Huge increase in large groups of teenagers terrorising the public

[Shopaholic100]

Has anyone else noticed a huge increase in large groups of teenagers terrorising the public? I was in York today and there were huge groups of teenage boys causing havoc, screaming, swearing, shouting and pulling peoples hats off and throwing them on the floor as they walked past. At the same time another huge group of girls were also screaming and kicking full cans of fizzy drinks around so it was squirting everywhere. Milton Keynes a few weeks ago was the same with large groups running round John Lewis causing havoc whilst security were trying to get them to leave. In another part of the shopping centre another group were causing trouble too. I’ve seen the same in London too. I used to see small groups sometimes do silly things, but the size of the groups is much larger and threatening and they seem fearless. Anyone else noticed this?

I grew up in the 90s, in our small town there would be huge fights between dozens of drunk & high youths on the playing fields watched by up to 100 more.. the field was where everyone went to do drugs / have sex/ get drunk & fight then cause trouble round the sports centre etc. Everyone was from a whole mixture of backgrounds - poor, rich, caring, neglected..
I remember being upset one day because the local police tried to stop trouble & the nice community police woman ended up getting beaten up (and I liked her because she tried to help me when I was very depressed).

I left town years ago but I bet the kids are still having fights & getting high on that field!! The difference is they are probably filming it all for likes now.

Oh yes and our local pub was known as the fight club. Still is I think!!

Thanks, @HedwigIsMyDemon - and I totally take your point. I have a lot of friends and family in the education sector and they would agree that worsening pupil behaviour is a large part of their burnout (alongside unmanageable hours, chronic underfunding, levels of responsibility accelerating too fast from NQT, too many kids to manage which steadily increases and a regulator that seems to have unreasonable expectations with no knowledge of the reality of the challenges they face, their student demographic or the outcomes those students can reasonably achieve).

So it’s interesting to see that it is not playing out in the wider world…and it’s hard to see why. Teachers are living it and experiencing it so you’d expect to see it reflected. I don’t know the answer to that.

Maybe school is where kids feel more secure in how much they can act out (because, as many have said, parents are less likely to take their kid to task which is ridiculous!). Maybe school culture has become more bravado based?

Maybe the focus on getting kids to stay in school through fines etc means the highly and moderately disruptive ones that would have just fucked off and played truant (and raised hell outside school), are now doing it within school grounds. And have learned that the school has no real power because they’ll just be sent to a PRS for a bit…but the fact the local authority has to ensure there is educational provision for them means they will likely end up in mainstream again, being moved around.

So, they’re not causing issues outside school anymore, leading to a drop in the stats outside school but leaving more and more teachers feeling like they’re having to gird themselves for a grinding conflict every day.

Then, because those kids are so disruptive, the friends I have that are teachers say that they can’t give the same attention to the other kids…who then also start to act out, especially when they’re being encouraged by the bad examples they’re seeing from the others.

Add that to increasing class sizes and staffing shortages, and you have a pressure pot? But one that might not be picked up outside of school grounds - maybe we need to look at crime and disorder stats for post-education ages, instead to see what happens as they come out of school settings.

I wasn’t trying to invalidate anyone’s personal experience - but if there are evidence-based reductions in behavioural issues for that age-group across the board, then it needs pointing out.

There needs to be zero tolerance of bad behaviour in schools. Day one, these are the rules, if you break them you are gone, no second chances, no appeal, you are marched out of school on the spot and it's up to your parents to find you another school or teach you at home.

In London, not noticed this...but local Mc D has 4 security guards now and restricts entry at after school hours to stop the gangs of teens.

How would you define bad behaviour?

Would you go for the silence in class, silence in corridors approach?

Would you not have any leniency at all?

I guess you wouldn't try to find out the cause, the issues etc ?

What do you think the outcomes are for pupils excluded from school and the effect on society?

"What do you think the outcomes are for pupils excluded from school and the effect on society?"
Not good but far less overall than having hundreds of thousands of kids leaving school in a completely incapable, uneducated and unsocialised state, as is the case now.

You'd only have to expel a few before the others got the message and knuckled down and started taking advantage of the educational opportunities offered to them, instead of seeing school as a place to mess about.

