If They’re All Young Hooligans, Why Are Four of Eleven Over 35?
With a hat tip to Tim Harford, The General Manchester Police are reporting their already-public-record convictions via Twitter (@gmpolice).
On a quick check, four of the eleven so far convicted (including the one woman), are over 35. So far:
It appears that legendary “moral decay” began under Margaret Thatcher. Whodathunkit? Well, maybe David Cameron in 2007:
Sometimes a piece of research is published which goes straight to the heart of the national debate – it holds up a mirror to the whole of society and makes us see ourselves as we really are.
That happened this week. On Wednesday, Unicef published a report entitled “An overview of child well-being in rich countries.” It brings together comparative research on the material, educational and emotional state of childhood in 21 developed nations.
Britain comes bottom of the list….
Ten years after the current [Blair] Government was elected on the promise to end child poverty and make education its number one priority, Britain comes 18th out of 21 rich countries on material wellbeing, and 19th out of 21 on educational wellbeing. According to the report, British children are among the poorest and least educated in the developed world….
On the radio yesterday morning two local residents were interviewed about the spate of killings in their area….One said, “the children don’t seem to have anything to do. They just roam the street.” When she was asked who she blamed for that, she said “the Government, really. They’re closing down all the community centres.”
Now I like to agree when people blame the Government for things that go wrong. And, more seriously, I also agree that there is a problem with the lack of community facilities in our big cities….
Ultimately, we didn’t need the Unicef report – pages of statistical analysis – to tell us there is a problem with the emotional wellbeing of Britain’s children….
We need common sense in schools. It is madness for the authority of teachers and heads to be second-guessed by outside evaluators when they want to impose simple discipline in their own classrooms. It is madness for a teacher to fear that if he restrains a child who is violently bullying another child, he will end up in court on charges of abuse. It is madness for schools to have to cancel outdoor trips because their insurance policies won’t cover them in case of mishap.
Indeed, it is grimly instructive that the only measure in the Unicef report where Britain does not come at or near the bottom – where we come a respectable 12th out of 21 – is (you guessed it) health and safety. Our children might be the loneliest, worst behaved, unhappiest children in the developed world– but at least they are protected from sprains and bruises….
And I hope they illustrate something of what the Conservative Party under my leadership stands for. When we were last in government, in another political era, we stood for economic revival. We now stand for social revival. We used to stand for the individual. Now we stand for the family, for the neighbourhood – in a word, for society.
How’s that working out?
(cross-posted from a personal blog)
I am guessing its because the people over 35 are not able to out run the police. Similar to those wildlife films of life on the plains of africa, it is the slow and weak that inevitably fall prey to the predators. They are also less demographically likely to be adept social media users…a key tool that makes this hooligan trouble different from that of past years.
“Why Are Four of Eleven Over 35?”
Probably due to the fact that they’re slower than their fellow rioter. Plus, if you’re still looting after the age of 35, you probably can’t afford a decent lawyer to get the charges dismissed.
According to this theory, is Eisenhower to blame for the riots in the 60s?
“The politics of envy ends up in flames.”
Part of English society has literally collapsed. No values. No discipline. But they have cell phones and other electronic goods. Instant thieves, no matter how young.
One of the first things I did after the roits started was jump to UK newspapers and television video feeds. No point in reading sanitized U.S. newspapers that fail to show the emotion of what is unfolding in London and other parts of England.
I had the good fortune of living in Europe a few different times. I spent some time in and around London. The social collapse as early as the late eighties was evident as compared to previous years. Maybe it has always been that way, but I thought it had become much worse. You could see it if your were observant and talked to the locals of all ages. A few cities northwest of London were even worse. I recall seeing people never smile in a few of those cities. Very unhappy people.
Leaving London and visiting nearby smaller towns and suburb areas was a different experience. I was struck by the lack of activity during the day. Very little traffic, few people out and about. Few adults anywhere. Weird. And this wasn’t the case in northeast England, Scotland, or parts of Wales. In England there are many areas where you see few people on an average day and the shopping hours are limited. It reminded me of Finland before the collapse of the USSR. That was a very boring experience.
Many northern cities in England were a helluva lot rougher than central or northern London. Day and night. You needed to be in good shape if you were out hitting the pubs at night. That was your only guarantee that you wouldn’t get the hell beat out of you if something kicked up. London, not so much if you were in decent areas. Mostly small, skinny guys down in London proper. Odd, that. Plenty of very attractive women, by the way. 🙂
What struck me in the current videos was that the young people weren’t like some of the thugs I had seen during my travels. No bulk. No ugliness from years of wear and tear. These were just mostly under thirty young people and kids running wild for the most part. So, England has continued to decay and the welfare state appears to be a serious failure. Money doesn’t solve all problems.
