Feral children

[Overbearingndn]

Several children, have been arrested in connection with the death of an 80 year old dog walker.

What is wrong with children today? I remember the Bulger case and it sent shockwaves around the world, now people just accept that children kill.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/article/2024/sep/03/five-children-arrested-over-murder-80-year-old-man-in-leicestershire

opening post edited by MNHQ

@WearyAuldWumman I remember your post, horrific and it has stayed with me. As shocking at this Leicester case is, thinking about it it's hardly an uncommon occurance for a gang of youths to attack and even kill people, I'm thinking most recently of the bus driver in Aberdeenshire. Of course the SNP response is to become ever softer on youth crime.

As @@Thevelvelletes rightly also points out about Aberdeen. I've read numerous recent reports of the situation there and it's not good.

Thing is, there's a massive culture in Scotland of tolerance for low level poor behaviour from children and they are allowed to play out unsupervised from a very young age. Anyone who is on a fb community group will have seen the posts complaining about chappie (knocking a door and running away), kids coming into gardens etc and the amount of vitriol they generally get back is staggering. Person after person saying aww they're just weans and weren't you ever young? Oh and there's nothing for them to do apparently.
Of course by 12/13 the behaviour has then escalated to vandalism and assault. Absolutely zero consequences. As an adult, if you tell them off you'll be hounded mercilessly and probably have the parents on you as well. Defend yourself and it's you that's in trouble.

If I have to pass a group of teens in the street now, I can feel my heart rate escalate. I won't get trains when they're travelling to or from school.

….in which case it’s an apples and oranges thing, and one can’t glibly put this down to @shuggles‘ ‘breakdown of traditional values and morality’…

My elderly mum had eggs thrown at her window,two kids banged on her door to say boy's had done it ..I'm hazarding they were in on it.
My mum was terrified and has serious health issues and like anyone should feel safe in their home.

Heartbreaking, I’ll be reading into this case
more.

As a bit of an aside I find it interesting he had a seemingly close family and no reported drug problems and was meant to be in a shelter but somehow ended up sleeping on a bench outside. Obviously that’s not to excuse or explain what these awful teens did to him but I’m just curious.

Anyway it’s horrific the way some homeless people get treated. He was just minding his own business and they did that. What went through their head as they stabbed this poor man?

Canada has very lenient sentencing. Don’t expect they’ll get jailed for too long.

ETA: I’ve just read something that may indicate he may have had an alchohol problem. Not blaming to be clear but it just kind of explains to me a bit more how he ended up on a bench and not sleeping inside a shelter or a family’s sofa.

Very sad either way.

Absolutely sickening.
I expected because of their ages it will be a small, pointless punishment.

I feel the social contract in this country has been broken in so many ways and this is one of them. I hear stories like this so often and it’s sad - just why is it allowed to go on?

We need more order in this country and they need to crack down on this more low level stuff first as I feel this is where it starts. People (of all ages) are allowed to intimidate their neighbours, hurl abuse at strangers not clean up after their dogs, drop litter etc and it all empowers certain people to go on to do much worse.

Think what often? Can't see the message you responded to as it's been deleted.

Well, when one young rioter's mother jetted off for a holiday in Spain after her son's arrest., you can kind of see the kind of parenting these children don't get.

FFS what hope do we have with parents like this😬

DS 17 isn't even allowed to play GTA.

Sadly it doesn't surprise me. We moved onto a lovely new build estate a few years ago. Unfortunately, the developers had problems shifting houses, so parts of were quietly sold off to housing associations. The problems happened almost instantly - large groups of feral children hanging around day and night causing problems, being loud and damaging property. They had no respect for anything and neither did their parents who simply didn't care.

The police did nothing about it, even going as far to tell me that they'd only had one report of asb in the area which was untrue as many of my neighbours had rang them. The housing association did nothing. I spoke at length with my local councillor who admitted she'd been contacted by numerous other people but didn't have the power to do anything.

Unfortunately, there's no consequences for these children. Their parents, their communities and the law let them get away with it.

Exactly. Some people just shouldn't have kids if they can't be arsed to look after them 🙄

Discipline doesn’t really start until age 4 or 5, by then it’s too late. You see it on here time and time again - ‘they’re too little at 2 to be told off for hitting, just ignore or remove them’. My 17 month old understands the word NO said firmly and loudly and has done since he turned 1, it’s been very helpful if he’s gone to do something dangerous and I might not get to him on time.

