How and why are teens allowed to roam the roads freely for hours?

Well obviously I don’t know what every child in the country was doing but I’m certainly talking about all the kids in my school.
This was in a mining town, so somewhere that would be considered quite rough and working class.

It was a small dog, going by the picture. It will have been terrified too. The dogs I've had would have been pretty useless faced with a raging, violent thug.

I’d be too scared to work with today’s youth (the outdoor ones). They’re brave!

I'm not blaming the dog
Just wondered why he didn't protect his owner though, I thought dogs did.

I completely agree.

I know a 14 year old who literally is not allowed out of the front door alone, I'm not exaggerating, he's not even allowed to put the bins out. He can't ride a bike, and is driven to and from school. He even has to ask to go out in his back garden and they will sometimes say no, because it's too windy or spitting a bit.

On the other hand, I know kids of 10 or 11 who's parents have pretty much washed their hands of them and they are bringing up themselves. By 12 or 13 these kids will be out of control.

The problem is by this age some parents either start to feel like they can relax and their work is done or are terrified of losing control and over manage. It's a difficult balance to get right, but that's parenting, it's what we signed up for, it is difficult and it doesn't stop once your child starts getting more independent.

What rose tinted world did you grow up in?! As a teen I, and most others I knew, were out all day and parents didn't know where we were. Sure, we might have told them. But whether it was true or not.... And with no mobiles, how could they check?

I think generally, teens these days have way less freedom. But for the most parts they are just doing what teens have always done. That's not to say there aren't some more extreme issues like knife crime and other things like sexting and cyberbullying that weren't around 'in our day'. But a blanket 'kids these days....' isn't really true or helpful in any way to addressing actual issues.

God I was hanging round in a cemetery drinking cider and kissing boys as a teenager. Don't see much of that in my area now! (Thankfully)

This is totally untrue - I think you are misinformed. I run a range of youth clubs across a city and we have hundreds of kids in every night of the week one of our clubs alone gets over 200 on a Friday night. And often their behaviour is much, much better in club than it is in school, on street or at home. I know this because I work with other providers to support them so I do hear how they're getting on in other places and I will go out looking for young people on the street to direct them into our clubs - usually they just want somewhere safe and warm to hang out with their friends where they can be themselves and they're receptive to it. Kids who struggle to engage with youth clubs are struggling for a reason - the most common reasons are trauma or exploitation related, or sometimes it's because the club is hobby specific or putting too much focus on group work and some kids struggle to sustain this on top of school or due to being ND. Or they may struggle due to their circumstances - for example its very difficult for young people in care to engage with youth clubs simply because they are moved around between placements so much it becomes geographically difficult.

But youth centres absolutely work.

Children are Interested in youth clubs.

We have three in our area, as well as thr youth bus that goes to the park and it's always busy and has lots of kids engaging with it. They offer thr kids activities that they want Esther then whether they think they want, and because of ther its successful.

Well, i',m not sure you can blame the dog!!!

But I do agree re people. I'm constantly shocked at how people don't ever want to step in anymore. Of course, I assume that no one was around in this case because his chidlren found him so it' snot even like a passerby who was too scared to intervene then called an ambulance once the children had gone.

While that situation was truly awful, the fact that it' sreceived so much coverage etc is because, awful though some anti social behaviour is, it does not usually reach this level of appallingness.

When I was a teen (in the 90s) we were all in the pub from about 15/16ish. As children in the 80s, we were out from breakfast to tea time and would only go home for lunchtime we remembered or were really hungry. This generation spends so much time indoors and playing violent video games.

Yes, it is easy to blame the parents, but I'm fairly sure every parent tries to teach their kids right from wrong, so there must be other factors beyond parental influence at play.

Makes you wonder how nobody else noticed what was going on, and how the dog didn't protect him. Shame.

That's it blame the government. Children are your responsibility

It's pretty obvious as in the case of Brianna Ghey that parents are giving in to demands for I phones but not having any idea what their kids are doing on there or who they are talking too.
Wake up. It's easy to blame others.

Girl in this case had clips on her phone of violence, is that what the parent/s bought her the phone for so she could film attacks on people. Wonderful.

It has ever been thus.