It's really hard to remove them especially if they have an EHCP and yes they need an education

You'd only have to expel a few before the others got the message and knuckled down and started taking advantage of the educational opportunities offered to them, instead of seeing school as a place to mess about

Do you think so - I am not so sure

Not good but far less overall than having hundreds of thousands of kids leaving school in a completely incapable, uneducated and unsocialised state, as is the case now

I agree.

I think a lot more needs to be done to look at the reasons why, the opportunities, issues children face at home. all the sociological reasons - as well as the school curriculum itself. Is it suitable for the 21st century?

@HedwigIsMyDemon - also, you said you’d be interested in stats on perception of behaviour from teachers.

Came across this on my deep dive before but chary of it, as I don’t know the quality of the data or the sample size - it‘s hardly Nat Stats.

Teachertapp UK: Are Things Getting Better Or Worse?

I'd issue warnings for disruptive pupils and then suspension and eventually exclusion but every bad behaviour has to be punished. You have to have some common sense with it and allow kids to be kids (so no to silence etc) but there needs to be set standards and kids held accountable.

It'd make schools far better places for everyone else. If excluded pupils cause problems out of school then send them to young offenders prisons.

A friend of mine sent me a photo of us when were teens c. 1987 this week. We're on a train and clearly being very rowdy. The legs of one boy are the only part visible because we're all piled on tip of him. Bear in mind too that this was probably posed, no camera phones in these days and our worst excesses weren't captured.

I was a proper swot, very well behaved at school and all the people in the picture have gone on to have professional careers. It's nonsense that this is new.

We had riots in the 80s and the whole Skinhead/Casuals/Mods thing too.

I'm not with it these days but I think the Casuals clothing brands are making a reappearance, especially at football and the behaviour with it.

It's not new but it's not good either.

@LaughingCat interesting. I’ll have a read! But don’t ever use the phrase “deep dive” in front of a teacher 😂

Haha! I work in comms and I’ve mentally hung, drawn and quartered myself for that phrase as well.

Don’t worry, I’ll keep some more examples of relevant stats in my back pocket and circle back on this later when I have more bandwidth.

I think further analysis could prove really impactful and might even move the needle on our alignment. Let’s touch base on this later and see if we can unpack these learnings further…

Oh god. I need a shower now. shudders

*castigated…I’ve mentally castigated myself for using that phrase.

I can’t stop with the clichés. 😳

Touch base 😀

@LaughingCat - the work of the devil! Very good

Then kids like my DD would have had their whole future ruined because of a 'uniform violation' that was the result of a temporary blip in finances due to my ill health, or the time she dropped the F word while in the yard with friends and was overheard by a teacher and got a bit lippy when challenged.
She got inclusion for both and I bloody well backed the second one 100% and she got punishment at home in the form of no phone for a while and no going out. I was a bit shocked tbh that they also hadn't asked her to apologise to the teacher, and the teacher was apparently shocked when she went and did so, and was a little taken aback when I was more "Well that's unacceptable" rather than "Not my little darling" or "Don't you pick on my kid, she can swear if she wants".
There's only been those two instances where I've got a call home and I fully backed the school on the swearing and answering back one.
And she learned from it because although I don't doubt she was told a few times because teens do push boundaries, she wasn't in trouble like that again.
But a zero tolerance would have seen her excluded for either issue.

The key I think that was things she cared about were taken away in both instances, and the first instance was a bit ridiculous, because you can't teach kids to not be poor, I would have agreed if she'd had the correct footwear, but she didn't and I didn't have access to get her more by the following day. It wasn't due to bad behaviour.

The second though she was taken away from her peer group at school and not allowed her phone or to go out at home as a result of her behaviour - concequences she cared about. So she didn't behave like that again. Job done.

The issue really is that there's less and less concequences that these kids care about, the parents won't back the school up because they don't see an issue with the behaviour and getting kicked out of school is the whole point. If DD had ever been suspended for behaviour she'd have not been leaving her room, she'd have had no freedom, phone or anything like that for the duration and after and would have been doing school work.
For many kids suspension is a badge of honour and a couple of days off without having teachers on your back.

