Great, just what we need, more political points being scored over a tragedy.
I give up on this thread ffs. Most of the local yoot would piss themselves if they read it.
5 yr old girl & 35 yr old man shot in Stockwell
- Thread starter wemakeyousoundb
- Start date
Great, just what we need, more political points being scored over a tragedy.
I give up on this thread ffs. Most of the local yoot would piss themselves if they read it.
Laughing Toad
Turn the volume down please.
Like attending a good church, for instance.
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
Oh please shut up you wally. I don't think you've read my post at all; it's quite short and it clearly talks about respect and honour etc - what's that to do with if not to do with "losing face" and consequent bravado etc etc. Honestly this is pathetic stuff. Argue with what's there not with the voices in your head.
I specifically addressed one claim made by another poster - i.e. that it can't be social deprivation that "causes" people to turn to violence because other people in the same social circumstances don't do so. But the case that has been made is that social deprivation is a major risk factor, not the simple cause - that's why violence and social status correlate so well (<this is called "evidence" btw).
I'm not expecting you to try and grapple with this though, it's so much more fun to froth up and gibber isn't it?
miss minnie
Well-Known Member
I didn't say that it "can't be" I said that "its not necessarily symptomatic".
Blagsta
Minimum cage, maximum cage
Presumably these things exist in some kind of social vacuum?
These people would not bother with universities, exams or apprenticeships. They probably are the kids who skip school or who have been chucked out for threatening the teachers and other pupils. Or actually assaulting them.
No job or training scheme they would ever be offered will be enough for someone who wants the "glamour" of being a local bad-boy, maybe dealing, robbing people etc.
Ordinary life is never going to match the short-term "rewards" of a criminal career choice, is it?
Unless you are the lucky one in a million with a super sporting talent or something.
Giles..
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
OK but I don't think the hairsplit is that important. You said;
I think this is wrong because
(a) violence clearly displays a social gradient, it gets commoner as you move down through a social hierarchy (i.e. it IS symptomatic of deprivation) - I don't think anyone disputes this as fact.
(b) your reference to other young people not being violent or whatever is irrelevant; the fact that not everyone exposed to a risk factor ends up exhibiting the behaviour associated doesn't mean it isn't a risk factor. Unemployment is strongly correlated with depression but not everyone who is unemployed becomes depressed etc etc.
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
Yes that's a good way of describing it - I was using the term in its loose meaning - i.e. "violence committed by people we don't respect".
miss minnie
Well-Known Member
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
I think I get the technical difference between the words you've highlighted. I'm less sure about the usefulness of discussing the hairsplit and ignoring the substantive point.
miss minnie
Well-Known Member
The point is that you choose to take something I say and twist it into something I didn't say.
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
*sigh*
I'm not "choosing to twist your words" etc - your intention seemed pretty clear to me, but if I've misinterpreted what you said the best thing to do is to point that out, I'll even apologise if you like. Why not address the substantive point instead of details? All I've done is said I disagree with what I believed you'd posted, that's not argumentative or rude.
ericjarvis
give a feck for the feckless
Excellent news. It probably means they already have a fair idea who the other two were. It's also good that one of the intended targets is co-operating with their enquiry. There comes a point when whatever your opinion of the Metropolitan Police, they are a much better bet to deal with than the alternative of outright gang law. I would hope that eventually that point becomes somewat earlier than people chasing after you firing guns fairly randomly. Still, every small step helps.
miss minnie
Well-Known Member
If you choose to misrepresent my words then why would I consider engaging with anything else you have to say? You have no substantive points afaic. Nothing but generalisations accompanied by a big dose of condescension.
*sigh* seriously!
ericjarvis
give a feck for the feckless
Actually it is a substantive point and not a hair split. In fact it highlights something very important.
The simple fact is that the vast majority of children in this area are growing up in relative (and often extreme) poverty. There is a clear correlation between relative levels of poverty and crime, just as there is a clear correlation between smoking cigarettes and contracting lung cancer. Pointing out that some children grow up in poverty and don't ever commit any crimes and claiming that shows there is no connection, is just as logically sound as showing that a single individual has smoked cigarettes for a while and not developed cancer in order to claim cigarettes have no connection to lung cancer. That is not logically sound in any way, shape, or form.
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
If you choose to misrepresent my words then why would I consider engaging with anything else you have to say? You have no substantive points afaic. Nothing but generalisations accompanied by a big dose of condescension.
*sigh* seriously!
Oh stop being such a drama queen! If you've been "misrepresented" and had your "words twisted" it's because I misunderstood your original post. A more grown up response would be to engage with that not get hung up on ridiculous perceived insults.
I actually haven't got a clue what your original post was about now but if you don't want to discuss it that'll be quite a relief.
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
Which is, and was, precisely my point.
miss minnie
Well-Known Member
I thought I endeavoured to help you understand the difference between what I wrote and what you interpreted with calmness and clarity, only trying to be helpful.
You're the one doing the dramatic *sighing*! ericjarvis
give a feck for the feckless
Which isn't entirely the case. Some of them will be, but some of them will seem perfectly well behaved when with their families or at school. They are the ones that do whatever it takes to fit in, and unfortunately what it takes to fit in when running with the gang is to be a violent and vengeful criminal, so that's what they'll be at those times.
