There is a new story every day about some chav terrorising a neighbourhood, but what would the rebels do about it? Is there even that big of a problem, or are we all getting worked up about nothing? Do ASBO's work? Should we just lock every naughty little boy and girl up for minor things?

Come on, give me some good sensible ideas, i'll write to the PM and get them put into practice.

Eye blayme thu teechers.

I think the problem with ASBO's is that the media have almost made them a badge of distinction now and the effect of them has been diluted by this. I dont know if kids of today are any worse than they used to be. Maybe they are, maybe not. Certainly where live, we dont see much of a problem and I dont live is some high priced posh area. On the other hand, I dont live in the inner cities so maybe what they say on the news is accurate in them area's. I do tend to think it is sometimes blown out of proportion tho.

We need a whole reform of the justice system, starting at the top with serious offences such as murder, rape carrying capital punishment, or at least a life sentence, which means a life sentence. You then need to make a prison a deterrent, so that people are actually scared of going, which used to be the case but isn't so anymore. Particularly young offenders institutes, get rid of the televisions etc. I'd also make national service compulsory for offenders, so rather than sitting in a prison cell, they are out learning a trade as such, which could then reform them, putting them into the army etc.

I'd agree with the capital punishment idea if our justice system was perfect and unflawed, but it isn't. There have been too many people wrongly convicted for it to be safe. At least if they are in prison, and they are later found not guilty, they still have a life. On the other hand, the prisons are already filled to breaking point so keeping them locked up for ever is not practical either.

I do agree that prison and YAI's are not hard enough and should be made more of a deterrant. As for putting them in army .... If you were a normal enlisted soldier, would you want to put your life in the hands of a convict?

Get rid of concurrent sentencing. 6 offences means 6 sentences, one after another. Quit the fucking around. Manadatory life for Murder, Rapists and Paedophiles. And life means until the day you die. Tough minimum sentences for carrying guns or knives, or dealing drugs.

I completeley agree, but the prisons need sorting out first.

I agree with that. We currently have a situation where if you commit one burglary yuo may aswell commit 100 because you'll just spend the same amount of time in prison how ever many crimes you commit.

Bring back national service. Not necessarily in the forces, but forms of social and community work would work just as well. People need to learn respect for others and the community that they live in, and if their parents are lazy dole scroungers that's unlikely to happen. It might well help with integration of sociatey too.

Kids tend to be a pretty fair reflection of their parents on the whole.
They come into the world, not as a blank slate exactly, but with their attitude to society and others completely unformed.
They learn from what they see around them at a very, very early age, and once that programming is established it's very hard, if not impossible to break.
If the society they see around them every day is based on hard work and respect, they'll learn those values. If it's based on greed and grab anything you can anyway you can, they'll learn that. If it's based on fecklessness, laziness and selfishness, they'll learn that.
Why do you think the rich spend such fantastic sums of money sending their kids to private schools?

Very true Musta. I've read a lot of books on childhood development and they pretty much agree that what you see at age 5 is basically what you get.

How did that happen? :mask:

Is this Lee now trying to cover up? :rolleyes:

In general i'd like to agree with you musta. I really would. i think that works for myself.

Family values from the french side, the importance of spending time with your family, looking after each other, calling them on a regular basis when you cant see them. Discipline from the English side, my dad was in the navy as most know, things were run by the book, we knew where we stood, knew right from wrong. Add to that a good mix of culture, literature, history, good education in good schools - both me and my brother attended private schools for a couple of years. From it I think i've come out pretty good, even if i do say so myself! I'd say i've a pretty balanced, if maybe traditional, view on the world, i can get by away from home well enough and i've achieved some pretty good results.

BUT..

How can then, my brother, with the same upbringing as myself, be so different?
Today he finished the last of his GCSE's. Since i've been home - 2nd June - i've not seen him lift a finger to open a book, to read over notes, to revise or even think about the exams that he's got the next day. A couple he's got out of bed 15mins before the exam and demanded a lift into school because its a 45min walk in and he'd never have made it. He doesnt care, he doesnt want to care.
He cannot control his temper, he screams and shouts and throws things about, throws punches when he doesnt get his own way. He will be out on a night until midnight, even later, on school nights becuase he turns his phone off and disappears off and we cant find him. Several times he's been brought back by the police for various stupid things he's been cautioned for. Often we're out in the car until 1am driving round the streets trying to find him. He wants to move out. He smokes, he drinks, he fights and he's 17. Seven-fking-teen.


