Be honest what's your reaction when you hear of a young person...

[EhatBow]

Killed doing something anti social/criminal?

A school aged teen died here last night. Well after midnight, on a motorbike.

He and his friends are part of a group who've been causing quite a disturbance late at night/early hours in residential streets for several weeks.

I always think there but for the grace.... I haven't always known what my DC are up to and you have to let them spread their wings and trust them at some point, although at that age they wouldn't have been out regularly after midnight.

My heart breaks for parents who made decisions they must now be regretting, but as you can imagine, the reaction locally has been "mixed".

A good friend of mine lost her 20yo only child a few years ago. He crashed his car driving far too fast. The response was venomous, but these are still someone's child 😥

I can’t believe the amount of people saying “we all did stupid things as teenagers”. No, I did not do a single thing as a teenager that risked death or serious injury to myself or another person. Stop normalising reckless behaviour.

Pretty sure this happened in my town ( Does it begin with B?) I read about it on the local Facebook page. Someone had reported youngsters tearing up and down a road on a motorbike without a helmet on a few days before. As soon as I read about this tragedy I wondered if it was the same teen.

I do wonder about parents who don't know where their 14 year old kid is out after midnight even in the school holidays. And how does he have access to a motorbike? Having said that, I feel desperately sorry for a young life lost in a moment of impulsiveness and the devastation their family must feel.

Exactly! All of these people saying we all did stupid things, does that mean they would be ok with their own children out acting like this?

Im a teacher and it certainly isn’t the norm for teenagers to be out breaking the law night after night, supported by their parents because they apparently did the same things - I work in a deprived inner city school and the majority of parents would be horrified, not justifying it.

I didn't do anything like that either @AppleBottomRats. I was a complete goodie-twoshoes tbh, as it's my dd. I still think it's tragic that a young person has lost his life as the result of a stupid mistake.

You can't believe the amount of posters who are saying that they did stupid things as teenagers. I can't believe the amount of posters who seem to think that kids who go off the rails a bit in their teenage years deserve to die for it. I guess we're all surprised by different things!

My first instinct is usually “thankfully they hit a wall before they hit someone else”.

Yes, I know some will think that’s cold-hearted and I genuinely awful for the teen who died and their family.

I don't wish anyone dead but if a hooligan dies I don't regret it . I don't feel anything because I don't know them .

I just think what a shame he / she didn't have decent parents who instilled right from wrong and think how much other criminal behaviour from them will stop

I don't know if this one would have or not, but all the big achievers take risks
Eh? 14 year old's stealing motorbikes and crashing them is not a sign of future greatness.
It's tragic that he died at 14, but let's not pretend he was more destined for greater things than any other young person, on the basis of his risk taking alone.
Sounds like he was quite a troubled boy.

@Anothernamechangeplease I don’t think they deserve to die but I don’t think being a teenager is an excuse. At 14 you know that motorbikes are risky, that drink driving is wrong, that it’s illegal for you to drive a motor vehicle, and that your actions have consequences. You’re old enough to be tried as an adult. It’s the age my grandmother left school and started working full time.

Absolutely this .
People are sick to the back teeth of other people's feral kids .

Personally I'm sick to the back teeth of people with bitter and poisonous attitudes @hattie43

The word feral is unacceptable. A boy is dead.

Death doesn't confer instant sainthood.

There is going off the rails a bit and putting peoples lives in danger. The kid that died near me had gone the wrong way down a dual carriageway earlier on in the week and nearly caused a pile up. They had also lost balance and nearly gone into the side of someone’s car, where their toddler had been sitting. They had also kicked wing mirrors off of cars at traffic lights. That isn’t going off the rails, that is being a criminal. 14 is old enough to understand that, on the Facebook groups where it was being discussed his mum has said that another relative had died recently in an accident and she was still struggling with that, her son was willingly risking other peoples lives and risking other families having to go through the same before he ended up killing himself.

@hattie43 no you're absolutely right I haven't and I'm sure my thoughts would be very different if I had. Thanks for making your point I didn't look at it like that

I never said it did. But it's a tragedy when a good life goes wrong, it's a tragedy when a kid dies.

It's a choice to be a bitter twisted adult. Won't be a shame if people like that die either, presumably.

My first reaction was, what was a 14 year doing out after midnight on a motorbike?!

I do feel sympathy for (most) young deaths. My twenty year is just beginning to stretch his wings regarding driving, going further distances, motorways etc. For longer distances, I always clock when he’s due to arrive at his destination, and am relieved that he gets there without receiving a phone call. Accidents can happen to anyone, even the most proficient of drivers.

I'd feel sad for the family however part of me would be thinking that it's one less person to pose a danger to innocent people.

It's very simple .

Lead a life of criminality and you'll have a higher chance of injury / death . Would you be quite so charitable if he'd have killed one of your children / relatives / friends .

I think it's sad. Lots of teens have shitty risk assessments and can come to harm in ridiculous ways but some of these kids, for whom a miserable early demise seems inevitable, navigate their short lives in a world that never fucking cared about them and then inevitably they die without a single ounce of self care or preservation.

As someone who lost a relative to one of these young people, I find it hard to have much sympathy really. When you see and feel the destruction and devastation they have caused to your family, it’s difficult to care.

Exactly.

I was the victim of a 2 year campaign by our local scrotes, culminating in a suicide attempt by my dd and fireworks through the letterbox. Everyone, including the police, knew who it was, but no actual evidence.

I would not be in the slightest upset if any of them came to a premature end. No doubt there would be an outpouring of sympathy on fb for the lovable rogues, but their parents don't give a shit about what they're up to at midnight on a school night (night after night, for month after month, for 2 years), it's a bit hypocritical to bare all on social media once the bad lad comes a cropper.

And I don't mind being called out as heartless for that opinion. Once you've lived with the terrifying consequences of 'lovable rogue' behaviour, it hardens one's soul.

I don't disagree in the sense that of course all of us can make momentary misjudgements - that lasts into adulthood.

But I always dislike theway in which this sort of statement glosses over the fact that there are people who are much, much more likely to do unwise things, at a risk to themselves and others. And they're kids who've had disrupted home lives, deprived upbringings and traumatic experiences.

The tragedy happens in slow motion for such kids, and I think it's disingenuous to talk about it as if it would be as likely to happen to all of us equally.

A lot of people are completely out of touch with the reality of being a teenager.

Its all very well to say he was stupid and his parents were stupid, but that is very simplistic and quite phenomenally ignorant.

Teenagers now are subject to huge pressure, much of it driven on social media and away from their parents’ eyes. Of course we don’t know the circumstances but we don’t know whether this boy was pressured into sneaking out and riding the bike. Unless his parents had bought him the bike and said yes go ahead and ride it all night, there are other factors at play.

As so many (wise) posters have said, the teenage brain is incapable of making rational decisions all of the time. Add to that peer pressure, and it’s a dangerous combination.

He and his friends are part of a group who've been causing quite a disturbance late at night/early hours in residential streets for several weeks
Yeah, sorry, this is not the everyday reality of being a teenager.

That's. Very nieve view I'm afraid.

I've been a police officer for 13 years. These kids are not pressured into this - they tend to find their own and stick together.they generally don't or didn't attend school . They're often a product of their upbringing. Mini Wannabe gangsters . Their families are dysfunctional. But they're all just lovable rogues - till they now down your kids , or threaten your kids with a machete , or tie up the lock
Shopkeeper and rob the safe at gunpoint .
These are my real experiences. Not imagined .

He didn't steal the bike.

No one knows what he would have achieved, that's the tragedy, but the people who are destined to change the world, aren't usually rule followers.