http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Topic: Risk and responsibility en Mon, 01 Jun 2026 04:33:27 +0000 http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-162163 Thu, 14 Aug 2014 11:52:49 +0000 crowriver 162163@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>@SRD, interesting link. The discussion in the comments below with the father pitching in rather good too. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-162131 Thu, 14 Aug 2014 09:20:25 +0000 SRD 162131@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Slightly different angle but follows on from various discussions about parents and risk:</p> <p><a href="http://www.thelocal.se/20140808/swedish-dad-takes-kids-to-war-zone" rel="nofollow">http://www.thelocal.se/20140808/swedish-dad-takes-kids-to-war-zone</a> </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156209 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 15:58:37 +0000 chdot 156209@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>"Folk look at you as if you've got two heads when you suggest the government should interfere in the housing market to make it fairer for actual people."</p> <p>Well they do interfere - interest rates, mortgage subsidies/incentives, 'relaxing planning controls' etc. </p> <p>Oh -</p> <p>You're talking about fairness... </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156208 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 15:51:45 +0000 calmac 156208@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>"Council control of public housing could have been broken up and passed to housing co-ops, tenant management groups, local housing associations and the like" </p> <p>"If councils could have invested the receipts of RTB sales in new housing it would also have helped sustain social housing construction in the 80's/90's, easing today's huge demand for social housing and taking the heat out of the housing market."</p> <p>Seriously dude, are you me? I've been ranting about this for years to anyone who would listen (and to many who would not). </p> <p>The state and prominence of housing policy in the UK is a joke, and an aberration in European terms. On social housing we've had two extremes with no willingness to compromise, while on private housing we've had a complete withdrawl by government to leave everything in the hands of market forces. Folk look at you as if you've got two heads when you suggest the government should interfere in the housing market to make it fairer for actual people. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156203 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 15:24:18 +0000 chdot 156203@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Another great CCE drift thread. </p> <p>"You could probably even have introduced the RTB as well, without the discounts (max 70% for a flat and 60% for a house). If people had to pay market value it would have been far less attractive."</p> <p>I seem to recall that the idea for selling council houses was (partly) to create a "property owning democracy". Though the idea is pre-Thatcher -</p> <p>"</p> <p>The phrase ‘property owning democracy’, on which the popular conservatism of the 20th century rested, and with it a vision of the good society, was coined by the Scottish Unionist Noel Skelton in a quartet of articles for the Spectator entitled ‘Constructive Conservatism’, written in the spring of 1923. </p> <p>"</p> <p><a href="http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2014/04/04/aaron-bastani/property-owning-democracy" rel="nofollow">http://www.lrb.co.uk/blog/2014/04/04/aaron-bastani/property-owning-democracy</a></p> <p>HOWEVER ('her first speech as party leader') -</p> <p>"</p> <p>I know you will understand the humility I feel at following in the footsteps of great men like our Leader in that year, Winston Churchill, a man called by destiny to raise the name of Britain to supreme heights in the history of the free world; in the footsteps of Anthony Eden, who set us the goal of a property-owning democracy - a goal we still pursue today; of Harold Macmillan whose leadership brought so many ambitions within the grasp of every citizen; of Alec Douglas-Home whose career of selfless public service earned the affection and admiration of us all; and of Edward Heath, who successfully led the Party to victory in 1970 and brilliantly led the nation into Europe in 1973.</p> <p>"</p> <p><a href="http://www.britishpoliticalspeech.org/speech-archive.htm?speech=121" rel="nofollow">http://www.britishpoliticalspeech.org/speech-archive.htm?speech=121</a></p> <p>When RTB was introduced Labour was ideologically against it, so weren't interested in considering amendments such as reducing the discount or limiting the type of housing or restricting the number sold in any particular area (for instance). </p> <p>The Tories weren't 'true to their beliefs' otherwise they would have offered discounts to <em>private</em> tenants...</p> <p>So however much they believed 'society is better if people own there own homes', this was clearly an attack on "municipalisation' - ie (mostly) Labour councils. As has been suggested upthread, councils weren't always the best landlords, but RTB didn't address this (or even try to). </p> <p>"If councils could have invested the receipts of RTB sales in new housing it would also have helped sustain social housing construction in the 80's/90's, easing today's huge demand for social housing and taking the heat out of the housing market."