However it is a perfectly valid point that many of them see no alternatives but crime or poverty. That in my view is where they have been failed, by their parents, by their schools, and above all by society as a whole.
They are capable of doing a well paid job. All you need to do is look at how efficiently the local gangs manage the crack market and it's clear that there are some clever kids involved with one hell of a future in retail or marketing if they but knew it. However in most cases they've never been told that. They have no examples to follow, because by and large most people from inner city areas who succeed in life don't hang around where they grew up. They don't see what they are actually capable of.
ericjarvis
give a feck for the feckless
Only if it has activities that aren't strictly supervised by a minister of some sort. Basically a church generally doesn't add anything much to their chances of a decent and peaceful life, unless it's that immensely rare creature... a church where the minister and congregation actually live according to the teachings of their religion rather than just attacking others for not doing so.
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
I thought I endeavoured to help you understand the difference between what I wrote and what you interpreted with calmness and clarity, only trying to be helpful.
Thanks for all your help. I haven't got a clue what you think about violence and its possible causes but you've got some attention and I guess that's the important thing.
miss minnie
Well-Known Member
ericjarvis
give a feck for the feckless
It's also important to note that this sort of gang violence is not restricted to the inner cities. It happens amongst far wealthier children, where it is more likely to be referred to as youthful high jinks that went too far.
To give an example. Back when I was at college, four of us were walking past a hall of residence late one evening just as a group were ejected from a party. They walked up behind us and just laid into us in a completely unprovoked attack. I ended up with cuts and bruises and my glasses smashed, another ended up blind in one eye. Fortunately the other two managed to get away, and just around the corner met some members of the college rugby club who knew us all. They charged over to grapple with the gang who were by then attempting to kick our heads in whilst we were on the ground. As I was helped away to be patched up (and my mate was led away to get a taxi to Casualty) I saw a bunch of seriously large and somewhat irritated rugby players holding our assailants by the legs and banging their heads on car bonnets.
It turns out they were a bunch of students from an Oxford college who decided that as some Imperial College students had ejected them from a party for sexually harrassing one of the girls at the party, that some other IC "oiks" should be made to pay for the insult. We just happened to be handy.
It was reported to their college, where it was apparently treated as a bit of a laugh that got out of hand and not really a disciplinary matter.
Actually it's an example of gang violence of much the same kind. There is a difference in the level of armament involved. However kicking somebody repeatedly about the head when they are prone on the floor is just as much an attempt to kill or seriously injure them as an attack with a knife or gun. The big difference is between working class kids from a council estate and ex public schoolkids from an Oxbridge college.
Social deprivation is relevant because it limits the options available to children. It isn't a requirement for gang violence, it just means it's much more difficult for children to avoid being drawn into it.
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
For example the Columbine High School massacre which took place in the economic equivalent of a gated community (median income of inhabitants of Columbine = $120,000). Clearly the social gradient does not result from a simple causal link but involves other factors.
Didn't think it would take long.
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
Obviously there will be some children who get involved with gang violence simply because it's more prevalent in their neighbourhood - it's an available option, so here you'd have peer-pressure, the glamour etc as factors.
But there's plenty of evidence for a more intrinsic role for social deprivation than simply making it more difficult for children to avoid getting drawn into it. Provoking a violent response from any given individual is an unpredictable business but some sort of 'insult' seems the best method. Obviously this insult is in the eye of the beholder; that is, people behaving violently almost always consider themselves to be responding to an attack not initiating one. And this is a pretty deep cultural 'given' - responsive violence is not just justified, it is celebrated as noble and restores honour and manhood to the perpetrators - see just about any U.S. film for corroboration of that.
The further down a social hierarchy you are born, the more likely it is that you have been denied sources of social honour and self-respect (money, success, fame, whatever) and thus the more likely it is that a certain proportion of people will be faced with the choice of either accepting that they are essentially social nobodies or unwanted rubbish or enforcing 'respect' by whatever means come to hand. This is not some by-product of social hierarchy, in the way that say - higher rates of smoking is - it is intrinsic to social status hierarchy. Make social wealth divisions wider and you get greater pre-disposition to the use of violence, make them narrower and you get less.
While not disagreeing with your general thrust necessarily, I would disagree that the Columbine murders could be referred to as "gang crime".
co-op
But....but cLoWnFiSh....
I'd agree it doesn't fit the standard template, so to speak, - it was a very middle-class place so you'd expect the structures to be different from those generated in an inner-city environment with widespread poverty.
But the perpetrators - Klebbold (can't recall the exact name) and Harris had been systematically bullied and humiliated as 'faggots' and 'weirdos' etc by a dominant group within the school for many years, and it's clear that some of the bullying involved physical violence. It was systematic and organised and ultimately the victims decided to enforce respect and obtain revenge in the socially-approved way, i.e. by counter-violence. They restored their manhood.
I'm not saying that Columbine was a 'gang event' btw - but that the psychological processes involved are pretty similar. For a start I doubt that a Stockwell wannabe gangster would put up with years of humiliation before responding, a few seconds maybe. But calling something 'gang crime' is often a way of pigeon-holing it in the 'ignore' tray, in terms of trying to understand what we need to do to reduce it, especially when there are clearly many people who utterly refute the idea that social deprivation has anything to do with this kind of violence.
