Lawless towns

[worlybear]

WTF is happening in our towns?
I live in a small seaside town in the S.E. of England.
Over the last 2 years the police presence has diminished to practically nil.
From 6 pm in the evening it is unwise and unsafe to walk through the town centre or along the harbour due to a burgeoning and aggressive underclass of "homeless " people/drunks.
They pester for money and are very intimidating.
One person I know when approached said "sorry I've no money on me"-so the guy offered to walk him to a cash point!
Unbelievable!
Every night and I mean EVERY night the drunken brawls screaming and fighting carries on through drinking time until the early hours of the morning.
It's not safe to be out.
People are bedded down in shop fronts, both vacant and in business .
The police seem to shrug their shoulders and turn away ,probably because they have no resources or stomach to keep addressing these issues.
I understand that there is a local,homeless shelter but some people prefer to beg.
I'm sick to death of it and want to see some action to prevent this significant minority of morons from terrorising the town.
Personally I think that an active police presence with permission to use tasers would improve the quality of life for many law-abiding people.
AIBU?

I think if you are fortunate enough not to live near people like those the op describes it’s quite easy to be passionately right on and deeply sympathetic.

When we lived in London we had neighbors who exhibited similar behaviour I know you are not supposed to say underclass so I won’t but let’s say gangsta rap at all hours fights in the street drug dealing large fighting dogs that leapt our fence and shat in our garden groups of undesirables congregating outside our house no one in work etc I could go on We used to be quite left wing but that can take a hit after a year or so of living next door to the aforementioned behaviour

Your priveledge is showing.
'taser the homeless' but then you turn around and tell us you were 'technically' homeless? Shall we taser you? Or was that bs because this isn't going how you think it should?

This thread got a bit more interesting in the middle while I was asleep. Drop the tasering issue fgs, we’ve all said it was an overreaction.

Someone asked about official statistics upthread, does it really surprise anyone that official statistics are rigged in Britain? I’ve heard - and yes it is hearsay, but I reckon you’ll find more than 5000 rough sleepers in London alone - that if you have something between you and the ground, you are no longer considered homeless or a rough sleeper. So if you’re sleeping on a bench somewhere, you’ve officially got a home. Stats have been rigged even more as we’ve come to rely on them more, to enable politicians to claim they’re doing jobs and councils to make desperate grabs for more funding. Is it really a surprise?

As for the lawlessness issues, pp’s are right, it is complex. On the one hand you do have the issues of those left behind by austerity - but even there, I come from a poor working class background with no ograndparents or family support, poor relations with my birth family, and was left to drag myself and younger siblings up through my teens on an estate with drug dealers. Somehow I’m not part of this. I never wanted to be, so I’m not. The other group mentioned, the better off who see nothing better to do with themselves than get drunk every weekend or at the slightest excuse and make total spectacles of themselves are not just ‘victims’ of their culture either, they are willing and active participants. We all re create the culture around us daily, and that is what they choose to recreate. I blame ‘consumerism’ as a useful catch-all phrase. Perhaps we could also talk about the corrupting effects of too much luxury for that group - Britain’s inequality is huge- and the poverty of our culture. Whatever it is it’s not simple. Culture never is.

I stopped conversing with this vile creature, as she is demonstrating no empathy or humility. You will unfortunately not get her to see that her attitude is unacceptable

Agreed. The amount of people on the thread agreeing/ spouting all the homeless myths/ advocating the use of 'underclass' etc is bloody depressing though.

My point was when horrid behaviour impacts on your quality of life daily sympathy can drain away....

Tasering abit harsh. Though if you’d asked me when we still lived there after yet another disturbed night I fear I may have given a different answer...

reckon you’ll find more than 5000 rough sleepers in London alone

Yep, I agree. Statistics are skewed too as they are compiled by volunteers counting the amount they can see at any given time. Most hide, mainly to avoid attack from the general public, not other homeless people.

Shame it’s got boringly ‘right on’ again now. TheMemoryLingers had excellent points.