As i said, i'd love to agree with your arguement musta, its the one i think is nearest reality. As a general rule - the kids follow the example of the parents. i wish my brother did, becuase my folks are near on giving up with him. People say its only a phase and all teen boys go thru this, but 5 years on this is getting out of hand. Now i've been trying but i cant think of an explanation for it. Theres 3 years difference between me and my brother.... what changes so much?

Well, Sav, if you read back in the post you'll see it says that children are not completely blank states.
There is a great book on this by Steven Pinker whose title I can't remember.
In my experience much of a person's character is already formed before they are born almost. You can see quiet, timid babies and raucous babies, nightmare toddlers and little angels, very intelligent 3-yr-olds etc....
I think a person's basic personality type is innate, but humans are tremendously flexible things normally, and the later path that personality takes is formed by their social surroundings.
The case of your brother tends to reinforce this I think.
He's a chav, but a middle-class chav. He knows that his parents will make the effort to get him to the exams on time. You and your parents spend the nights cruising the streets looking for him. In a working class family this probably wouldn't happen.
A fuckwit is born a fuckwit, the upbringing determines the form this fuckwittery takes.
You're at Uni now, you must see loads of examples of fuckwits who got into Uni not on the strength of their intelligence, they're as thick as pigshit, but because they were crammed through expensive schools to get the exam results.
I know of loads of cases where two brothers are like chalk and cheese, and their parents will tell you that they were like that from birth.
But I agree with Lee, I think, the two factors have pretty well solidified by the age of 5 or so. Not much change will take place after that unless major force is used, and usually not even then.
I remember an old quote of GB Shaw, it goes summat like: You can forgive the lumpen proletariat to a large extent because they are proletariat, you can't forgive the lumpen bourgeoisie.
Best of luck with you're brother, Sav.

I think what musta said on the whole tends to work for the majority. Kids growing up do learn firstly from their parents. The foundations of who a person is are set at a very young age, they can of course be moulded and changed along the way, but those foundations are very very hard to break.

However, as Sav pointed out, what about the so called "better class". The privelidged kids who grow up in a stable home and go to a private school? You still get some of them turning out "bad" should we say.

I blame one thing today for the out of control youth of today and that is the handing over of power in this country by the government to the children. They are fully protected by the law in this country, no longer are teachers, policeman and even parents able to enforce discipline on kids today.

The day Discipline became unacceptable and was sent into exile, was the day it walked away with its bestest mate Respect, and his part time aquaintance Fear.

Without Discipline kids have no Respect and no Fear factor that made them view people in authority a little in awe.

With Discipline, Respect and Fear gone....look who moved in.....Disrespect, Criminal Rights and my personal least favourite Fuck Off, who seems to be the main spokesperson for this little group.

Would you like to justify this comment Musta...

You pretentious pompous arrogant fuckwit...

I think he means in a working class family we'd all be out walking the streets and calling everyone we know because we would be as frantic as any other class of society? Hope thats what was meant

I was tempted to not be bothered replying to that, but here goes, seeing as you asked so nicely.
I grew up in a very typical working class council estate in Leeds (Moor Grange, some of you may know it).
If a 17 year old lad from our estate stayed out on a Friday night I can't think of one instance where his family would have been out searching the streets for him.
Not one, really.
That doesn't mean that the mothers weren't worried sick, they were, as was my own on more than one occasion, to my shame. But it was considered pretty normal in that environment. You got a right bollocking for it, but it happened.
On the other side of Spen Lane was an area of well-to-do, middle class houses. Obviously us young lads from both sides of the tracks used to mix quite a lot, I had a couple of very good mates with pretty well-off parents.
If they had stayed out all night there would have been hell on. Their parents probably would have been out looking for them, and on one occasion when they did stay out their parents woke mine up at 3:00am to see if they were at my house.
They weren't, neither was I.
My parents tried to tell them that it didn't mean we'd been abducted by aliens and would probably turn up the next day with shocking hangovers, which we did.

