Knife Crime UK

Knife Crime UK. It almost sounds like a website or exclusive club. With the meteoric rise in knife related crime in the UK at an all time high the most shocking statistic revealed is that the worst offenders are aged between 15-25 and more specifically 15-18. The attraction to this kind of violence and crime seems to be that of reckless abandon an uncompromising and vengeful act stemming from somewhere in a younger society that has maybe, just maybe grown up in the midst of a desensitizing of their childhood through media, movies, gaming, drugs and gangland culture where somewhere in the innocence of it all a switch has flipped. Maybe?…maybe not. Certainly movies have softened over the years where once a movie, violent or otherwise, rated as an 18 now in the modern day would be classed as a 15 giving rise to the greater scope and pushing of the boundaries when it comes to content. Does that mean it turns every young skip bright eyed and bushy tailed into a knife wielding fiend capable of murder?….No of course not…Does it open their eyes in a way that is more primitive to a lack of respect for life through subject matter that as young children becomes an influence of notion or identity?…. I think it could.

If you think about the recent movie. The Dark Knight in which a scarred, brutal tortured individual wreaks havoc in an completely uncompromising way the attention to the detail and the gesture of how the director and actor portrayed this kind of violence and ease grated close to the bone, close to the heart of the matter and became obviously iconic. It is an ease which seems to be blanketing the youth of today at least the youth of today who indulge in such behaviour. You wonder why I’m picking on the Dark knight…..I’m not, but it’s an example of extreme violence and suggestion which is effortlessly released into our consciousness and you only had to be 12 to see it. For the record No I don’t think movies have the influence that some may presume but such is the escalation of this type of crime that all avenues must be explored.

An example of media and movie influence springs to mind. Here in the UK a story made the front of the news papers where by a small group of gang type individuals boasted on YouTube that they where going to kill someone, a man, as they waved knifes and machetes at the camera. They where branded the YouTube killers. To the disgust of the nation they made good on their promise and killed a young father of one Who merely asked them to keep their voices down as he was trying to get his one year old daughter to sleep. further more they then went onto YouTube again boasting about what they had done. Apparently one of these idiots was seen to be waving a knife at the camera quoting the phrase “say hello to my little friend”…..

The complete and utter lack of respect for life must be the most alarming cause in this case, the ease of the execution and the state of play in such a persons mind to inflict such a personal and fatal act on another. It’s sad to say but it’s everywhere right now, both historically and factually it’s worse than it has ever been. Young people wielding and dying on the streets…for what? most reasons are unclear or at least if there is a reason it it doesn’t seem to be something that is punishable by death…..So i ask you..please tell….help me understand this notion, this attraction, this angst, this stupidity to rank life in such a little way. I’m sure the problems and avenues in the initial thought, the decision to carry such a weapon are plentiful gang pressure, fear, bravado…..but are we so weak that we can’t or don’t recognise the potential out come of our actions….And how it changes lives forever……Or are we just so desensitized now… that we really just don’t care?