“… I find by sad Experience how the Towns and Streets are filled with lewd wicked Children, and many Children as they have played about the Streets have been heard to curse and swear and call one another Nick-names, and it would grieve ones Heart to hear what bawdy and filthy Communications proceeds from the Mouths of such…”
A Little Book for Children and Youth – Being Good Counsel and Instructions for Your Children, Earnestly Exhorting Them to Resist the Temptation of the Devil, Robert Russel
1695

That poor old man was not killed at night.

Bullocks to youth clubs, you are misinformed.
Children aren't interested in youth clubs. Even if they went their behaviour would be bad.
I know someone that tried to run one.
You need to accept times have changed.

Op no point being annoyed at the kids or the parents. Be annoyed at a government that has so chronically cut funding to youth provision over the years that youth centres, services and spaces are on their knees unable to keep the doors open or staff in post. When you do away with those services then you will naturally find young people looking for other places to gather (as we all do within our social circles except they don't have the money to go for dinner together and aren't old enough for the pub). Some parents will do their best to monitor their kids but ultimately part of parenting is trust that your kids are where they say they are. When I was a teen I was extremely closely monitored by my parents. They wanted to know who I was with and where I was and what I was doing all the time. I got really good at lying but ultimately that was down to needing a bit of freedom and wanting a place where I could hang out with my friends. There was no resource near us so we got up to mischief instead.

The other issue is that many young people are being exploited and while parents are being told 'this happens' there's not enough support available or reliably enough funded to actually help parents when it does happen. They're told 'talk to your teens' but not how to talk to them.

Then of course you have vulnerable young people in the mix who are struggling at home and feel safer out and about but then can't regulate themselves and don't know how to behave appropriately because they and often the parents have had bigger issues which take focus - which is a job for statutory and community services which are also being massively cut back.

I’m a member of the family and have been attending the trial almost every day. It was a tough day for all of us. We’ve tried to hold forgiveness in our hearts for the kids involved, but the family made that incredibly difficult. They would often come out of court celebrating—high-fiving each other whenever something went in their favor. It was deeply painful to witness their lack of remorse throughout the process. The only time we saw any emotion from their side was after the guilty verdict was read.

It was clear these kids were failed by their upbringing. Let this be a wake-up call to all parents: stay involved in your children’s lives. It’s our responsibility to guide them, to teach them right from wrong, so tragedies like this never happen.

We hope that these young kids take this time to reflect, learn, and grow into better individuals after serving their sentences.
Thus is from a member of Mr Kohlis family.

Stop with the parent bashing. I have a really difficult teen. So loud and annoys people. Diagnosed Autistic/ADHD. From the outside, he looks like a really terribly parented brat with no actual issues. Each attempt at a bit of freedom I think, what are you doing. Don't mess it up.

There's no criminal behaviour, more annoying in this case.

My biggest issue personally is phones. I would never feel comfortable politely confronting poor behaviour anymore in groups of teens because the phone will likely come out and I'd struggle with that.

We were feral with no oversight growing up. I don't see that happening anymore. We're all tracking kids and checking in. There isn't a fear of authority generally as much anymore. A good thing and a bad thing.

I mainly agree with this, but the shift in recent years has been in aggressive behaviour that is often condoned by parents and resource strapped public services meaning that there aren't accessible youth facilities, schools can't get on top of disruptive behaviour and lack of policing to manage criminally disruptive and violent behaviour.

Drugs are also more accessible now which fuels negative behaviours.

Anti-social and violent behaviour has spread beyond its traditional territory largely assisted by online resources and communications, and there does seem to be more innocent people getting caught up as victims rather than targeted territorial gangs.

It's not totally new, but there has been a gear change. Younger teenagers are hitting the news more frequently as offenders than in recent decades too.

It's going to take a lot of investment in youth services and public services to reverse the trends and that's not about to happen imminently.

Mist teens I come in contact with while they're out " roaming" are fine. I think it worse if they're stuck on their computers all day and night.

My kids are teenagers they go out all the time
I do not want them indoors not knowing how to socialise - not being street wise - just siting in front of social media rubbish all night

A lot of these types of children, the antisocial and or violent ones, don't have proper parents, or functioning parents, or parents that care, quite probably their parents behave in exactly the same way. A lot of these kids don't have a loving or safe home to be in, it's preferably for them to be outside on the streets with people their own age. They've probably learned this behaviour from adults around them.

It's not a simple solution to punish the parents, especially if there are no parents. Culture and society needs to change and people need more respect for authority/police. But in many areas the police also need to earn that respect.

It's a massive problem with no simple answer.