The society we live in today - what is wrong with some people and how can it be fixed?

[DrNortherner]

Watching the news, all you see is stories of yobs being violent, socially disruptive, on the dole and genrally not giving a toss about themselves or anyone else. They have no desire to get off their arses and get a job and a better life and future.

Do we make it too easy for these kind of people? We give them money to spend, we let them off if they commit a crime and hell, we even house them if they become parents and pay some of their monthly bills.

I grew up on a council estate in Teesside, lived there till I was 17. My parents still live in the same house. My Gran and 2 aunties live on council estates too, and I visit regularly so I know what I am talking about. Don't shout me down in flames, I am not critiscising everyone, I am well aware there are many good people with morals who live on council estates, and I am the first to defend when a bit of council estate bashing takes place.

But I have seen a huge change.When I was a kid, most of the residents were elderly or young families, but mainly people had jobs - they just didn't earn alot. People took care of their properties and the gardens were immaculate.

Now it is a different story. It is full of youngsters with kids, with no jobs, with no hope and with no desire to improve their lot. I so worry about my mum and dad. They live next door to a young girl with 3 kids. The Dad is 19 and on drugs. They have lots of visitors throughout the night, and last year 4 men turned up and smashed all their windows and kicked their door in.

This is just one example. The local shops are nearly all closed down, lots of houses boarded up, kids parks in disrepair (because of local vandals) and kids as young as 2 wander the streets for most of the day 'playing' outside.

The local secondary school is crap and in special measures.

Can you imagine living there as a teen?

What can we possibly do to get out of this rut?

'I do blame Thatcher but also our overwhelmingly results-based exam system and American cultural influences. '

Oh, yes, all that Christian and other religious fundamentalism over there, with its strong emphasis on family values, no sex outside marriage, being teetotal and the importance of religious worship has had a huge impact on teh UK.

The answer is really simple. Yobs don't happen, they get made. Babies who have their needs attended to grow up believing the world is a nice place. Babies who aren't that lucky grow up believing the world is a hostile, scarey place. Many babies have absent dads, for boys this is difficult to deal with. Many babies have depressed mums, or mums who are so stressed they can't deal with their crying baby. Stupid shows like Bringing Up Baby (Claire Verity, C4) encouraged mums to leave babies to cry. Those babies quickly learn the world is an empty and cold place. They give up and stop crying. The brain gets hard wired to be self reliant.
Babies like these live in fear of not surviving. They see everything as a threat and build defences in order to survive. They don't trust people and are angry cos no-one has ever cared for them. They enter school stressed and difficult to handle. They get excluded and out on the street they meet others like them.
Yes, they behave like yobs, because society has treated them like yobs.
If we can ever get our heads round helping all mums and dads to see their babies as vulnerable little things that need help, support, cuddles and love, and when they cry they aren't out to get you, we can begin to put an end to the next round of yobs.
Start by signing the petition about parenting programmes! petitions.pm.gov.uk/parentingshows/
Clive (socialbaby.com)

families with young kids need more help with parenting. with the sustaining of famiy units. whether they be nuclear, lone, or extended parent famiies isnt the point. as long as they provide healthy place to be emotinally and mentally.

i agree with sabaidii.

also i would ban private/independent/public schools and everyone would have an equal chance right from the start.

wouldn't blame parenting programmes myself.

and teachers would all be respected more.

I have a new slogan

No taxation without spending it on something useful

Wars are not useful
Quangos are not useful
NHS managers are not very useful
MPs are not useful
Bailing out the Northern Rock because their directors were shite is not useful
Incarcerating more people than anywhere else in Europe is not useful

I am not sure how useful schools are but some people like them

I think of all the current increases in aggression there is nothing that has me so horrified or so scared as the increasing number of attacks upon people with disablilities.
When I was a child you were considered a coward if you picked on someone smaller than you. There was also an understanding that no group picked on an individual ( we were the crowd of kids around a brwaling couple yelling 'fight fight fight')as that was beneath contempt.
Somewherte along the line it has become OK , clever even,to pick on the weak and the vulnerable. In the most recent case the kids that beat and kicked that poor young man to death singled him out because he was vulnerable and then took gloating photos of what they had done.
It speaks to an extrordinary discconect that I cannot find any reason for. It is a loss of humanity , of empathy almost of soul.
And as the mother of a child with SN it is terrifying.

I think what was meant by American influences was overt materialism, mindless violence and bling- bling-and the Christian right in the USA are despicable. What's wrong with sex before marriage or not wanting to worship?

Low standers, low morals, the breakdown of the family unit, punishment of crime is a joke, to many people using an already over burdened social security system, feral teens on the street with nothing to do, I could go on....

All those bloody low standers!!!!! I agree, they are to blame