Yob Britain

**Watchman** · 06-05-2005, 01:16

Huh. Can't say I saw any of that when I was in the UK couple of years back. But, granted, it *was* a fairly brief (about two weeks) trip...

And ShadesWolf ? You might find it interesting to know that human civilization and states have survived some eight thousand years (give or take two K) without anything classifiable as "capitalism" by modern standards, which is a concept max five hundred years old. Its real breakthrough only came with the Industrial Revolution in the mid-1800s, and by the end of the same century most states were enacting policies descripable by modern terms as "leftist" chiefly to contain and reduce the "collateral damage" it caused (like overworked and unpaid and duly restless factory workers)...

And, of course, we Scandinavians have done right fine under a pretty long spate of decidely leftist, social-democrat policies and governements.

**bmolsson** · 06-05-2005, 03:48

Sure, English people are peaceful..... Unfortunately that makes the English womens rather boring and inactive when it comes to sexual activity. Long live the immigration.....

**Tribesman** · 06-05-2005, 09:23

The good old days
Things used to be so much different before all the hoodies and yobs appeared under Blair .
Nostalgia , the realm of the forgetfull .

**King Henry V** · 06-05-2005, 09:28

Well the Guardian is only the leftist version of the Daily Mail, so if you think that's just a load lies to undermine Labour, then the Guardian is a load of lies used to undermine the Conservatives.

**Tribesman** · 06-05-2005, 11:45

Henry , then read my earlier link to yob youth culture in the 50s . All this crap about violence and the decline of society is rubbish , you could pick any decade or century from the past 2000 years or more and find that it has always existed and people have always complained that it wasn't like it when they were young . Its pure bullshit .
Hey its even part of the tourist industry now , take the tour of London to see the scenes of the gang violence , robberies and shootings from the golden age of the 50s

where anti-social behaviour prevails, where chief constables admit they have lost control of their cities, where feral children wander without restraint, where drug-taking and gun crime is rife, where family structures have broken down and authority has collapsed.
That part of the original article could have been written about Victorian London . If you take out the guncrime bit it could be Elizabethan London .

**Big King Sanctaphrax** · 06-05-2005, 11:53

Social decline? If you have a gang problem, that is certaintly bad, but I don't see how it would be as extreme as
Quote:
anti-social behaviour prevails, where chief constables admit they have lost control of their cities, where feral children wander without restraint, where drug-taking and gun crime is rife, where family structures have broken down and authority has collapsed.

I of course don't live in England, but I for one fail to see how drug taking is bad ( ), or how "yobs" destroy families...

That's because it's not as bad as all that. The guy's just on his high horse and injecting a massive amount of hyperbole.

**JAG** · 06-06-2005, 00:17

Originally Posted by Big King Sanctaphrax

That's because it's not as bad as all that. The guy's just on his high horse and injecting a massive amount of hyperbole.

Be fair, he is a Mail reporter it is expected!

**English assassin** · 06-06-2005, 11:17

And of course things were soooo different back in the 50slink
Maybe he wants to go back further to seek his past Utopia , how about the 30's , oh dear ...race riots , political riots , violent strikes. How about back to the Victorian age , poverty , disease , riots , gin houses , opium dens , rampant criminality .
Just because a rag like the mail wants to cite an author who seems to believe that things used to be so wonderful doesn't mean its true . It has always been the same and will always be the same .

That's it in a nutshell. There's a piece written by Charles Dickens where he goes into the St Giles rookery (ie criminal slum) in London. He goes with about 6 armed police, and he STILL finds it so remarkable that they get out without being seriously attacked that he makes a big thing of it in the article.

As for gangs, Romeo and Juliet anyone? Obviously Elizabethan England thought fighting to the death in the street was perfectly normal.

i do think it is true (though I don't have the figures to hand) that the period from about 1900 to about 1950 had unusually low levels of serious crime, but if you ask me we are more reverting to type now.

Not that that is good.