Tasering abit harsh

No shit Sherlock.

Tasering vulnerable people for being homeless? Yeah, possibly not a good idea. Fucks sake.

@dootball I read the OP and thought the same thing!! I've just been in coop and the staff are fighting with the homeless man that always sits outside because he's been shoplifting again

Shame it’s got boringly ‘right on’ again now.

Yes, lets go back to being less right on and advocating violating the basic human rights of societies most vulnerable eh....

It has fuck all to do with where you live, and whether this sort of things disturbs you - I live in a very deprived area full, of this sort of stuff. The difference is, I try and help and understand them, not post vile judgement and calls to taser the homeless. It's what decent people do.

To the person who said there is ''no other words to describe the underclass''- there is - human beings ffs.

Drop the tasering issue fgs, we’ve all said it was an overreaction

I get your point, and partly agree, but then, the OP didn't shout it out in anger. She carefully typed a decent-length, considered post and finished with, Personally I think that an active police presence with permission to use tasers would improve the quality of life for many law-abiding people

It wasn't an off-the-cuff comment. She didn't even retract it: the OP merely added a grudging Ok so using a taser is a step too far. Hardly an epiphanic moment of compassion.

It's a bit Trumpian to say something outrageous and offensive and then to dial it down and normalize it. But it's been said. People's ears prick up. Drip drip drip.

I understand why other posters are still commenting on it. We're shifting towards a right-wing, bleak political future and language matters.

staff are fighting with the homeless man

Fighting?

The selfish bastard should just sit out there and starve to death eh. If he doesn't freeze to death like many do that is.

@MsTSwift yeah I'd say tasering of a homeless person or indeed any person not posing as a serious threat of violence is a bit fucking harsh!

@todayisnottuesday you're 100%right, my son did the "count" as he says utter bollocks, so many hidden rough sleepers that are not counted!

*Drop the tasering issue fgs, we’ve all said it was an overreaction

I get your point, and partly agree, but then, the OP didn't shout it out in anger. She carefully typed a decent-length, considered post and finished with, Personally I think that an active police presence with permission to use tasers would improve the quality of life for many law-abiding people

It wasn't an off-the-cuff comment. She didn't even retract it: the OP merely added a grudging Ok so using a taser is a step too far. Hardly an epiphanic moment of compassion.*

^^this and OP is supposedly a "decent" human being?

Not again. Underclass is a perfectly valid term which describes a section of society well.

You say ‘understand’ them. I do, I grew up with the kids of these people attacking me on my home estate. I know how little hope of anything better they have given the examples they’re set. I also know that they get given quite a lot of chances, more sometimes than the rest of us. What’s the solution? Lift these kids right out of their homes and cultural environment and destroy all contact with their families? When does this behaviour become set in stone? The media - Love Island and other reality TV crap is an influence that could be cut out and controlled very easily without such invasive violations of freedoms, which could after all be used against any of us.

so many hidden rough sleepers that are not counted!

Quite - including the latest poor man to be scooped from the rubbish bin he was hiding in and killed, he died in absolute agony. But one less of the underclass on the streets eh

Underclass is a perfectly valid term which describes a section of society well.

I disagree. 'Ignorant cunt' however....

We need carrots and sticks both - the help for unfortunates and the discipline for poor behaviour. As someone said I think upthread, the issue is that both are being abandoned as too expensive. We’re all being abandoned with them.

Lots of seaside towns seem to have drug problems. I live in a coastal town in Kent to and it's rife here, we aren't far from a city centre which is full of homeless which has got worse since about 2010. It's really sad .

We need carrots and sticks both - the help for unfortunates and the discipline for poor behaviour.

This would sound good in some sort of dystopian novel. In real life, it sounds fucking ridiculous.

I come from one of the places in the UK that’s just about as far from the sea as you can get on Britain. Drugs are everywhere. Midlands are as noted for it as anywhere else. Britain is on the edge of socioeconomic collapse.