But in amongst all the to-ing and fro-ing, this question goes unanswered:
Mary Lou, southend says...It's a very good question, isn't it? The NuPuritans will undoubtedly blame violent TV shows/films/computer games/rap music, the loony liberals will undoubtedly blame poverty, the right wing will say it's because prison sentences aren't long enough to be a deterrent...
On a general note I am puzzled. I have read that soldiers, particularly during WWI & WWII were very reluctant to use a bayonet on the enemy. It is said that it takes a lot of conditioning and training to overcome this and even then some troops would never do. Even when their lives are at stake and the enemy was actively trying to kill them.
How come then that it is common place for the modern generation to stick a knife in a complete stranger on a whim?
Have our values changed that much in only about a 100 years ?
Suggestions?
8 comments:
Well, that's the thing: the troops spent nearly two decades being raised in a civilised society, before being pitched into combat. OTOH, huge numbers of kid today are raised in utterly dysfunctional circumstances, but liberals don't like anyone to mention that because that would be judgemental....
....and when you think about, exercising judgement being a bad thing is also a symptom of how far we've fallen.
Mary Lou is mistaken - killing is easy and it always has been, be it with a bayonet, rifle or helmet (living with it afterwards... that's the hard part)
But of course I refer to war and combat where ones very survival is at stake. These kids willingness to shank any and all with callous disregard to life is beyond tragic.
Possibly less violent TV/film exposure and more a change in attitudes in society.
Also possibly the reduced fear of society's retribution - I heard a BBCR4 program about an English WW2 black marketeer/mobster recently - he carried a 5 inch knife everywhere, and wasn't afraid to use it to disfigure/injure his victims. But even when wielding the knife he was extremely careful to avoid killing them - as he feared the death penalty, although in other ways he was dismissive of the Police/prison.
Today murderers are not judicially killed by the state, and even a long prison sentance does not appear to be the deterrent that it once was. However, Hansard carries a 1962 speech, which alleges that (juvenile) knife crime in the UK reached a peak in 1945 but dropped in subsequent years until the practice of birching (another deterrent) was stopped.
http://hansard.millbanksystems.com/commons/1962/apr/19/juvenile-violence
I'm not advocating either hanging or birching - but both appear to have been deterrents to would be knife wielding criminals.
Um, troops get what, 8 weeks basic training, and you need to know that every last one of them will step forward in a bayonet charge. And you're fighting 20 years of conditioning that killing is wrong.
These gang kids have been in a gang for what, 5-10 years before they manage to kill someone, and it isn't the massed ranks charging together, it's usually one or two hotheads (although the Kinsella murder was indeed "massed ranks"). There is a difference between "most violent" and "least violent", which is applicable here. Also, in a bayonet charge, the guy you charge probably has a weapon aimed at you. These scum are generally attacking the soft underbelly.
I meant to say that the gang conditions its members for years that shanking people is what "real men do, blud, innt". That conditioning is often in loco parentis at a formative age.
Basic training is some small number of weeks with civilised adults.
I can't condone state killing but here's an idea:
1) bring back the death sentence for knife attacks and other contemptuous violence
2) sentence them to death with a limit of 30 days to appeal, in a prison on the british turf in calais.
3) somehow, inexplicably, they escape and seek asylum. we look at the gendarmes and give a gallic shrug.
4) the EU can't repatriate to a country with the death sentence so get to keep them.
5) we are expelled from the EU
6) in the likely event we lose calais and need to kill some of them then I suggest a method such as mine clearance in Afghanistan. They can do it with their knives if they wish.
"Well, that's the thing: the troops spent nearly two decades being raised in a civilised society, before being pitched into combat. OTOH, huge numbers of kid today are raised in utterly dysfunctional circumstances..."
I think you may have put your finger on something there...
"Mary Lou is mistaken - killing is easy and it always has been, be it with a bayonet, rifle or helmet (living with it afterwards... that's the hard part)..."
For people brought up as DJ points out we used to be brought up, I've no doubt.
I wonder if their actions keep these killers up at night? I suspect not...
"Also possibly the reduced fear of society's retribution..."
Yes! Because it's no longer regarded as 'retribution', is it?
"I meant to say that the gang conditions its members for years that shanking people is what "real men do, blud, innt". "
And yet, some of the knife killings have not been gang-linked, but rather young men on a night out. What explains them?
"6) in the likely event we lose calais and need to kill some of them then I suggest a method such as mine clearance in Afghanistan. They can do it with their knives if they wish."
:D
It's ignorance that causes knife wounds. Give the scrotes some basic training with guns and knives if you want them to respect them and each other.
Sometimes counterintuitive works
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