</p> <p>Indeed. I have never been clear where the "discount" came from. I presume the answer is that it was entirely notional. Selling something that you weren't planning to sell results in 'unexpected income'. <em>Except</em> that councils no longer had the rental income and were still paying the 'mortgage' on some of the newer houses!</p> <p>Being unable to use the "capital receipt" to build any replacements was just further putting the boot in. Even Tory run councils weren't happy. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156193 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 14:07:58 +0000 Morningsider 156193@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Insto - again, I agree with what you say. The RTB was a vote winner and politicians have only recently changed their mind on this, effectively when all the decent housing stock has been sold off and sales have declined to a trickle.</p> <p>Personally, I don't think the RTB was the only solution to aspirations for better public housing (not saying you do either). Council control of public housing could have been broken up and passed to housing co-ops, tenant management groups, local housing associations and the like - which are common in some European countries, as Calmac mentioned. </p> <p>You could probably even have introduced the RTB as well, without the discounts (max 70% for a flat and 60% for a house). If people had to pay market value it would have been far less attractive. </p> <p>If councils could have invested the receipts of RTB sales in new housing it would also have helped sustain social housing construction in the 80's/90's, easing today's huge demand for social housing and taking the heat out of the housing market. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156190 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 13:54:43 +0000 Baldcyclist 156190@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p><a href="http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/mar/10/scotland-dirty-secret-thatcherites-referendum" rel="nofollow">http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/mar/10/scotland-dirty-secret-thatcherites-referendum</a></p> <p>"<br /> At the 1979 election, the Conservatives won over 31% of the Scottish vote,<br /> "</p> <p>Not all Scots 'hated' Thatcher, and what she stood for at the time. Many parties today would give their right arm for 31% of the vote </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156187 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 13:38:54 +0000 calmac 156187@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Instography, I think it's mistaken to equate the number who bought their council house with support for the policy. Lots of the people who took advantage did so because they knew it was best for them, but they also knew that the policy was wrong overall and would have voted against it, had they been given the chance. I know many families in that boat.</p> <p>It's self-defeating not to take advantage of something like that while others are doing it, but that's not inconsistent with thinking nobody should have that choice. </p> <p>One of Thatcher's motives for RTB was that she thought she would make Conservative voters out of the people who bought. This broadly worked in England, and broadly failed in Scotland. For the reasons behind that you have to look at the cultural differences. </p> <p>As for creating a new middle class, I don't think RTB had much to do with that. Maybe later, for those who ended up with a nice profit that they could shift into a house in that street in spam valley they'd always fancied. It was more to do with changes in the economy overall - taxes, growing the service sector, new housebuilding, building roads and making car ownership cheap, expanding universities and the cultural leadership of encouraging people to make more money and spend it on themselves. </p> <p>RTB also didn't benefit those in the sprawling estates - Castlemilk, Drumchapel, Easterhouse, Pollok. It was in the nice wee estates like Merrylea where people did very nicely - and moreso beyond cities like Glasgow altogether. I'm living in an ex-council flat now which cost us £115,000 - cheap for the town, but beyond the reach of lower-income locals. Someone made a killing on that at some point. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156177 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 12:46:10 +0000 crowriver 156177@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>The fourth Yorkshireman of the Apocalype hath arrived. Well, technically half Lancastrian, but anyway...</p> <p>As a young kid I lived in Wester Hailes, when it was still new. There were problems even then, I recall gang fights, petty thieving, and transient criminal elements around the place. But there was still a strong sense of community, lots of families living there, a strong Tenants' Association, and certain expectations of behaviour and doing your bit (woe betide you if you did not take you turn to scour out the rubbish chute with boiling water).