Seems to me that wherever you turn at the minute someone is moaning about the kids you get these days, long gone are the days of kids helping and respecting their elders. Now all they apparently want to do is mug you for their own pleasure, set fire to your granny and get drunk. We’ve all seen and heard of the groups of ‘youths’ who roam the streets and are more than happy to attack people and their possessions just for kicks. People are always pointing the finger of blame, normally blaming the parents, the schools, immigration, Black man music, old fashioned conservative views, modern values, etc.
Trouble is there’s a lot of blaming going on but no one actually taking a step back and tackling the whole problem. I believe most of the problems are actually caused by those responsible for fixing them. For example take the parents they are normally the first to be blamed, although arguably this is because they have the most power over a child, but in reality it’s just because they are the easiest targets they get the largest slice of blame. Sure a parent can stop a child going out, accessing things and teach them the difference between right and wrong, all basic duties of a parent. There are bound to be parents who don’t bother to do this, in which case they certainly deserve their share of the blame. But you can’t tell me we’ve been on this planet as humans parenting all these years and it’s only just now that people have realised they cant do it? Again I think it’s unfair to brand a particular genre of music as being responsible; Rap is the expression of current social and political issues experienced by the performer, it’s very unfair that it be labelled as the root of all evil. I’m sure there are some naïve individuals who do think that rap is glamorising violence, and it’s ‘cool’ to be like that. These people need help and I believe the artists are to blame if they don’t explain the motives of their music. Immigration is another hot potato, with people often clinging to the social implications. These people are just scared and unable to accept change, after all if you look at the history of the United Kingdom we wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for immigration. Another point that makes me laugh is the old fashioned views/modern values argument, what’s changed? Me and my dad have different values, my dad and my grandfather have different views, each time you go up the chain you consider those above you as ‘old fashioned’. Times change, people change, again this is something that’s happened forever not just in the past few years. In the schools we have removed all power from the teachers, and instead given them target after target to reach. No longer are academics concerned about the knowledge, they are forced to meet statistics and worry about funding, with the constant pressure of knowing the kids in real terms have more rights than them.
I feel all of this contributes to the real problem, a lack of ambition and inspiration; think back to when you where young, you had the possibility of being anything you wanted. Then you went to school and were told that you had to do well at your exams in order to succeed; to some this seems impossible, and it’s easier to misbehave and instead of the teachers and parents being in a position to nip it in the bud they are both disillusioned and leave it. Then those that do to good in their exams instead of being congratulated, they have to listen to people telling anyone who will listen that the exams have been dumbed down. All this leads to a youth with no sense of achievement or vision, so it’s easier to do nothing productive rather than be torn apart for trying. The recent protests in Burma show a motivated youth, those that have ambition, those who feel they can achieve.
At current we can only dream of such an ambitious and imaginative youth, for that I feel very sad.
