I've just been reading about this in the papers and have seen it on  the news.

Apparently, gangs of thugs go round with the latest mobiles that take videos and film innocent people being beaten up by their friends.
There's a programme on ITV tonight about it. I can't believe the depths society has sunk to sometimes :(

Lindsay
x

I know... it's a very sad world that we live in.

Some people are scum, and unfortunately where I live, I get the impression it's by no means the minority.  I walked out of my front door the other evening to discover two boys of around 10 with a wooden plank about to start bludgeoning a family of duckings and their mother that had had the stupidity to wander into our street. I went mad at them - no doubt we will now have our house and car vandalised, as they saw where I live.

Sorry, that should have read "ducklings".

BRing the cane back in schools is what i say!!!

I would never advocate a return to caning or corporal punishment -we have moved on and there are other effective methods now. However, it does seem strange that this generation themselves seem to have become more violent. Why

Because they dont get enough discipline!!

Possibly but i don't think physical punishment is the answer personally - children need to be taught to respect boundaries and that parents are fair but do mean what they say.

A child psychologist was on a news programme about it and was talking about the gang culture and also about how the brain chemicals in some teenagers were different these days, not quite sure what she meant by that as  I only caught some of it. Maybe she meant they enjoyed the adrenalin rush?

There seems to be great lack of empathy; one boy spoken to seemed reasonable and said he did feel abit sorry for the victims, but also said that it was funny and just like you see on tv. Apparently there have been programmes and games on tv  re. very similar behaviour and since them there has been this happy slapping happening. I got the impression the teenagers involved were very hard boiled.

Lindsay
X

I watched that program last night and I must say that I was really shocked by it. I'm quite young(altho now out of my teens :D )and I find programs like Jackass and Dirty Sanchez funny, if I'm in the right mood, BUT only because the people in are voluntarily been hurt, or hurting themsleves.
This so called Happy Slapping is ridiculous and it seemed they would target anyone, I'd like to see what would happen if they picked on the wrong person!
The worst part was the poor man who was set on fire and filmed by two thugs....thankfully he survived but they only got 6 years in a young offenders home, they'll probably be out in 3 :(
What a sad, sad world we live where we aren't safe even walking down a road or sitting on a bus
Emily