</p> <p>Living in a council house or flat in the early 1970s did not have the same social stigma attached to it as it did just ten years later. It was normal. After a certain age (around 5 or 6 in my case) we kids were allowed to play relatively unsupervised. Yes, we got into the odd scrape (cf. the gang fights alluded to above) but there was also a joy in the freedom of being given some responsibility for your own affairs.</p> <p>Of course they were different times. Many (though not all) mothers were at home for much of the day, or there were extended family nearby to keep an eye on children. Traffic in council estates was very light, so incautious crossing of roads was not the death sentence it might be today. It was socially acceptable for kids to be running around in groups together, doing what kids do. </p> <p>I'm trying to pinpoint when that might have changed, certainly not in the early 1980s, at least not north of Watford. Probably the change was later, in the late 1980s or 1990s: The rise of car culture during that period is certainly a factor, but not the only one. I can't say with certainty because by then the only school age kids I knew were living in Orkney: island life is/was so radically different from urban living that it's impossible to make meaningful comparisons regarding the freedom of children to roam. Oh and folk really did leave their doors open on the smaller isles at least. Maybe not now, but 30 years ago for sure. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156172 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 12:32:30 +0000 Instography 156172@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>"What happened here was Thatcher told the aspiring working class, "I'll make you middle class, so long as you forget about those you leave behind". She was true to her word."</p> <p>The key to this, however, is that the aspiring working classes existed long before Thatcher and they have always existed. Thatcher, I think, hitched a ride on a train that was already rolling. What she did was give these people a large measure of what they wanted - to be cut loose from the Council and allowed to decide for themselves what colour their front door and windows would be. Thatcher didn't create it, she recognised it as an aspect of her own experience and as something she felt should be allowed to happen so she facilitated it. And people voted for it, whether the Thatcher or Blair version, for nearly twenty years. They're still voting for it. RTB might have speeded something up but it was happening anyway. </p> <p>By the same token, let's not characterise tenants as unwilling victims put upon by an over-bearing council. Most were perfectly happy to benefit financially from the mismanagement of their own houses. People voted for the low rents and certainly wouldn't have voted for any plan to increase them.</p> <p>I haven't got the data to hand but I think you'll find that the Scots, in general, supported the policy of selling council houses to sitting tenants. Half a million took it up. Attitudes, both political and general public, only changed once the sales had slowed to a trickle anyway. In its 2007 manifesto, the SNP planned to continue the right to buy. In 2011, their manifesto made no mention of it. Labour also planned to continue RTB in 2007 (albeit with some exceptions in pressured areas). They too were silent on it in 2011. So possibly not seen as a vote winner by either party. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156165 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 11:42:48 +0000 calmac 156165@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Aye. We wuz poor, but we wuz 'appy! </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156162 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 11:37:53 +0000 Morningsider 156162@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Insto, Calmac - we only need one more for a full Four Yorkshiremen! </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156161 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 11:33:43 +0000 calmac 156161@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>And on RTB - I think it speaks volumes for Scots, and for the diofference between us and most of the UK, that though we may have taken advantage of it individually, we always knew it was collectively wrong and didn't want the policy. Labour put a moratorium on it, and the SNP ended it. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156160 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 11:30:59 +0000 calmac 156160@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Instography, I was born in Castlemilk too, and we also left in 1980. It was a sh*t-hole.</p> <p>Have you read Blossom by Lesley Riddoch? She points out the public rented accomodation in Scotland was provided by distant, monolithic councils who were unaccountable and totally out of touch. But in Europe it was, and still is, provided by community-based landlords. Tenants have much more power over what happens and they are the bosses. </p> <p>The European social democratic model differs principally from the Scottish model because there it is something they do, and here it is done to us. It's the sense of ownership and empowerment that we're really missing, and neither side, left or right, has understood that. The right tries to fix it through individual power, which is mythical and leaves the less able behind; the left tries to fix it through paternalistic State provision. </p> <p>As for baby monitors... I think that would be more correlative than causative, personally. