressing charges against his colleague. Several MPs attempted to calm Joyce down, but he allegedly struck Andrew a second time.

Much to the chagrin of the parliamentary authorities, the fracas took place in front of a visiting delegation of Canadian parliamentarians. According to a Scotland Yard spokesman: “We were called at approximately 10.50pm last night to reports of a disturbance at a bar within the House of Commons. A man aged in his 50s was arrested by officers on suspicion of assault. He remains in custody in a central London police station. Inquiries are continuing.”

The Labour Party has temporarily cut ties with Joyce until the matter has been resolved. “This is an extremely serious incident. We have suspended Eric Joyce pending the results of the police investigation,” said a party spokesman.

The Speaker of the House of Commons, John Bercow, made a statement in the chamber the next day. “Members will be aware of reports of a serious incident in the House last night. I have been informed by the Serjeant at Arms that the honourable member for Falkirk has been detained in police custody. The matter is being investigated. I take this matter very seriously, as do the House authorities. I would ask that no further reference should be made to these reports in the Chamber today,” he said.

Joyce entered Parliament in 2000 through a by-election. When Labour was in power, he served as an unpaid parliamentary private secretary to a number of ministers. In 2009, he achieved the dubious distinction of being the most expensive MP, having claimed £187,334 in expenses during the previous parliamentary year. He would go on to beat his own record and become the first MP to claim more than £200,000 in expenses.

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By now, London is in a state of collective hangover, but the recent week’s mayhem could just as well have swept through Athens, Madrid or Rome. The year 2011 will be remembered as the year of youth revolt; where the youth of Europe realized generations before them did not leave much for their future.

But lawmakers around Europe can’t really say that the protests, which most recent turned into arson and looting, were all that surprising. Danish newspaper Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten reported that the generation that took to the streets in European capitals are the first in decades who cannot expect to reach a higher living standard than their parents. The rioting in Britain underlines this with socio-economic irony; the underbelly of society has been ignored for years while leaders scrambled to save the economy under the global financial crisis. A breakdown was unavoidable.

The initial problem has played out in several countries. In Spain, a staggering 40 percent youth unemployment led to mass protests in Madrid in May. Demonstrators, despite a ban, gathered to express their anger at the unbearable unemployment rate, the recent austerity measures and political corruption. In Athens, demonstrations and strikes led to violent clashes between police and protesters and last weekend saw a protest in Tottenham, UK, against the shooting of Mark Duggan turn into a weeklong street riot that destroyed so much more than materials.

The English anarchy was a display of societal meltdown — the media and politicians were quick to point their finger at fault but the explanation is straightforward. What it comes down to is a generation, raised in the economic boom of the 90s with all its optimism, but held back as they were about to enter society themselves as workers. A strained labor market and an increasingly nervous financial climate prevents many from looking to the future. No wonder those with the least hope, financially or socially, will break first and most furiously. It may be a terrible and upsetting situation, but it shouldn’t be a surprising one.

According to Chris Roycroft-Davis, a British political commentator, Prime Minister David Cameron’s harsh words in the wake of the recent riots will achieve nothing without direct, unrestrained consequences.

“Society is being destroyed because for decades we’ve gone soft on a underclass of lawbreaking, drug dealing layabouts who treat with contempt a world which they think owes them a living,” Roycroft-Davis said.

Though Roycroft-Davis’ words are hard, they voice the tension between the have’s and have-not’s which triggered the violence in London. One part is that young people have no jobs and no future to plan for – another is that some of the European welfare states have taken such good care of their people that they have forgotten society is a two-way agreement.

Some countries have nothing to give and the opportunity to give back is equally limited. The unemployment rate in Greece climbed to 14.2 percent by March and Spain was at a staggering 20.9 percent in the second quarter of 2011. In comparison, Germany only had 7 percent unemployment as of July.

But on the other hand, many western European countries continue their generous benefit systems despite numbers showing that only half of the population is employed. With the deduction of children, students and elderly, Morgenavisen Jyllands-Posten found that there were still a large amount of people who simply lived off the state — a vicious circle that many of the newest generations on the labour market will drop into by default.

In comparison with other decades and areas, the youth of Western Europe was arguably spoiled rotten by optimistic and protective states. Whether they achieved academically or was raised on the streets, there was always some sort of security net that tried to catch them if they fall.

There comes a point where people stop being grateful and start expecting more: ‘we want jobs’ or ‘we’re entitled to benefits’. The point is when they truly believe the world owes them just because they were born into it. The people who had no problem destroying their fellow citizens’ livelihood in the last week should be considered the fruit of society’s unrelenting labor. Kids down to eight years of age were out smashing windows and grabbing all they could get because society kept telling them that they were “entitled”. On the other hand, students and graduates want governments to take responsibility for creating jobs for them, while blaming people at the top for everything without fully appreciating the complicity of their parents, the greater society — not to mention the world.

The lost generation of Europe is in the end a motley bunch. All layers of society, educated or not, face bleak prospects in the coming years. While the student camps in squares with eloquently written protest banners, the mobster throws stones and steals designer hoodies but none of this can really change the probability that economic order will not be stabilized before our most important years on the labour market have passed. Governments will ask for patience and restraint but the revolting youth will not be silenced with words and they may spend the rest of the year proving this.

Image Courtesy of Flickr: http://www.flickr.com/photos/64742792@N05/6026530372/

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