police in east dulwich (or "some kids detained on Grove Vale")

[BB100]

edresi10 Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Sorry but I find the defense of "there are no

> summer activities for kids" an absolute joke, the

> fact is I never had any summer activities and the

> majority of people I know didnt either, but it

> didnt mean that that we hung around on street

> corners praying on individuals, because we were

> bored!!!! And frankly how what sort of kids are

> these that need to be "entertained" otherwise they

> will go out looting!!1 The fact is these kids are

> prepared to break the law, they have no respect

> for it, for authroity or other members of their

> communities, which is why they are quite happy

> wrecking their own high streets and areas.

> The cuts to youth clubs and activities ahve

> nothing to do with it, the types of kids who used

> these were the type of kids that wouldnt go out

> with the intention of commiting crimes, the nice

> kids.

You miss the point entirely. You don't miss what you don't have.

It's when you take things away that people will naturally feel devalued. Relative poverty is a feeling, not a state. We bombard our children with sexual images in the media and then tell them not to have sex. We bombard our children with images of the latest gadgets and charge the highest prices for them and then wonder why they can't live without them. We tell them in nursery they can't climb the tree or stand on the wall or shout or scream when they play outdoors(there are many nurseries that do this). We tell them at school to sit still and be quiet and listen. We tell them they can't play in the street or cross the road on their own. We buy our children violent video games and then wonder why they become aggressive.

As a society we are hypocrites. We tell our children not to do things when we are doing them ourselves. Of course poor parenting contributes but what about addressing the issues that contribute to poor parenting? The truth is the UK is the worst place in the developed world for children to grow up in. http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/6359363.stm It's offical. Some kids survive, but many just don't make it. Then when you take stuff away from them in the cuts and not the pesioners how do you think they feel? And what do they do with the void that is left? If society doesn't think they are worth investing in then why should they care about society?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/6359363.stm

[genwilliams]

BB100, you're right.

When my sister and I were teenagers and both of my parents worked fulltime, we spent most of our summers at inner-city summer clubs, held 5 days a week in school buildings during the holidays. It was basically a daytime youth club with set start & finish times - it mixed specific organised activities (typically sports and art activities) and general hanging out in a supervised environment with other kids, with occasional field trips. My parents would have been up the creek without access to these council-organised services. What else could we have done? Sat at home watching TV all day? Greeeat. Roamed the streets? No thanks. One of our parents having to take the whole summer off work to supervise us? Not an option. I'd have been happy in the library some of the time, but I was a bookworm, and not all kids are. And that was back before so many of the services for kids were cut. The options now are deeply limited.

I saw a pertinent interview with an eloquent teenage girl in Wood Green yesterday. She explained that if there are no youth clubs to go to, the teenagers she knows just hang out together outside their local station, McDonalds etc. She said they don't want trouble, but sometimes other groups approach and threaten them or pick fights etc. And then she described going to a party, bringing a male friend (with permission from the host), and then seeing a group of kids attack her friend for being from the wrong area.

The excessive amounts of their spare time that teenagers spend on the streets, with nothing engaging to occupy them, makes it unsurprising that groups of them become territorial, drawing lines around 'their patch' and starting trouble with other kids from outside it. I think much of it stems from boredom and what they see young adults doing in their areas. No wonder some teenagers feel safer joining gangs and surrounding themselves with a protective bunch of 'mates'. Teenagers, though they may try to ape adults (sometimes in the worst ways), are NOT adults, and they need support, supervision and provision of time and services from the adult world around them, or they can become a frustrated and apathetic force to be reckoned with.

BB100 Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> twofourseven Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

>

> > It is a fact that if any kids brings home

> stolen

> > goods then the parents are accessory to the

> crime

> > committed. So, where are the parents of these

> > people.

> >

>

> Believe it or not some parents are actually at

> work whilst their children are left to do as they

> please. My neighbour, who is a single parent, has

> two young teenagers she leaves at home when she

> goes to work and one of them causes trouble when

> she is not there and has been invloved with the

> police.

>

> Councils have had to drastically cut the youth

> provision during school hols this year so there

> are not the activities available there have been

> in the past. This year there is no 'Summer Uni' in

> Lewisham for teenagers which was a really fabulous

> provision for two weeks of the summer hols.