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156158 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 11:24:27 +0000 Morningsider 156158@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Insto - A very good analysis. As someone who spent their early years living on the 13th floor of a council tower block, I can only agree about the poor quality and mis-management of council housing in the 1970's and 1980's.</p> <p>I still think the Right to Buy played a role in the rise of individualism, principally through speeding the decline of collective housing provision. I understand why individuals bought their houses - my parents held out from buying until it became more expensive to rent our flat than buy it. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156157 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 11:22:06 +0000 calmac 156157@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Morningsider, are you me? Because your post yesterday is exactly my interpretation of the last 35 years in Scotland. </p> <p>The end of your point 4 is of massive significance and is very little recognised. Most people believe that the industrial age was coming to an end in Western Europe by the 1970s, but what people in Britain do not realise is that it wasn't like this in other countries. </p> <p>In northern France, western Germany, Belgium and the industrial parts of the Netherlands, they faced the same harsh economic realities as we did, in particular with competition from the far east. What happened here was Thatcher told the aspiring working class, "I'll make you middle class, so long as you forget about those you leave behind". She was true to her word. So we shifted to a service economy, sold off the nationalised industries, benefited from very high oil prices, cut taxes and created a new middle class.</p> <p>Meanwhile in Europe they invested massively in new technology, training, vocational education and infrastructure. Instead of metal-bashing and coal mining they moved to chemicals, plastics, high-tech engineering. My Bosch dishwasher is awesome. </p> <p>Thatcherism was absolutely all about ending any genuine sense of solidarity with each other. Loyalty was expected to institutions - the monarchy, the armed forces, the flag - but we were told that we were all in competition with each other and if anyone was struggling, that was their own fault. </p> <p>What does this have to do with letting kids out to play? We don't trust each other so much any more. We don't accept any responsibility for anyone else's kids, so we don't expect anyone to look out for ours. We're just more fearful.</p> <p>So we drive our kids to playdates with friends we have picked for them, because that's what respectable people do. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935&page=2#post-156154 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 11:06:35 +0000 Instography 156154@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>It's not that I want to let RTB off the hook but neither do I want to let (largely Labour) councils off their hook for a much longer standing neglect of their housing stock. Estates like Castlemilk or Craigmillar, where the bulk of social housing was to be found, were largely neglected from the moment the building work stopped in the late 1950s. It's just not true to locate the problems with the RTB. By the time I left Castlemilk in 1980, the Thatcher was barely in power and it was already in an advance state of decay. The right to buy hadn't touched it and would barely touch it. It would be (Tory) urban regeneration - New Life for Urban Scotland - that would see Castlemilk (and Wester Hailes, Ferguslie Park and Whitfield) get its first large programme of housing refurbishment in 30 years. </p> <p>That systematic neglect - largely to keep rents down and effectively buy votes - also affected the better off areas and part of the appeal of the right to buy was that it allowed people to be independent of the council. Sure, it was a bargain (although not so much of a bargain when you consider what the tenants had been paying in and getting back over the years) but it was also the mechanism by which those people could get new kitchens, windows and doors, which most of those houses also hadn't seen since they were built.</p> <p>So, the aim of the right to buy might have been to undermine collective provision and encourage individualism but it had a ready audience. Collective provision hadn't been all that good. Councils had done a pretty poor job of being developers and landlords - building crap houses and then systematically mismanaging them. RTB was an individual solution to collectivisms problems.</p> <p>The social processes - the changing populations had also been going on for years. The trouble with most council estates was always that they were nowhere near jobs and they had poor transport links so skilled workers, the better paid, the ones who would maintain gardens, improve also had middle class aspirations. You would see their living standards improve. They would get a phone installed, a colour TV and a car and then they would move to East Kilbride or Cambuslang where the Scottish Special Housing Association was a better landlord or where there were nice new houses to buy near work and shops. Again, those processes (and that process of setting up housing associations to stop councils running the housing stock in the new towns) predate the right to buy.