What I have done is collected a number of comments from various points of view, from the more moderate to the very authoritarian.
Here is the collection of random comments – I have tried to be as representative as possible in what kind of comments I have collected – that I have found from various news websites:
“Its time to carryout stop and search on any person and convict the individuals who carry knives or a weapon to 5 years hard labour, or we will have these stories on a weekly basis”
“WANT SOLUTIONS, GREAT BRITAIN: discipline relapse ungodly laws, raise age of marriage re introduce moral instruction re introduce corporal punishment zero tolerance in schools and society for young people and everyone in general re view laws on drinking and pubs”
“The comments I've read on here so far seem to indicate the old truth: 'There's a simple answer to every complex question ...... and it's always wrong.' To suggest that violence in Britain is down to foreigners and present laws is too simplistic. There has always been violence in British society with people becioming instantly incensed at the slighest insult or provocation. To find out the cure for this will take a lot more than a few off the cuff self-congratulatory remarks.”
“I remember London's East End in the 1970/1980s & it is far more safe today. As for teenage gangs - gangs are not something that have just been invented - remember the Krays etc. The idea that a death penalty will serve as a deterrrant is foolish - just look at the United States. As for Jo, who thinks teenagers are killing for kicks - you are clearly out of touch, despite having a teenager. No-one has been killed for kicks, it is a rivalry usually based on turf and/or the trade of drugs - just like in the days of the Kray Twins. The bottom line is - we as humans are capable of killing - look at the way we butcher people in wars. As British people, we should be least suprised at killing others. We are amongst the most murderous nations in history - we celebrate killing in our marches and parade our army!”
“I live in Harrisburg (capital of pennsylvania) ,we have about 1000 knife crimes a week and this is just one small city. there is at least 2 gun deaths every day in Philadelphia. but in the UK i dont see why every single incident has to be sensationalised and thrown on the front pages and the news, the UK is one of the safest countries for violent crime on the planet! if you have problems then change some laws and crackdown but dont try and fearmonger everyone and make the population think they are living in fear. its just dumb”
“We cannot expect children to act as if they belong in society if we continually ostracise them. We cannot expect them to follow human values while we continually allocate respect and status on the basis of power and wealth. We cannot expect children to respect property if we value our cars more than childhood. We cannot expect them to be whole, curious, active human beings if we prevent them from playing by selling off their territory or driving cars all over it.”
“It all comes down to basic education... which our culture lacks, and has done for some years.. look around, its children having children... so theres no basic education there.. go to any shopping mall, and they are there all ages, parents not interested... our society is full of these kind of people.. education.. is important... no education.. results in these terrible actions.. alchol fuelled as well.. which does not help.. as i say ''welcome to britain''.”
What is extremely interesting to see from this is how the viewpoints from so many different people in the same society are so contrasting, totally irreconcilable in some cases. This does beg the question on how can any government organise a strategy in order to challenge major social issues like crime rate, youth delinquency and many other such contentious issues when there is such a major divide in society. If the government is concerned in trying to balance as best it can the views of the population, there is always the risk that no one is satisfied.
What all these comments do highlight however is the extremely vast nature of the beliefs that exist in society and regardless of how illogical and totally wrong that many of other people’s comments do seem for each of us, we cannot deny that they do exist.
-NS-
Picture taken from Sky News website
2 comments:
I think what these comments illustrate is that some people use stories about knife crime to advance a repressive moral agenda.
Come on, "spiralling out of control"? As some of the better comments say, look at the rest of the world, look around you when you walk around London. The likelihood of being stabbed, especially for the people who write these comments, is still minute, however much its sensationalized.
Yes of course it is sensationalised and I think most people do understand and realised that, however I believe that it is working and is successful. Many people are becoming increasingly scared, people are feeling unsafe in London and very sceptical of people around them, which is a direct result of this sensationalisation... So while many people do realise that what much of the press in the UK is saying is a great overeaction, but still they find themselves very much affected by this.
So unless the government is seen to be doing something substantial on this issue and about crime in general then people's fears will probably not change.
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