> Additionally, LAs tend to cater for early and

> middle childhood but there is very little for

> teenagers to do. Where there are activities they

> can be very expensive - sometimes upto ?30 per

> day. This year my teenagers have very little to do

> because of the cuts so I sent them out of London

> to spend time with family but not many people can

> do that. If they play in the street people

> complain if a ball nudges their car. If they go to

> the shops adults stare at them suspiciously. If

> they go to the free swimming they get bullied by

> other boys. There used to be free organised ball

> games in the local park but this has been stopped

> by the cuts. The parks are not well supervised and

> my boys have been mugged by other boys even when I

> was walking a distance behind them. They refuse to

> go to the adventure playgrounds because it's full

> of younger children. The local library has

> closed....I could go on.

>

> Children's services have been cut in a disgraceful

> way and unfortunately when young people feel

> society does not care about them they have little

> reason to care for society.

[BB100]

danmaitland Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> there are summer courses for the kids. i was

> teaching on one last week at the albany deptford.

> The kids were the excat demographic taht are

> rioting, and were lovely - respectful and

> hardworking and keen... Yoo know why and how they

> were there - mostly? parents who gave a f+++.

The summer courses have been very heavily cut, are few and far between and booked up. Yes there are some in the most deprived areas but the courses at the albany are too far away, won't take my 12 year old and assume my kids like music and dance. Not really available or known about for the little thug that lives next door to me either.

[tarafitness]

Can I just add that my 15 year old son isn't sitting on his backside playing computer games - or out rioting with the rest of the thugs, he's been taking place in some of the excellent courses (to date film making and screen writing) organised by the government through this site: http://www.futureversity.org/ (aka Summer Uni)

there is plenty for teens to do, but teenagers are notoriously idle so it's up to their parents to go out their way to research the options available and follow up on them. Lazy parenting has a lot to answer for but then so does the government and local authorities as our own borough Southwark has contributed ZERO to this scheme this year and my son has had to travel to Enfield and Ealing to participate in these courses! This is okay for a 15 year old who is big enough to travel on his own (armed with a map and directions etc), but not perhaps suitable for an 11 year old to travel to the other side of London just for something to do because their local borough hasn't provided anything for them to do.

[james84]

BBC reporter at Highbury Magistrates Court, John Brain, tells BBC 5 live: "the first person who appeared in the dock this morning was a 31-year-old teacher called Alexis Bailey. She pleaded guilty to being part of the looting of the Richer Sounds store in Croydon" - I guess even teachers get bored with too much holiday time on their hands.....

[lostcat]

KFord-'I suspect they'll be at uni, working and paying for your pension. If the biggest issue in your

ED life is that the pavements are occasionally blocked by a 'designer buggie' or that a child makes

a noise in cafe, then you should count yourself lucky.'

What pension?! I imagine these young narcissists will do very well in the private sector, plundering and looting anything that remains of the public sector with little or no social conscience at all!

[lostcat]

Oh yes.. and what university? By the time they grow up it will be some privately run educational establishment which they will sue if they don't get a degree..

[steveb]

Most of the little c###s I saw smashing up The Palmerston on monday night would understand only one thing a good hiding so stop talking all this liberal crap things have gone to far end of.

Why the police have to walk on eggshells when dealing with these w####rs is beyond me they quite happily smack you with there batons at football matches.

[BB100]

tarafitness Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

>the government and

> local authorities as our own borough Southwark has

> contributed ZERO to this scheme this year and my

> son has had to travel to Enfield and Ealing to

> participate in these courses!

EXACTLY! Lewisham has no summer uni this year either. Last year the local secondary school had courses running through the holidays so they could just walk up the road to them.

[BB100]

james84 Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

- I guess even

> teachers get bored with too much holiday time on

> their hands.....

That is actually very funny!

[James Barber]

I'm a Liberal. I believe in civil liberties. I don't think anyone would wont lots on Ian Tomlinson's which is why the Met Police have repeatedly asked people to stay away from the troubles to make it clearer who is an antagonist and who isn't.

apparently it takes a UK Police officer 4 hours to arrest and book in a suspect. In the current troubles that would mean arresting a rioter takes you away from the frontline and supporting your colleagues for hours. The original night they didn't have enough officers without arresting any except the most outrageous for fear of depleting their numbers.

But other western liberal countries such as Canada it takes 30minutes to arrest and book in a suspect.

This is not about bleeding liberals it's about bad management and processes gobbling up Police time.

But now what can we do now today?

Take a look at every image you can and try identifying people. If you do spot anyone tell the Police.

