I am a PhD student at the University of Dundee examining the impact and responses of people and authority to anti-social behaviour. As such, a lot of the coverage of the London riots has interested me - not least because of the way that the problem of 'youth' is being framed by the media. I thought I would note a couple of initial thoughts and see what others think.
The media and those in power are banding about the term 'youth' in relation to the riots in a very uncritical way. Although a lot of young people appear to be involved in the looting and violence, the media and those in power appear to be framing the entire problem as 'youth mob violence' (various papers - particularly the Daily Mail), a problem with 'feral youth' (Kit Malthouse, Deputy Mayor of London and Chair of the Metropolitan Police Authority) and a breakdown in parenting. While there may be elements of truth to some of the arguments, I think that framing the problem in such a youth orientated manner risks deepening the disconnect that many young people feel in their 'communities' across the UK. This so-called disconnect has been widely reported as one of the key reasons why many of the looter's are out on the streets in the first place. Those organising the clean up via social networking did receive widespread praise in the media and the majority of those taking part fell into the 'youth category (16-24)', yet the age of those participating in the organised clear-ups was hardly mentioned in the media. Those appearing in court yesterday and today in relation to the riots were aged between mid teens and late forties, with an average in the late twenties - clearly not only 'youths'.
So why does it matter what age the rioters are? Perhaps rather than referring to 'youths'; using the labels looters, rioters and criminals would be suffice. Hannah Breeze's blog (available here http://www.totalpolitics.com/blog/177012/why-do-we-care-if-the-rioters-are-young.thtml) provides some very interesting debate.
I also thought the rhetoric that David Cameron was using today ('sick society') had very strong echoes of Tony Blair's anti-social behaviour/ Respect agendas of the early and mid 2000's. It will be interesting to see how this impacts on future criminal and anti-social behaviour policy.
Andrew Wooff
PhD student
School of the Environment
University of Dundee
Email: [log in to unmask]
Web: http://www.dundee.ac.uk/geography/current/postgrad/students/wooff/
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