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While I am sure we all send our condolences to the family of Ben Kinsella who was stabbed to death in London over the weekend, am I naïve in thinking what was a 16 year old doing in a pub at two o'clock in the morning? What were his parents thinking of?
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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Benji
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Location: USA
Registered: August 2007
Messages: 297
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I'm not familar with this story as I'm stateside. Is he well known? Also, I know there are not a lot of handguns in the UK, but it does seem that there are a rash of knifings going on there.
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Nigel wrote:
> am I naïve in thinking what was a 16 year old doing in a pub at two o'clock in the morning? What were his parents thinking of?
>
He was probably doing much the same as I was in pubs, certainly well after midnight, at age 16 (some 37 years ago). 15/16/17 is the age when kids learn by experiment and experience - some of them will chose inappropriate challenges (as I did), many more will choose challenges which are not actually sensible because we fail to offer them appropriate challenges. But part of growing up is to take our own risks - kids that age are SUPPOSED to find ways to do things their parents don't approve of.
And yup, kids sometimes make disastrous - even lethal - decisions. Which is sad, and at an individual level is tragic. But the day kids stop taking risks is the day we finally settle for a bland grey society of conformist little consumerlings ... the risktakers may include both potential criminal elements, but also includes many of the artists and greatest contributors to society. And we - as a society - desparately need that creative leaven.
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. ... Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night devoid of stars." Martin Luther King
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JimB
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Registered: December 2006
Messages: 349
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I don't think so Nigel. I had the same reaction when I first read the story: "What was a 16 year old doing at a pub at two in the morning? Where were the parental controls?"
When I was 16, some 44 years ago, neither the society I grew up in nor my parents would tolerate such activity. Thus, I didn't do such things.
NW isn't wrong in saying that mid-teen kids learn by experiment and experience. However, there are rules and laws to help them not choose inappropriate challenges. Actually, both of those sentences are true regardless of the individual's age. In my opinion, this kid is dead because both society and his parents failed him.
JimB
[Updated on: Wed, 02 July 2008 00:04] |
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timmy
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Has no life at all |
Location: UK, in Devon
Registered: February 2003
Messages: 13801
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The problem is that society will see your reasonable question as churlish and uncaring. I know my own 16 year old back then went to pubs, while he was at school, 'escaping' form school sometimes to spend much of the day in the pub. But never at 2 in the morning!
But some kids will not be told.
I know nothing of this lad, as do none of us. But it seems an unusual thing for a kid of that age to be doing.
Author of Queer Me! Halfway Between Flying and Crying - the true story of life for a gay boy in the Swinging Sixties in a British all male Public School
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For our overseas friends here is an article to help explain the background.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2228258/Ben-Kinsella-murder-police-make-four-arrests.html
I'm surprised that NW was in pubs well after midnight 37 years ago as there used to be a national curfew no later than 11pm. The risk taking element is irrelevant. The greatest foreseeable risk was getting caught underage drinking (18 in the UK). My point was standards within the family.
Hugs
N
I dream of boys with big bulges in their trousers,
Never of girls with big bulges in their blouses.
…and look forward to meeting you in Cóito.
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No, it's just that Fings ain't wot they useter be.
J F R
The paradox has often been noted that the United States, founded in secularism, is now the most religiose country in Christendom, while England, with an established church headed by its constitutional monarch, is among the least. (Richard Dawkins, 2006)
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Benji
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Location: USA
Registered: August 2007
Messages: 297
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Thanks for posting the link to the article, all I can say is that it's a shame.
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Actually pubs didn't stay open that late in those days. Except when a special licence had been applied for and approved (which might have been half a dozen times a year.
Someone is remembering wrong.
Love,
Anthony
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No, not mis-remembering
There was a thing called a "lock-in". If you were in before closing time, you stayed in, the doors were bolted ... and the till was cashed up. So if the Police turned up, it was described as a "Private Party", with no money changing hands: the Landlord kept an under-the-counter "slate", and you settled up the following day.
It was a fairly widespread phenomenon in various parts of the UK - Oxford, Norwich, small villages in rural Wales, etc that I can attest to from personal experience during the 1970s.
I remember one time in particular, drinking at 3am in the "public" bar of a small Welsh village pub, secure in the knowledge that the only Policeman for ten miles was safely accounted for ... in the "saloon" bar of the same Pub! But I'd've been a bit older then - I was probably around 20.
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. ... Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night devoid of stars." Martin Luther King
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