[ianr]

> BBC reporter at Highbury Magistrates Court, John Brain, tells BBC 5 live: "the first person who appeared in the dock this morning was a

> 31-year-old teacher called Alexis Bailey. She pleaded guilty to being part of the looting of the Richer Sounds store in Croydon" -

A black male learning mentor at a Stockwell school , according to the Guardian and other papers. http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2011/aug/10/england-riots-primary-croydon-burglary A pity. He's apparently the only male out of a dozen or more learning mentors and teaching assistants at the school. http://www.stockwell-pri.lambeth.sch.uk/whoswho.asp [Flash needed!]

[edresi10]

Just had one of teh looters knock on my door, proudly told me he turned over Argos on Monday night, hes got 500 catalogues if anyone wants one.

[northlondoner]

Ian R - hmmm can't make up my mind if I'm pissed off at apparently gratuitous mention of ethnicity.

Endresi - tell the police.

[cmck83]

Urm, I think Endresi was making a joke...

[ianr]

northlondoner> Ian R - hmmm can't make up my mind if I'm pissed off at apparently gratuitous mention of ethnicity.

I was worrying and teetering either way myself, both before and after posting. But it wasn't intended gratuitously. The thing that was in my mind, and that I wanted to be available to readers, was that there's probably going to be one less male role model for kids, when they're already very short in at least primary schools, and, even more a pity, one less male black professional role model, in a school which, I'm assuming, has many black students. Perhaps I should have been more wordily explicit at the time.

But perhaps they will let him stay on, if he and they want and he's available. I'd assumed that his current conviction would more or less automatically rule out his continued employment there, but I don't know now how true that is.

[dulwichbloke]

Whether or not his conviction would bar him from that employment, I suspect the fact that he may well get more than six months in prison is going to interfere with his school attendance.

[sebadoh]

northlondoner Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> Green Goose Wrote:

> --------------------------------------------------

> -----

> > The politicians, the bleeding heart liberals,

> the

> > PC brigade, the smart layers paid from legal

> aid

> > and the lenient judges have reduced the police

> > force into a powerless, disrespected and

> > ineffectual body. They all should be totally

> > ashamed of themselves.

> >

> > When are the spineless English authorities

> going

> > to actually do something to save this country

> from

> > total disintegration?

> >

> > Just watch the Yobs go to court and get a slap

> on

> > the wrist as usual.

> >

> > Where I came from a curfew would have been

> > declared and any looters breaking the curfew

> would

> > be shot on sight.

> >

> > Elsewhere, like in Russia, the police would

> simply

> > drive a truck at speed into any crowd that was

> > looting and committing arson. If anyone turned

> up

> > at hospital later for treatment they would be

> > arrested.

> >

> > People dont do crime if they know they will be

> > caught and severly punished. Fact!

>

> Mate you sound utterly deranged. Fact. If you miss

> the fatherland so much......

Northlondoner- how many times can you turn left without spinning in a circle? pathetic

[Green Goose]

northlondoner Wrote:

>

> Mate you sound utterly deranged. Fact. If you miss

> the fatherland so much......

I am just telling what happens in other countries. I did not express a view.

Are you one of those that can't understand that people in other counties have a different way of managing things. Are you bigotted or just another slightly deranged liberal idealist who never ventured beyond Little England?

GG

[Chick]

I hate looters, muggers, burglars, violence, robbers (including banks), the thugs who used the chaos to kick in people?s doors and rob them while they were in bed and the vandals who smashed up the likes of William Rose.

What I hate more is the lynch mob mentality which when you scratch the surface has appeared on what until now has been a very pleasant and useful local resource-this forum. Shame on you.

[Damian H]

Chick Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> I hate looters, muggers, burglars, violence,

> robbers (including banks), the thugs who used the

> chaos to kick in people?s doors and rob them while

> they were in bed and the vandals who smashed up

> the likes of William Rose.

> What I hate more is the lynch mob mentality which

> when you scratch the surface has appeared on what

> until now has been a very pleasant and useful

> local resource-this forum. Shame on you.

If you think this forum has invariably been very pleasant until now I doubt you have been following it very closely :-)

[karter]

There have been police walking the area all day, strange to see but good.

[Spaceman]

So people who offer to come out and help defend there homes and the businesses of fellow

East Dulwich neighbours are WORSE than the mindless thugs that choose to destroy people's

homes and businesses, and deserve to be HATED MORE than the mindless thugs..

God help us all

[Marcus]

Better to let children run around smashing things, I'm sure they'll get bored soon... keep a low profile, hope its happens to someone else, anyone else, just not me. They're not my windows, it's not my business, it wasn't me that got mugged etc....

[benmorg]

Lots of sensible people on the news calling for calm. A bit more calm on this forum wouldn't go amiss either.