Number 95 : February 1999 |
I am sorry that Frank Walker (and other members of PDG) were not able to get to the conference in September. Such topics are much better discussed face-to-face, and in company with others, and, both in the discussion periods, and over meals, glasses of sherry, and walks, Braziers offers many opportunities for this. I can only partially agree with the points he raised.
We need to be very circumspect when people refer to "the big rise in crime", comparing the present with the 1950s, the 1930s, or even the 1830s. Offences relating to drugs, motor-cars and computers used not to exist, and many acts within families and in neighbourhoods would have been ignored in the past. Are we worse off because we are now less tolerant of brutality against children, of discrimination against women and minorities? All such factors can result in an increase in prosecutions. Also, we should not exaggerate the problem. We in the UK live in one of the most peaceful and crime-free countries in the world. Crime is brought to our attention because it is News.
Nevertheless, each criminal act is one too many. My main contention is that our attention is too often directed at the crime, the victims, and how to punish the perpetrators, rather than at understanding the source of the problem and assuming the will to deal with it. The latter course would demand some painful changes of attitude - of parenting, teaching, and community values - it would be unpopular, expensive, and would not make good News.
Frank Walker refers to how the more violent types used to join the Army and Navy. Pre-WW2, the more active and aggressive went out in huge numbers in the armed and civilian services and as settlers to run a vast Empire. This is not the place to argue the morality of Imperialism, and there have been immense changes in values since. However, many of the attitudes and actions of those engaged abroad were considered acceptable, if not commendable, in those days, but would be considered criminal if they obtained in this country today. By today’s standards, we exported much of our crime.
I question Frank Walker’s main theme, that from their teens to their mid-twenties young people have a need to act rebelliously, at least if by this he implies that it is in-built in the human character, and is independent of previous up-bringing. I see a continuum between misbehaviour in young children and in adults, only the surroundings are different. In the former case, it is "naughtiness" and is normally kept within the family: in the latter, it is "crime" and occurs within the community. Serious and persistent naughtiness reflects the failure by the parents to do the job for which they are intended. It is a most difficult and demanding job, almost impossible to get right all the time, and the parents may have "excuses" like poverty, ill-health, or their own conflicts. But none of these permits the underlying fault to be transferred to the child - each act of naughtiness has its precursor in some earlier lesson which has somehow gone wrong.
Just as the infant is pre-programmed to grow through childhood, and the role of the parent is to guide his/her behavioural patterns along socially-acceptable lines, so physical, mental and emotional development is set to continue through the teenage years, and parents are joined by teachers and others in the community in being required to make final adjustments to the new personality. Again, things can go wrong, and the new personality can turn out to be a monster.
Frank Walker sees in teenage development an intrinsic element of rebellion, something which needs to be thwarted by the imposition of rules, even silly ones. With these must come figures of authority, and punishments for transgressions - he might have added "even unjust ones".
I see these as Victorian values carried through to the end of the present century, where they do not belong. I am far from happy with the present state of affairs, if only for the waste of potential and unhappiness it produces in the youth it creates. But I regard attitudes of the past as more cause than solution.
For the present, I will leave others to take up the argument from here.
Leslie Haddow
Leslie : Again, I don’t like what seems to be an unwritten assumption that parents are autonomous beings, responsible for their actions, while children and adult criminals somehow aren’t but are buffeted along by their genes and society. I would suggest that children’s initial "naughtiness" is in-built to ensure they get the attention they need in a competitive world. Too much naughtiness is counter-productive, however, as the attention received is undesirable; most children get the hang of this. It’s game-theoretic and part of learning to live in a community. Of course, radical changes of rules may lead to radical changes of behaviour (see William Golding’s Lord of the Flies and the activities of Nazi collaborators).
Theo