Sadly, it’s not just England or the U.K. Berlin was a good example as far back as twenty-five years ago among the twenty year old crowd. That problem has now popped up all over the continent and it is moving down in age groups. What are their personal values? Apparently not much.
So, this is the new England. I won’t be revisiting.
sammy,
The envious are “Cain and Noah’s spawn”.
These would be better off on a plantation in Georgia cared for by Simon Legree.
Up Calvinism.
Today is the anniversary of FDR signing the Social Security Bill. 12 August 1935.
The Anti New Dealers have had something to attack for 75 years.
Lobotomy could solve the “problem”.
Europe has always been a place of war and violence. From the post Ice Age when the plight of survival yielded to the pursuit of accumulation vis a vis the neighboring clan.
Check the civil unrest in the mid 19th century.
175 years ago the less violent left for Africa and the Americas.
A dose of Calvinism, and plantations to stack the……………..
Noni,
So you think the riots were caused by all homeless people in northern London. What a joke. That is not what happened. The riots and looting were primarily done by young people, many of whom have dropped out of school. They sure as hell weren’t looking for jobs when they were stealing from the stores. Those were kids.
The young kids are not homeless. One young person was an Olympics representative for the United Kingdom. A number of articles focused on why their parents didn’t have better control of the kids.
You can always count on someone trying to paint the homeless picture to justify anything that the thugs do. The photographs and investigative reports coming out of London dispute your contention that the young kids taking pictures of the riots with their cell phones were rioting because they need to take a break from searching for jobs.
What a con, Noni.
If “thugs” were Muslim it would be better. The Brits have a few Chinooks, and the SAS.
These “thugs” don’t have RPG’s.
You may take a few moments and listen to Mick Jagger and “Sympathy for the Devil”.
40 is the new 20. If you aren’t over 60 (maybe even older than that) then you have very little input in modern society. You aren’t old enough to lead a corporation, and if you’re the president, then you’re going to be dominated by older people in congress.
It’s government by the old and rich for the old and rich.
Calvinism: god wants them poor, drugged, drunk, lame, delusional, down throdden…….
He wants a few rich……………………………….
It is so ordained.
Forget what that Carpenter said 2000 years ago.
They oppress people for generations and then get surprised that they’re angry and well hard. Ironic, innit?
If you think unemployment insurance is expensive how much does a 4 day riot cost?
EK,
They weren’t oppressed. Quite the opposite. They had their spirits destoyed by government welfare dependency.
In the U.K. the rioters and their immediate families may lose all of their welfare benefits. That is how much it may them plus jail or prison time.
Of course for the mentally ill we could go back to the 50s lock them up in the booby hatch as we did back then. (And threw away the key). Of course back then being homeless without $10 in your pocket meant that you were a vagrant and got housed in the local lockup. (The courts have ruled both systems unconstitutional)
You’re quoting colbert right? I know I saw this bit on his show at some point.
Nathaniel Tapley writes an open letter to David Cameron’s parents.
http://nathanieltapley.com/2011/08/10/an-open-letter-to-david-camerons-parents/
To make the rioters homeless makes sense when you think about it. The rioters are the young with no future, they know it and rebel, the homeless are as low as it gets, way down on the bottom, they gave up a long time ago. They have no energy, no will to fight, they just get a drunk and want to forget where they are, they are no danger, just an eyesore in the city.
Many if not most of our social problems could be fixed with decent jobs. Jobs that provide dignity and living wages.
In the UK offcial usage of homeless means sombody without a permanent residence, most are in temporary accomodation such as bedsits and B&Bs. Those who literally have nowhere to stay are counted as rough sleepers. The estimated number of rough sleepers in England in 2010 was 1,247.
Clearly, Soma is the answer.
Brett, thanks for that information. Appreciated.
amateur socialist,
I simply explained what was stated in a few UK news articles.
I suppose you would cheer the rioters, perhaps encouraging them to burn more buildings and cars, and then petition the UK government to not prosecute them at all.
Is that what you promote as state/fed social policy in Kansas?
I suppose you would suppose that.
Similar policies are in place in the US. Certain illegal behaviors will get your entire family banned from subsidized housing (drugs, probably others I’ve forgotten at this point, it’s been a few years).