The New Barbarism

[ted_bloody_maul]

I do know what you mean but the reason I and others keep coming back to historical examples is that people have gone through periods of feeling this for centuries and each time they are convinced that this time it's the real deal, that society is about to implode, etc. With the benefit of hindsight, we realise that it wasn't. I suspect that in 20, 50, 100 years people will look back on current moral panics and see them very differently.

But surely the point here is that historically there have been good reasons for the existence of violence and criminality - behaviour born of poverty, undiagnosed mental problems, lack of welfare provision, terrible working conditions, genuine class division, children growing up without either parent and so on and so on? These problems don't exist to anything like the same extent anymore. Of course, there are new problems but they seem to me to be explained best in psychological terms.

Also, whilst it might be accurate to say that some people currently perceive levels of violence as indicative of something apocalyptic it seems to ignore the point that many people simply feel the current level of violence and anti-social behaviour (and for that matter the levels of the last 25 or so years) to be unacceptable. Generally their perception is accurate - that violent crime and anti-social behaviour, whilst not neccessarily higher now than a decade or so ago is, is considerably higher than it was in the living memory of about half of the country's population. Those of a generation old enough to remember otherwise, I suspect, probably balk when they see what's available to children nowadays and hear about they have nothing to do. Of course, they themselves grew up in far more favourable circumstances than their grandparent's generation from whom they'll have heard of even greater deprivation.

 

[JamesWhitehead]

A spasm of late Summer panic brought on by a handful of grotesque incidents or an outbreak of real concern about a real new phenomenon? The papers and the web are awash with apocalyptic visions, drastic proposed solutions and simple statements of despair.

"Isolated Incident" is a phrase the police reach for automatically when social panics start. However, while the police may see the extreme crimes as rare, unusual and unpredictable, they are part of a continuum for the people in those areas. People who have watched low-level misbehaviour develop into serious crime and felt increasingly powerless to do anything themselves. The answer has been flight from bad neighbourhoods, for those who can afford it and keeping your head down for those who can't.

It is true that hooliganism isn't new and there have been tearaways in every generation. What is new is the emergence of a hardened underclass and the end of social mobility. Add to that a sprinkling of technology which enables halfwits to network with halfwits and you get a peer-group culture, where kids are totally incurious about the world but avidly lap up the noisy trash which will drown out their real anxieties.

Imagination used to offer some kind of safety-valve. Kids have dreamed for years of being rock-stars or footballers. Now they are immersed in a marketing free-for-all with material prizes for those who want to swim through the shite to collect them. They regard social networking as a competition, hiding their own uncertainties behind inexpressive slogans and put-downs learned from tv and written in text-spellings. It is rare to find youngsters who are confident enough to set their faces against this wall-to-wall artificial environment: reading a book spells social death for many, especially boys.

It certainly isn't material deprivation alone which can be blamed. I see a very similar development in middle-income families, where there is little or no communication between the generations. Expensive treats are a poor substitute for time. Anyone who reads the things children write will find quite often that an expensive holiday is described in four paragraphs of complaint about boring 'plane journies and terrible queues followed by a tacked on happy-ending about the Holiday of a Lifetime!

A few years back, it was thought in bad taste to laugh at the emerging Chav-culture, a bit like sneering at kids who couldn't afford proper shoes. Now it rare to find anyone who won't contribute to a discussion about falling standards in the street, on public transport or in places of entertainment. The tabloid press stokes our anxieties and promotes the escapist drivel to drown them out. We seem as a society to have stopped talking about self-improvement a long time ago. Home-Improvement sounds a lot less quaint. Perhaps the Barbarians at the gate will focus minds on things which have been long neglected.

 

[ted_bloody_maul]

A spasm of late Summer panic brought on by a handful of grotesque incidents or an outbreak of real concern about a real new phenomenon? The papers and the web are awash with apocalyptic visions, drastic proposed solutions and simple statements of despair.

"Isolated Incident" is a phrase the police reach for automatically when social panics start. However, while the police may see the extreme crimes as rare, unusual and unpredictable, they are part of a continuum for the people in those areas. People who have watched low-level misbehaviour develop into serious crime and felt increasingly powerless to do anything themselves. The answer has been flight from bad neighbourhoods, for those who can afford it and keeping your head down for those who can't.

That's a good point - I think one of the things that's being missed is that while there is an element of the nine-day wonder about the current wave of media reportage the issues which they're highlighting are ongoing and constant for far too many people. It's like the issue of poverty in Africa - every now and again the media goes into overdrive on the subject but just because it's flavour of the month it doesn't mean that it isn't a real problem for the people who don't get to write editorials or put on concerts but have to suffer its effects, either during or outwith the time that the issue is being discussed.

I also think that the point regarding the increasing external influences on children are particularly valid and that this is a new phenomenon, or at least exaggerated to an unprecedented level. It would be interesting to see just how much the vocabulary, expressions and vocal mannerisms of children has changed throughout successive generations. Not that there's neccessarily anything that connects that with violence or anti-social behaviour but simply to examine the extent to which distant ideals and cultures are capable of circumventing the traditional aspects of cultural definition.

 

[Yithian]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/wear/6964796.stm

 

[MrRING]

LINK

Police say teens beat homeless Ohio man to death

CLEVELAND - A group of teenagers beat a homeless man to death as passers-by slowed to watch the attack, some of which was caught on videotape, police said.

Anthony Waters, 42, suffered a lacerated spleen and broken ribs during the attack Wednesday night and died at a hospital, police said.

"The pack mentality going on in the city of Cleveland must end," police Commander Calvin Williams said Thursday at a news conference where he urged the attackers to come forward.

Portions of the attack were caught on a surveillance camera outside a towing company on the city's east side. Police said the videotape shows passing cars slowing to watch three teens attack Waters until he staggered into the parking lot, where he was assisted by employees of the towing company.

"It was just horrifying the way he looked," said Marlo Massey, Waters' sister, who saw her brother's body after the attack. "They beat him to death and I just can't stop thinking what was on his mind while it was happening."

Waters suffered from blunt abdominal trauma, a head injury and damaged internal organs, the Cuyahoga County coroner said.

The attackers, who appeared to be between the ages of 14 to 17, robbed Waters of a music player and headphones, police said. No arrests have been made.

Waters was a welder by trade but had been staying at a Cleveland-area homeless shelter, said Paul Eadeh, a friend.

"He's a good guy, a hardworking person," Eadeh said. "He was just trying to make some money to eat and to live."

Eadeh said Waters worked odd jobs for him at a beverage store.