Thanks. I read the BBC online every day. And what I read is that a couple dozen children and adolescents have been murdered so far this year, by other children and adolescents. What I read is that adults have been kicked and beaten to death by roving gangs of fourteen year olds. What I read is that the UK has one of the developed world’s largest populations of disaffected, anti-social teenagers. Has it occurred to you that, just like most Americans try to pretend that we’re not in Iraq, most Britons might be trying to pretend that you’re not overrun with murderous youth gangs?

As to whether we’re over-run with them; I’m not afraid to step outside my door for fear of wild gangs of youths. It’s the educated louts in charge of the economy and business I’m more scared of. True, I live in one of the more genteel towns (though at the less genteel end) but even so, not everywhere in Britain is Toxteth or Bradford.

I think you’re suffering from a bit of selection bias, Antinous. Not even the BBC news is free from that, alas. What are the relevant statistics for the nation you live in?

Sorry for the late response, by the way. I spent the weekend away from the Internet and with my family and friends.

(Though I didn’t insist they turn THEIR Blackberries off.)

US statistics are pretty easy to find as long as you don’t mind pie charts and pdf files. Basically, minors (under 18) account for about 15% of violent crimes in the US.

Statistics for the UK are unavailable because the government won’t even release basic stats for under-16s. So all I can offer are sound bytes from the Times Online.

Figures produced by the Youth Justice Board (YJB) last week show that cases of violence by young people, ranging from common assault to murder, are up 39% over three years. Some 56,000 violent incidents involving teenagers were recorded in 2006-2007, up from 40,000 in 2003-2004.

But citing the most recent figures from the Mori Youth Survey, a poll of 11 to 16-year-olds, it says 27% of schoolchildren admitted in 2005 to having committed an offence in the previous year.

There have been 39 teenage murders in London alone since January last year.

A few decades ago, the US was seen as a very violent place (which it was) while most developed nations had very little violent crime. The days of unarmed Bobbies meandering around calling people ‘Guv’ and “Luv’ is over. Britain has a very big violent crime problem and the perpetrators skew very young. Whether London is worse than New York is not the point. The point is whether 2008 London is worse than 1988 London, and it is – by a long shot.

This thread is self-fulfilling

The sort of person who gets angriest at the though of somebody touching their phone is the sort of person who really needs to switch it off when they’re supposed to be out enjoying themselves.

A major part of amusement parks is the atmosphere they try to create. If you’re yakking on the phone you’ll miss out on that.

The park works hard for you and has just as much right to tell you to switch it off as a cinema does.

Your heresy has been noted, Suspect. The Council will decide your fate.

(Kind of unrelated) there are some shops that have lockers for you to lock your bags before you go in (to reduce theft). But sometimes when I walk towards them, one of the staff members would ask “Is that a computer in your bag”. (It’s a laptop bag I’m carrying). “Yes”. “Never mind, you don’t need to put it in the locker”. I suspect the shop has had problems with angry customers complaining about lost/damaged computers.

You’ve thrown a lot of unrelated statistics up to support your notion that we Britons are deluded about the state of our nation (except for Daily Mail and Times leader writers, I guess). This page shows the rate of violent crime holding steady at just below 2,500,000 (from a peak in the mid-nineties of about 4.3 million). If we take the number of teenagers committing violent crime as the same as the number involved in violent crime (which doesn’t necessarily follow) at 56,000, that’s roughly 1:100. For the general population the figure seems to be roughly 1:25. Even allowing for differences of methodology, this hardly equates to us being over-run by youth crime.

Note also that your quoted middle statistic — 27% of kids committing an offence — has little to do with the rest of the statistics you quote that have to do with violent crime, and seems to be included merely to excite the excitable. Which it seems to have done in at least one case.

I don’t consider it US bashing when everyone points out that the Iraq war is a gigantic, evil disaster of our making. It’s just the truth. Both the US and the UK have gone to hell over the last eight years. You under Blair and us under Bush. It’s just the truth. Civil liberties are down, the economy is down and human misery is up. I would consider a 39% increase in youth violent crime in only three years to be a pretty big red flag, especially when considering the enormous increase in public surveillance. Acknowledging the problem is not bashing. It’s just facing the truth.

And a receipt for candy floss. No day at the amusement park can be considered complete without candy floss.

Mind, if your kid looks grumpy at the exit, you will have to do the whole thing over.

I am really confused by this.

“Hmmm people are telling us how annoying it is having all those PDAs, they can be so rude. Let’s do a test run and see if people really want what they are telling us they want.”

I’m not seeing the sinister side to this.

Especially considering that A) they can be useful in emergencies, or when a family member has been misplaced, B) they can provide GPS information when you get lost, and C) they can capture memorable parts of your experience.

Now, obviously, A and B don’t typically apply to cameras, but C does. All three points apply to many smartphones and PDAs.

If someone touched a $500+ device of mine, without my permission … I’d be just a tad angry. Amusement park wannabe-cop-washouts wouldn’t like me when I’m angry – unfortunately, like so many security guards and unfit police officers, I would expect them to be of such a fragile ego that they would resort to physical violence at the slightest provocation.

And now I’ve chosen to not have a family of my own largely because of that. It’s working fine!

#39, I’d actually read a newspaper if tits were on page 3. The internet is great in that regard — I can read the news AND have porn! Well, at home, anyway…

#44, thank you for calmly doing what I couldn’t do. I would like to argue that a kid needs positive attention from Mom and Dad at least some of the time, or, well… see above.

#46, you seem to live in the USA (CA, to be exact). I’d trust your opinion on current events in L.A. before I’d trust you on what’s happening a continent and an ocean away, regardless of your sources.

’nuff said.

- HC

Whilst I am a huge proponent of fighting anything that restricts our rights to blog or take photos in public or any of the other worthwhile causes that Boing Boing and Cory alert us to, this is just a silly PR gimmick.

The official web site gives a much fuller story – and whilst I think their use of the term “PDA police” is extremely unfortunate, it is nothing like as insidious as Unusual Suspect suggests.

http://www.altontowersresort.co.uk/index.php?news=68

“the Alton Towers Resort will be piloting a “PDA Free Zone” during May Half Term (May 25th – June 1st inclusive), to encourage parents to disconnect from the office and reconnect fully with their families. PDA police will be onsite to enforce the ban and any adult caught using a PDA whilst at the Resort will be asked to report to one of five “PDA Drop Off Zones” where they can safely leave their PDA’s for the day. If the scheme is successful, it will be introduced full time.

And why do people talk like anyone can choose any job and tailor it to their preference, and still always make a decent living for themselves and their family? What magical rainbow world do you people live in?

It’s called California. And I’m sorry to hear that you have so little respect for your friends’ wishes.

In a way, this makes me happy because it reminds he that the human race truly is one big unhappy, dysfunctional family ~ no moral/ethical/intellectual superiority for any of us…