Chronictank
FH is my second home
- Joined
- Jan 21, 2004
- Messages
- 10,133
Leading on from the other thread,
Why do you think the bad kids end up being SO bad ?
Now a part of me wants to believe it is just american gang culture coming over into the UK, and to an extent it probably is but i dont think that is the major driver behind the issues we face today.
Why are kids getting more and more extreme in their actions?
I had a think about it, and i reckon its years of neglect of the use system.
I think its the lack of competative sports/activities, before you laugh bear with me;
10,20 years ago every school essentially had enforced competative sports in the form of PE, but this time has been increasingly been reduced. When i started school we had 4 hrs of PE a week, this was reduced to 2 hrs and when i left it was 1 hr a week. Now 1 hr isnt even enough to have a football game, let alone do something productive.
So we come to extra-ciricular activies, again when i stated school things from hockey to athletics happened, every day of the week there was some sort of activity going on. When i left this was reduced to 3, then 2, and then 1 sport a "season" (football winter, cricket summer) which meant kids had bugger all to do 3-4 days of the week (excluding weekends)
But why should the school with limited funds organise everything, surely there should be afterschool and weekend clubs? well there were, then Thatcher got into power and then there were fewer, New Labour appeared and they dissapeared altogether.
When i was 11-12 there used to be a youth club we would go to (inventively named "The Play Centre"), where they had games, pool tables and such, as well as activities every weekend. You could idle there or get involed it was up to you, this ran from 10am to 4 pm, so again kids arent on the streets and are doing something productive.
But these places do not exist anymore, it isn't fair to blame this on the government though, it's also down to over-zelous parents suing at every opertunity because little jimmy scraped his knee ruining any enjoyment taken out of it by wrapping it in red tape.. twice.
I was speaking to a friend who was a volunteer at a youth centre, they have to do training and every kid needs to have a signed permission slip if they want to do any activity off site (this includes the park across the road), in the end she got tierd of all the hassel and just stopped volunteering.
So where does all this pent up aggression go? you could argue that they could organise their own events
However quite frankly kids have nothing to do which is free/cheap, i mean if you want to go play 5-a-side, you need to book a pitch/gym/etc.. which lets be honest costs an arm and a leg when you are that age
I mean ipay £6 a week for astro turf bookings, £3+Membership for sports center membership when i want to pay badminton or tennis.
These facilities should be free/run at a nominal cost not so expensive kids cant afford it.
Kids cant congregate in shopping malls, parks are so neglected they arent even safe beyond 5/6. Almost every light bar main pathways are broken in my local parks, and there is never a policeman/woman in sight to provide a sense of safety there.
End result? Well boredom, with nothing to do drink, sex and drugs at an age when they are not capable of dealing with them looks an awful lot more attractive.
Lack of competative sports to get rid of that excess aggression means it stays bottled up, which inevitably is going to end badly.
Now no doubt someone is going to turn up and say, WRONG I DIDNT TURN OUT LIKE THAT MEIGHT, well maybe not
But i would bet you are middle class/went to a good school/parents who put time into your social activities/a recluse
While it is a generalisation, yes there will be exceptions but i think thats the problem.
There is nowhere for kids to legitimately congregate so kids stay in crowds
there is no more easily accesible organised activity, leading to idleness and ultimately frustration
Now while there are definitely other factors into this such as poor parenting, culture etc..
This didnt happen overnight, so isnt going to be solved overnight, and the only reason this has come into public perception is that its got to a critical point where its making itself known
Why do you think the bad kids end up being SO bad ?
Now a part of me wants to believe it is just american gang culture coming over into the UK, and to an extent it probably is but i dont think that is the major driver behind the issues we face today.
Why are kids getting more and more extreme in their actions?
I had a think about it, and i reckon its years of neglect of the use system.
I think its the lack of competative sports/activities, before you laugh bear with me;
10,20 years ago every school essentially had enforced competative sports in the form of PE, but this time has been increasingly been reduced. When i started school we had 4 hrs of PE a week, this was reduced to 2 hrs and when i left it was 1 hr a week. Now 1 hr isnt even enough to have a football game, let alone do something productive.
So we come to extra-ciricular activies, again when i stated school things from hockey to athletics happened, every day of the week there was some sort of activity going on. When i left this was reduced to 3, then 2, and then 1 sport a "season" (football winter, cricket summer) which meant kids had bugger all to do 3-4 days of the week (excluding weekends)
But why should the school with limited funds organise everything, surely there should be afterschool and weekend clubs? well there were, then Thatcher got into power and then there were fewer, New Labour appeared and they dissapeared altogether.
When i was 11-12 there used to be a youth club we would go to (inventively named "The Play Centre"), where they had games, pool tables and such, as well as activities every weekend. You could idle there or get involed it was up to you, this ran from 10am to 4 pm, so again kids arent on the streets and are doing something productive.
But these places do not exist anymore, it isn't fair to blame this on the government though, it's also down to over-zelous parents suing at every opertunity because little jimmy scraped his knee ruining any enjoyment taken out of it by wrapping it in red tape.. twice.
I was speaking to a friend who was a volunteer at a youth centre, they have to do training and every kid needs to have a signed permission slip if they want to do any activity off site (this includes the park across the road), in the end she got tierd of all the hassel and just stopped volunteering.
So where does all this pent up aggression go? you could argue that they could organise their own events
However quite frankly kids have nothing to do which is free/cheap, i mean if you want to go play 5-a-side, you need to book a pitch/gym/etc.. which lets be honest costs an arm and a leg when you are that age
I mean ipay £6 a week for astro turf bookings, £3+Membership for sports center membership when i want to pay badminton or tennis.
These facilities should be free/run at a nominal cost not so expensive kids cant afford it.
Kids cant congregate in shopping malls, parks are so neglected they arent even safe beyond 5/6. Almost every light bar main pathways are broken in my local parks, and there is never a policeman/woman in sight to provide a sense of safety there.
End result? Well boredom, with nothing to do drink, sex and drugs at an age when they are not capable of dealing with them looks an awful lot more attractive.
Lack of competative sports to get rid of that excess aggression means it stays bottled up, which inevitably is going to end badly.
Now no doubt someone is going to turn up and say, WRONG I DIDNT TURN OUT LIKE THAT MEIGHT, well maybe not
But i would bet you are middle class/went to a good school/parents who put time into your social activities/a recluse
While it is a generalisation, yes there will be exceptions but i think thats the problem.
There is nowhere for kids to legitimately congregate so kids stay in crowds
there is no more easily accesible organised activity, leading to idleness and ultimately frustration
Now while there are definitely other factors into this such as poor parenting, culture etc..
This didnt happen overnight, so isnt going to be solved overnight, and the only reason this has come into public perception is that its got to a critical point where its making itself known