</p> <p>For the left, Thatcherism has been a convenient historical marker used to signify some huge break with the past. To locate all of our social problems with the arrival of Thatcher is convenient because it means we don't need to look at what that past really was and where the problems really started. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156140 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 09:29:21 +0000 Morningsider 156140@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Sorry that I wasn't clear on the Right to Buy. In my view it did two things that did disrupt communities:</p> <p>1. When the majority of Scots lived in council housing almost everyone had an interest in its upkeep and maintenance. This has changed - social housing is seen as a burden, no-one aspires to live in a council house. People that find themselves in council housing know they are at the bottom of the social heap, which only adds to the problems many of these people already have. What were one stable communities are now social dumping grounds.</p> <p>2. For the first 20 or so years that the Right to Buy existed, Councils were explicitly banned from investing the proceeds of house sales in building new homes. Combine this with the fact that Councils were effectively prevented from borrowing to build new homes meant that years went by with no new public housing. Children moving on from their parent's homes had to buy or rent privately - often far from where they grew up due to the cost of housing. Again, resulting in the break-up of communities.</p> <p>Insto - I agree that large council estates were obviously not mixed tenure, although I would argue that there used to be a reasonable class mix. What was surprising is that back in the 70's/80's that councils owned lots of individual flats/blocks of flats in city centres that you would not assume were council houses. I assume the councils owned these for many years, prior to the post war council estate building boom. Almost all of these have been bought - effectively removing the public element from the tenure mix, although I suppose the buy-to-let market is re-introducing some mix. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156132 Fri, 06 Jun 2014 00:52:27 +0000 Instography 156132@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>"wasn't that the first stage, and then those folk sold up/their kids moved up/away and divisions emerged?"</p> <p>I can't remember the research into right to buy resales so I'll need to substitute my vague recollections and re-rememberings. Buyers of former right to buy properties would, on the whole, be more like the existing social tenants. They would have low incomes (on the margins of buying, that's why they're buying ex-council houses), buying at full market value (rather than a 50-70% discount). Resales would, on the whole, reduce rather than accentuate those kinds of differences. But the other kinds of differences - age, aspiration, lifestyle and expectations of communal living - would have emerged regardless of right to buy as older tenants died and were replaced off the waiting list by younger, less community-oriented, social renters.</p> <p>This is what happened around my parents - in their council house in Castlemilk for 50 years, from the day it was built. Their children grew and moved away, their neighbours grew old and died or were moved out to care homes and young people moved in. The young ones didn't clean the stairs, they played loud music, sometimes they were drug addicts, sometimes single parents, sometimes fine, sometimes disruptive, yadda yadda. It's the story of social housing. My mum had bought years before (she would be mad not to - 70% discount?). The change in tenure didn't change the area. Demolition, new build, under-supply, needs-based allocation and death changed it. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156124 Thu, 05 Jun 2014 22:25:30 +0000 chdot 156124@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>"Common experience is less common"</p> <p>On one level that started with BBC2. </p> <p>It accelerated with satellite and several telly families. </p> <p>I.e. less chance that 'everyone' had seen x the night before. </p> <p>My kids walked to school (lots still do), which certainly gives a better experience/familiarity of 'the world' than being driven to the school gate. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156118 Thu, 05 Jun 2014 22:04:33 +0000 PS 156118@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>It's always nice to have a bête noire, but I think Thatch gets more credit than she deserves. She's a figurehead for a time of change which was worldwide.</p> <p>The world has changed. Communities still exist, but they are increasingly virtual, nationwide and international. People don't have to bother interacting with people with whom the only thing they have in common is that they live in relative proximity.