The problem with all this ‘remove/distract/ignore them and praise good behaviour’ is they never actually learn what they did was wrong. They never learn impulse control by being told NOT to do something, they’re just redirected to something else or carried away.

Some posters on here also, frankly, desperately search for a neurodiversity diagnosis rather than face the fact their kid is badly behaved. Aggressive child? Neurodiverse. Destructive child? Neurodiverse. Doesn’t listen? Neurodiverse. Unkind to other kids? Neurodiverse. Rude and demanding? Neurodiverse. I can’t think of a single thing which is not now a symptom of neurodiversity and the issue with that is once the first or second poster has decided the kid is ‘neurodiverse’, every response suggesting various discipline methods thereafter becomes ‘ableist’.

Every poster agrees kids these days are badly behaved but there’s always reason why their child is special and different and needs a soft approach

They murdered someone an adult would be named

Serious crime committed.. Adult consequences.
Being the big man with a knife etc.. Adult consequences and no sob stories in court.
Lots of people have bad experiences growing up but don't go on to kill or maim others.

No they wouldn't, nobody has been charged! Four children have been released without charge and one is still being questioned. Adults are not named in either of those situations for very good reasons.

I said much earlier in the thread that most incidents like this with children result in NFA

They will have been involved though, the police just dont have enough to charge.

This is shocking and very sad. I live in this county and im appalled at this. It does sound like hes reported them to police before and theyve not done anything. The police being powerless has probably resulted in these children doing this because they felt they were untouchable and able to “get away with it” in a moment of madness. I feel really sad for him and his family.

i told my 15 and 11 year old boys earlier. They were both extremely sad and shocked that the poor guy had this happen. We talked through what was likely to happen to these children now and how its changed the course of their lifes.

And there are reasons why children are treated differently.

And four of them have been released.

I dont know about the rest of the world but in the UK, you can make a report of a crime, sometimes quite serious like assault but it wont go anywhere. So it depends on what stats you're looking at, reported crime, recorded crime, or convictions?

Ive been assaulted myself, it was NFA, not in the public interest to take it further. It was a child of course, female.

Some of the children being released without charge doesn't give me comfort. This man had been harassed before. They probably egged the attack on and took part in the harassment. At the very least they didn't stop their crony attacking the elderly man. Because they didn't technically strike a blow they will be let off to gloat about getting away with it. No consequences dealt, no lessons learned and a good forty or fifty years of these scrotes causing further misery and their own children and grandchildren being dragged up to perpetuate the cycle. Great.

I've seen this many a time on housing estates where gang's operate young children are given positive rewards for any bullying attempt made towards a targetted individual. Excuse after excuse is made for the children so police and other authorities are unable to take much, if any in the way of action.
Adequate social services interventions, day care, sure start centres supporting positive parenting for the under fives. Referral mechanisms in schools and ultimately intervention and consequences for neglectful and harmful parenting.

I'm half expecting the 14 year old to be released. Or have something muttered about diminished responsibility

Children have few boundaries regardless of parenting now a days & we don't know where these children are from or their family backgrounds.

A child can call a teacher a cunt and nothing will of any consequence will happen, a few years ago, that would have meant the cane or the slipper.

Its all very well blaming parents etc but the message we keep giving children is they can do whatever they like.

We keep blaming the parents, how about blaming these children? and stop with this "oh poor child" crap.

There is no respect anymore for authority, law an order or the elderly and that comes from society.

In the 70s, my brother was caught carrying a knife as a 14yo, the man who caught him, then twisted his arm so violently behind his back, he ended up with pulled muscles, this man then told him why he should never have a knife and threw it in the river, my DB never carried a knife again.

What would have happened to this man if he did that to a 14yo today? it would be "poor child" and "violent child abuser"

Agree with this and lots of other posts ^. Well said.

Well it looks like only 1 is still being questioned.
Is this the flip side of the angst about Joint Enterprise convictions? Here's a Graun article, and there was a Great Important Jimmy McGovern Drama about the terrible consequences for ppl in gang violence who get convicted

https://www.theguardian.com/law/article/2024/jun/26/and-manslaughter-charges-under-joint-enterprise-rise-despite-concern