I'm bored....

[JP53]

Originally Posted by paulmariner

2 things I suppose;
1. I used to work for a meat delivery company driving a truck many years ago (23 years ago actually, where's the time gone?). One of my deliveries was to smithfield meat market in London and to get there for 2.00a.m. I used to leave the depot at Midnight. Pure pleasure driving down the M11 and then part of the newly opened M25. At times I could be the only vehicle on the road it seemed. Much more traffic around now and it's as busy at midnight as it used to be mid afternoon nowadays.

2. I'm a youth worker. There are bad young people out there but in my experience they usually respond to the right "handling". e.g. treat them respectfully and as equals they'll usually reciprocate the behaviour. Give them constructive tasks, let them decide the things they think are important to them and assist them reaching those goals, they develop a sense of "being involved". Unfortunately the societal habit of "knocking" all they do and focussing on the bad behaviour of a few tends to stigmatise all of them and this just "embeds" the faults of a few into the good of the many (if that makes sense). Our media loves the easy headlines and ignores loads of young people who work inside their communities doing good all the time.
But, investing in the young takes time (no easy, quick fixes for the Sun newspaper here) and a lot of money (not popular in a country with the predominant economy based on low taxes and "pile 'em high sell 'em cheap" economics). Finally, on this point, what about the parents? If there are groups of young people hanging around and being a "nuisance" in the early hours then what are the parents responsibilities? If we accept these parents see this behaviour as normal then surely this suggests they too have done the same? If that's the case then we have a problem that's 10-25 years old? So the policy of spending little and not investing in good worthwhile facilities and projects for young people has failed??

My thoughts alone and thank you for the time. I enjoy this website, keep up the good work.

pm

It would not make for interesting reading if they printed stories about good kids.