Today I've mostly bin...

[clvrlad]

i take it your with me on the
its not getting significantly worse its getting reported more
side to news...

[Bunnylump]

Oh, I know all that. But I do just wish they would report the GOOD news a bit more. It makes such depressing reading otherwise. And I don't care what anyone says, a kid getting stabbed at 11 30 in the morning IS concerning. Yes, there will be, and always have been perverts and twits who drive too fast. But I do think that this phenomenon of kids carrying knives IS a worrying, new thing which needs to be dealt with. And I don't necessarily think that reporting it helps matters. It just normalises it.

[Scurra]

Maybe you should read some history? e.g. knife crime in pretty much any decade isn't that much different to today. Even amongst teenagers. As clvrlad says, it's the way it is reported that has changed.
No, I'm not saying that somehow that makes it OK. But in the end, the world is actually pretty much the same as it always has been in terms of human behaviour. We really haven't suddenly turned into a planet of barbarians - alas, we always have been! It's just that most of us manage to keep it under control most of the time. Except, perhaps, when trying to solve puzzles?

[Bunnylump]

I'm sorry but I have to totally disagree with you there. Remember I work with teenagers, and I see it first hand. Gang culture is FAR more prevalent and far more accepted as the norm these days, as is very early sexual activity and promiscuity. That's NOT to say that there aren't far more nice, normal kids who care though. Which is easy to forget when you see the idiots in action.

And are you calling me a barbarian?

[Wulfruna]

Well, at least the "News of the World" has got its some-uppance at long last.... That is the classic example of news reporting gone mad for the sake of shock-horror stories in the mistaken belief that that is all the "public" is "interested" in

[Redfraggle]

Ooh fight fight fight

I agree with you both - though they always report something good on our news every night. That's cos Norn Iron people love a good laugh.

[Bunnylump]

I don't call them news papers. I call them salacious gossip-mongers. And yes, you're quite right, they deserve everything they get.

[Redfraggle]

Well said bunny!

[MBH]

But in the end, the world is actually pretty much the same as it always has been in terms of human behaviour.

At the risk of becoming political, I'm disagreeing wih that statment. I'm pretty sure we were all taught 'polite behaviour' which is essentially based on 'respect'. I think the 80/20 split of life has swung the other way now

[LAT]

I'm not sure the NotW is actually getting it's come uppance. It strikes me as more of a cynical business move to close it down in an attempt to draw a line under this business and we will shortly see the Sun on sundays instead.
If people buy papers like these they will carry on producing and selling them.

What's the 80/20 split of life?

[Scurra]

I'm sorry but I have to totally disagree with you there. Remember I work with teenagers, and I see it first hand. Gang culture is FAR more prevalent and far more accepted as the norm these days, as is very early sexual activity and promiscuity.

As I said, you need to read those history books. (Hmmm. How old were Romeo and Juliet again? ) It's very easy to fall into the temptation of saying "it were all great in them old days". I promise you - it is pretty much exactly the same. I live on a road which has a large secondary school. It's riots, stabbings, muggings and casual sex every night. Not.



(As for the NotW - I don't think News International are going to get out of the hole they are in that easily. Although "live by the sword, die by the sword" does seem appropriate somehow.)

[MBH]

Most of life is an 80/20 split

You can do 80% of a job in 20% of the time, but the last 20% getting it right can take the other 80% of the time. [It's true for computer systems, I wonder about puzzle creation?]

In my reference above I was thinking that YES there were always thugs and villians, but 80% of people were brought up to respect others and with good manners. Now you can still find people being kind and courteous and civilized - but it's feeling like it's now the 20%

[MBH]

It's riots, stabbings, muggings and casual sex every night.

.... but sometimes you have a quiet night in

[Bunnylump]

Anyway. This is the most major thread deviation in the history of the world... (Unless you've been out stabbing people and having underage sex today, Scurra... )

[Scurra]

You can do 80% of a job in 20% of the time, but the last 20% getting it right can take the other 80% of the time. [It's true for computer systems, I wonder about puzzle creation?]

It's true of pretty much everything, isn't it?

(When troubleshooting, I prefer the 90% rule. 90% of problems are "standard" and have known solutions that are easy. Of the remaining 10%, 90% of them are also "standard" but unfortunately the solutions are really tedious and can't be short-cut. It's the remaining 1% that are the interesting ones because you often learn something from them. Except that far too often the problem is beyond your level of expertise so you end up having to pass it on...)

In my reference above I was thinking that YES there were always thugs and villians, but 80% of people were brought up to respect others and with good manners. Now you can still find people being kind and courteous and civilized - but it's feeling like it's now the 20%

That's my point - "feeling like" is how it has always been. There are plenty of examples of this dating back as far as writing goes (there's a famous example from Latin - Juvenal I think - saying basically "kids today are so badly behaved; we were never like that because we were brought up properly.")

[Bunnylump]

That may be. But when I was at school, Girls who had sex before the age of 15 were pretty much unheard of. Now, the ones with no sexual experience at all AFTER fifteen are definitely in the minority. And drugs are a regular feature. I've lost count of the times I've smelled dope wafting out of the loos. The bummer of it is they never offer ME any... *


*Joking, of course.

[Cenwulf]

Reminds me of 'Diggers'. There's an exchange that goes something like this:

Gurder: The things we used to get up to - up and down the lifts, in and out of the switchboard...
Masklin: I thought you said that the kids of today were always up to mischief?
Gurder: Yes, but that's different from our youthful high spirits.

Double standards or what?

[MBH]

Many of us used to carry knives - a penknife used as a tool - it was a small minority that would have dreamed of using a knife on someone else. There are horror stories of what music-based 'gangs' (e.g Mods/Rockers) did with Stanley knives with 2 blades and a matchstick but now we regularly hear of young people and guns.

Everything which is done has always been done [even back to when they spoke Latin ], but where some kids drank or smoked they then tried to hide the fact to avoid being 'in trouble' - now they either don't care or they flaunt it. OK - maybe I AM getting old, but I think the attitudes have changed

[Scurra]

But when I was at school, Girls who had sex before the age of 15 were pretty much unheard of. Now, the ones with no sexual experience at all AFTER fifteen are definitely in the minority.

Do you want the five-minute argument or the full half-hour?
Here's what looks like a tangential question - is the NHS a complete basket case in which people are left on trolleys in corridors and everyone who goes in ends up catching MRSA? But it's actually exactly the same argument. Personal anecdotes are the problem, because they end up misrepresenting things by being extrapolated to cover everything.
As I said, I do not dispute that these things happen. What I dispute is the idea that today is significantly different from any other period in history when taken as a whole.

edit: MBH makes my point perfectly. The Mods and Rockers were about as classic an example of "Gang Culture" as you could ask for. (And they didn't particularly hide their drinking or smoking either. )

[MBH]

The Mods and Rockers were about as classic an example of "Gang Culture" as you could ask for. (And they didn't particularly hide their drinking or smoking either. )

They weren't 12-15 year old