British Cops To Create "Naughty Children" Database

An anonymous naughty reader writes: "The Telegraph is running this story about the British police setting up a secret database of children who misbehave or commit 'trivial misdemeanors' so that they can be tracked throughout their childhoods. Officials cited a rise in youth violence as necessitating these measures." You have to admire the forward-thinking of a secret police "database of children as young as three who they fear might grow up to become criminals."

Comments

Christmas in London

[PD]

He's making a list
he's checking it twice!
Gonna find out who's naughty or nice
SATAN CLAUS is coming to town.

Cheekiness, causing nuisances?--off with 'er head!

[dlek]

From the article:

Children involved in cheekiness, minor vandalism and causing nuisances, will be targeted under the scheme.

Cheekiness?

Causing nuisances?

Let me get this straight. For so much as talking back to your teacher, you could be stuck in this database? For loitering too long in the candy shop, you could be flagged in a national registry?

Society's still arguing about whether it's ethical to put CONVICTED PEDOPHILES in such a registry, for crying out loud!

Man, the world's getting creepy...

This could be very very bad

[Chardish]

If a child is told by the government at a very young age that he is a potential troublemaker, won't he then feel somehow obligated to make trouble?

-Chardish

Our society

[RupertJ]

Before all the Americans here start harping on about privacy and civil liberties, people should first discuss how our (British) culture is different to that of the United States. Britain already has one of the highest volumes of CCTV systems in Europe (stats were in the Guardian a few weeks ago if you want to check). We have come to accept the Big Brother mentality much more than our US counterparts, even though it does not always benefit us the way we would like it to (the Lawrence murder etc).

I don't know if many of you will be able to relate to this, but when I was a child I had the greatest respect for my elders and for the authorities/law enforcement. It seems that in today's "yob" culture, violence, underage drinking and anarchy are seen as ways of expressing how "hard" you are. This crew-cut sporting, Kappa wearing football hooligan image of thuggery is further idolised by sitting around empty bus stops vandalising public property while drinking Diamond White cider and smoking Mayfair (very cheap) cigarettes - It is seen as a fashion by many young people and actions which will gain them "respect" or credibility among their peers, much like the gang cultures in the USA.

I believe the monitoring of young offenders will be benficial - Anyone who has studied criminology or worked in/with the police should know the old phrase "once a scrote, always a scrote".

Crimes perpetrated by minors are on the rise (this is an undeniable fact). You only have to look at events like the Jamie Bulger killing to realise that our nation is sliding down the same slope as the US when it comes to atrocities commited by young people (Columbine killings to name one).

I don't see this database as a civil rights issue for the children. The database should be managed and controlled like the data in the PNC (Police National Computer) - with the greatest care and confidentiality.

Before anyone flames me with "what about the rights of the children", please first consider the rights of their victims and any others affected by their crimes.

Re:Our society

[hearingaid]

You only have to look at events like the Jamie Bulger killing to realise that our nation is sliding down the same slope as the US when it comes to atrocities commited by young people (Columbine killings to name one).

Great, I'm glad to hear it.

Youth crime is down throughout North America. You don't see it on the news, of course; announcements that "The World is Getting Better" don't sell very many papers.

However, on to the effectiveness of the proposed measures. Speaking as a former victim of bullies, I doubt very much whether a system like this would have helped me very much. I in fact did accumulate a rather large permanent record through my school days; however, it was mostly filled with things teachers wanted to believe rather than the truth (which was often remarkably obvious; there are teachers who apparently really believe that I attacked groups of five or six other children by myself, unarmed, with many of these children being several years older than me, at recess every single day - right).

The reason, IMO, youth crime is down these days is not because of measures such as this British one to track children, but rather because of a rise in simple common sense: when a 10-year-old and four of his friends are fighting with an eight-year-old, it's reasonable to suppose that the eight-year-old did not initiate the battle (which is what they were; I'd been to the emergency ward at the local hospital several times before I turned fifteen, and hospitalized some kids myself as well) but rather take the more appropriate action of punishing the group, even if the teachers don't like the eight-year-old.

It's also inappropriate for teachers to give students time off from class for the express purpose of rounding up other students to beat somebody up. (Okay, that only happened to me once.)

It's basic principles like these that could have stopped Columbine.

Re:Our society

[rwally]

Well, as an American, I'll pipe in and give my two cents worth. At the seat of this problem, are our cultures so different? We both exist in a society that, for the most part, has both parents working (if the parents are still married), where we depend on nanny's and day care workers to rear our children and after school programs to entertain them until we can get off work. Society demands we work these long hours so we can provide the clothes and things our families need. We also tend to buy our kids way to many things to "entertain" them but not to "engage" them. We give all this authority to society to raise our kids, yet seem to get upset when society tries to correct our children.

As a kid, I was fortunate that even though my mom worked, she always saw us off to school each morning and was home when we got home from school. I romped and stomped outside most afternoons with the neighbor kids, playing cowboy and indians or whatever. Even though we had TV, I rarely watched it. When I got into my teens, I got into my fair share of trouble, but nothing like kids today. Why? I too had a respect for authority instilled in me by my parents and society. Kids are like ships that float on the currents of society. They will be guided by whatever wind and wave is the strongest.

Today's kids often lack that rudder to keep them pointed straight. They know they have influence over their parents and more and more they are able to exert that influence. Its really upsetting to watch a 14 year old tell their parents that if they aren't allowed to go to an all night boy/girl party, they (the kid) will call the police and say the parents are abusing them. The parents are so afraid of a system that automatically assumes the guilt of the accused, that they feel they have no choice but to give in. You say the above can't happen... try again, I witnessed it in a friend's living room one evening.

Should we monitor kids in a national database? No, I think that's just an attempt to cure the symptom, not the illness. When we as parents abdicate our authority to raise our kids to the government, we shouldn't be surprised when they use governmental institutions, like national databases, to try and manage the behavior of our kids.


Wally

Re:Our society

[rwally]

do you have kids?

In this case, the party was a kegger being held at a house where the police had routinely arrested the owner for allowing underage drinking and twice for assault on a child. Still, all the kids found this guys "Cool".

The point was, my friend as a parent, could see the inherent danger of possible arrest and was trying to protect his underage child from that danger. Its the same reason we don't let toddlers stick paper clips in the wall socket. Yeah, they'll learn a lesson, but it just might injure them for life. Of course maybe if we did, it would help clean out the gene pool.