I don't pretend to know what the answer is, but these teens are the adults of the future and that's a scary thought. There's always been families like that around, but it just seems that it's massively increased in recent years and there's been nothing effective to counter it.

Unfortunately the worst people in society tend to have more children than responsible, hard working people. Hopefully the benefits cap will curb this at least partially.

I suppose that's how they've been brought up and the cycle continues

Maybe the children should get taken away and be brought up by decent, hard working families instead?

Not sure if it's poverty in the true sense - most of the ones that cause trouble round here have on £200 trainers.

I've got a 14 yr old and he is terrified to be out in public as they are so intimidating on the bus, in McDonalds etc.

There were definitely troublemakers when I was younger but not to this scale and not carrying weapons/throwing bricks through windows etc.

Can I ask what you are allowed to do to manage this behaviour in schools? Are you allowed to tell them off? Shout at them? What happens if you do? Do they argue back? Threaten you? Do they gang up and start filming you?

Honestly, I don’t know how you do it. I think it’s too much to expect one adult to manage 30 out of control teenagers armed with mobile phones, mental health labels and an in-depth knowledge of their own ‘human rights’.

It will only get worse. This lot will grow up and have kids of their own, and then what? Soon schools will need prison wardens and not teachers.

1994 and I’m eleven. Local girls my age in rural estate don’t dare kick the shit out of me because I’m already nearly six foot. They wait until I leave the park to let my mum know I’m alright (I had to show my face every hour so she knew I was safe), then they pin down my two (younger and smaller) friends, and force poisonous berries down their throats. Friends end up in hospital with stomachs pumped, one nearly dies.

I did my silver Duke of Edinburgh award when I was around 14 in 1997. Near where we camped in the Forest of Dean one night was another group of kids of a similar age. We met up that evening, and were having a good time until one of our group made a pass at one of the boys (who happened to be the boyfriend of one of the girls). Things turned awkward and we said goodnight, apologising and beating a hasty retreat. Woke up at 3am to our tents being kicked in, by what felt like baseball bats or similar. Some bruises and a fracture but luckily nothing serious.

My mates and I got mugged in 1999 by a bunch of lads the same age as us (15-16) at knifepoint on the back of the bus in Cheadle.

In 2002, I was eighteen and working in the Hogshead pub in Wilmslow. I remember Friday nights we’d finish up closing the bar after time was called by midnight and then we’d head over to Waverley’s/Bank Square on the corner. I remember standing in an island in the middle of the road, and watching carnage at 2.15am, after the club shut. At least six police vans, women and men urinating in the gutter and fights everywhere. Like over a dozen. This was pretty standard. Most were my age. Saturday nights and there was a gang of teenagers that would force drinkers to go to the cashpoint and withdraw all their money, or they’d beat them close to death. Wilmslow…isn’t exactly rough lol.

I was at Download Festival in 2006 when rolling fights erupted between younger emos and metalheads. They started a lot of fires, and I remember watching them spreading through the campsite towards us and wondering at what point we’d need to pack up and run. Twenty minutes was the answer. Still shocked no-one got hurt.

In 2011, when my other half and I had just started dating, we had those riots from teenagers in a lot of the major cities.
I remember getting my best mate through the back streets of Manchester to Viccy station before making my way back to Piccadilly (misspent youth hanging about the dodgy end of town paid off as I knew the alleys like the back of my hand unlike the rioters).

They were setting shops on fire and their parents were driving them in and telling them what shops to hit.

I remember being really worried about my other half because he lived in some high rise flats above a PC World in Leeds, and I was terrified they’d set that on fire.

My brother lived in Birmingham and he said he saw them picking up a woman and throwing her into a plate glass window while he was on the other side.

There is a certain minority that causes trouble…but I think they’ve always been there. I just don’t know if they’ve really become worse or whether we’re hearing more about it now we’re permanently attached to the news and social media.

Also, I sound like I was always looking for trouble. I really wasn’t. It’s just always been there. Violence amongst and by teenagers was a permanent undercurrent in both rural and urban settings but I never really thought anything of it. It was just…life.

I wouldn’t have gone to Maccy Dees by myself either!

We're back to Borstal type school units perhaps