Obviously any decent parent loves and worries about their kids, class has absolutely no influence on this.
The way that love and concern manifests itself is often different, and more often than not is conditioned by expectations which in turn is hugely influenced by class.
I don't know Sav's brother, but his behaviour sounds not untypical of a lot of young lads, unfortunately, regardless of class.
Now I may be wrong of course, but in my experience it is much more likely that a middle class family will spend the night cruising the streets looking for a 17 yr old lad than a working class family.
Not because they love them more or are more concerned about them, but because certain patterns of behaviour are more accepted by one class than another.
But boys will be boys, of course.
Some working class families will spend the night looking for a 17 year old lad of course, and other middle class ones won't, it's true, but in my experience the probabilities are very one sided. Working class families tend to give their kids, specially the male ones, a good deal more freedom than middle class parents.
But maybe things have changed?

Judging a book by it's cover, whether you come from a poor council estate or a posh house with rich parents, is very naive. Not all families are how they seem, it doesn't make them families better simply because they have a nice car in the drive or a bigger house in a nicer area, infact, many times it can lead to parenting that is much poorer than that of the average working class family.

Thanks musta, can definately see your arguement. I guess its harder to understand and comprehend these thigns when you're right in the midst of it all.
Tonight i helped my brother up the stairs with a sick bucket, drunk as a skunk. fair enough it was his last day of school today but still... theres no responsibility on his part whatsoever. I dont know why i bother helping him, maybe just leaving it and letting him get on would calm him down a bit. who knows.

Thanks or clearing that up Musta. I didnt realise you were "Working Class". I assumed because of your "Holier than Thou" attitude that you had to be one of the so called "Upper Class".

Shame on Me..... I made a Classist judgement based only on my own experiences...

I dont know anyone who would ever do that...Do you????

As for my first, rather childish reply.... Do you think it has any similarity to your first responce to any of my posts. You must admit, it's not nice when you post an opinion on a DEBATE forum and the responce you get back is just one of attack.

Just to clear things up, I agree with your post that certain behavioural patterns are more accepted within different classes but dont think you can make Class judgements based entirely on your own experiences or even if everyone on YOUR estate acted like that. I am very "working class" and not asshamed of it. I was dragged back home several times by my parents when I was a young teenager (like you, to my shame).

Hi Sav. You help him because he is your brother and It takes a hard man to turn their back on family regardless of how bad they are. Your young brother sounds exactly like mine used to be. He was the devil incarnate when he was 17-22ish. Nothing we did was good enough and everytime we helped him, he just got into more trouble and spat it back in our faces.

You just have to keep chipping away I'm afraid. There is no easy fix here m8 but dont give up on him. Like my little Satan, he will eventually snap out of it if he has the support of his family. I dread to think where my brother would be now if we had just walked away and left him alone. It's easier for someone to see the error of their ways if they constantly have a voice behind them pointing it out. You've seen the cartoons with the angel and devil on someones shoulder..... You need to be the voice of the Angel Sav. Dont let the Devil's voice (some other snot nosed 17 year old hoodlum that he hangs about with) be the only encouragement he hears.

Thanks very much Quej, thats really great to hear. I really hope he manages to get to 6th form becuase if he tries he's a pretty bright lad, he just cant be bothered. I have to say, the school he's been at isnt greatly supportive of "trouble makers" - they do their best but its an all boys school too which doesnt help. the only mixed around here thats any good is a Catholic school for wihch you need a letter from your church leader to say you're a "beleiver" ... and of course aside mum, none of us are confirmed.

Becuase the 6th form in my town is separate from secondary school and privately funded... theyre not results motivated so you're left to your own devices. this could go one of 2 ways for my brother... either (heopfully) he'll pull hsi finger out and start making a real effort - (he wants to do Law, economics, english and music ... after careful consideration) OR he could just bum out big style. Im hoping that with a bit of encouragement in english from me, and a good draw on the teachers he gets, then he'll be ok.

Thanks again for everyones advice / nice comments and support. Really appreciate it. x

Sav, my sister and I are very different despite having much the same upbringing (if you can call it that!). She reacted to our childhood difficulties by getting on with school work and getting good grades at Uni, whereas I wanted to get out of school and into work asap, purely to live my own life under my own rules. While we were at home, however, she was the one going out and getting hammered at 13 while I was the dutiful daughter. We all react differently to the same situations.

i've got some sympathy with Musta on this one .. values change and adapt as you move from social level to social level or from region to region.

Behaviour starts at home.

The twins will therefore be beaten in the morning just in case they do something wrrong later in the day.

I completely agree with you Spoony.
I was horrified to hear about a group of youngsters who stoned a man to the point where he had a fatal heart attack. What kind of parents do these kids have? Col suggested that peer pressure must have played its part in it, but one of these stones was the size of half a brick.