</p> <p>One excellent way of giving people a sense of community is to subject them to the same adversity. Former miners who used to do talks at schools in West Cumbria missed the sense of community but most of them sure as hell didn't miss gaan doon t'pit. </p> <p>Nowadays there's more diversity. Common experience is less common. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156113 Thu, 05 Jun 2014 21:35:04 +0000 gembo 156113@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>If the corporation scheme was nice, like the one I lived in many people bought, others held out on principle. There were no private landlords nor housing co-operatives. So right to buy did open a fissure that wasn't there before.</p> <p>Many nice council houses sold to tenants who then passed to children who now sub let to people who like to keep sofas in their front gardens?</p> <p>World has changed.</p> <p>We did always lock our doors though. The myth of never locking your door is Inthink a reinterpretation of history.</p> <p>The st kilda community is an interesting case study. Ex kibbutniks also have varying feelings about living on a commune. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156111 Thu, 05 Jun 2014 21:26:07 +0000 SRD 156111@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>"it actually created mixed tenure rather than destroyed it: areas formerly solely social rented became a mix of tenures." </p> <p>wasn't that the first stage, and then those folk sold up/their kids moved up/away and divisions emerged? </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156110 Thu, 05 Jun 2014 21:22:01 +0000 Instography 156110@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>I'm not so sure about this right to buy theory. In general, where the right to buy didn't change single tenure social housing estates into single tenure owner-occupied estates (largely full of the same people), it actually created mixed tenure rather than destroyed it: areas formerly solely social rented became a mix of tenures.</p> <p>You could go back a bit to the mass demolition of the inner cities and the creation of the new towns and the peripheral estates. "Regeneration" like GEAR. Now that destroyed communities (horrible, patriarchal, drunken, unhealthy and squalid communities but communities none the less that people like to reminisce about). </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156108 Thu, 05 Jun 2014 21:15:44 +0000 Instography 156108@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Everything's capitalism's fault. But unfortunately for that theory, capitalism has been around much longer than over-protected children. Actually, when capitalism has its way children are far from over-protected. They might be over-protected here but they're still making our clothes somewhere else.</p> <p>I blame baby monitors. They condition parents to be too attentive to every sound their children make and to respond. Although baby monitors are only one aspect of what is probably a baby-boomer trend for parents to make children the suns around which their world orbits. We were allowed to run around making fires because, fundamentally our parents had better things to do with their time than chase after us, keeping us out of trouble. </p> <p>So, for me, it's a combination of Robert Shaw's <a href="http://human-nature.com/nibbs/04/shaw.html">The Epidemic</a>, Furedi's <a href="http://books.google.co.uk/books/about/Culture_of_Fear_Revisited.html?id=j_Gri3lTXEUC">Culture of Fear </a> and Michael Bywaters' <a href="http://www.theguardian.com/books/2006/dec/16/society">Big Babies</a>. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156107 Thu, 05 Jun 2014 21:15:43 +0000 gembo 156107@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>There is no doubt thatcher and Thatcherism to blame for the cult of the individual. The demise of the community has been around longer eg industrial revolution or highland clearances.</p> <p>There was a feel good factor around the Olympics, wiggins, Andy Murray etc.</p> <p>Out here in the sticks we go nuts for the village gala, weeks of floats and talent shows and closing streets off for barbecues. There is a kindness shared amongst the in group, two strong churches in competition .</p> <p>Not sure when people you know and socialise with (because kids same age) becomes a community spirit? I have been out here thirteen years and can think of two couples only in a large group of disparAte people who have divorced. Other phenomenon noted at surprise birthday party on Sunday was distinct lack of bald men. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156105 Thu, 05 Jun 2014 20:51:31 +0000 Min 156105@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Ah good, I know what I mean but I know I don't always express myself well. And I totally agree! </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156104 Thu, 05 Jun 2014 20:49:37 +0000 Morningsider 156104@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Min - that comment wasn't directed at you. It was just a general point that many people (or at least media commentators) seem happy to harp on about running wild as children and then point the finger at today's parents for stifling their kids, without stepping back and thinking about how this might have came about. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156103 Thu, 05 Jun 2014 20:43:38 +0000 Min 156103@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>I am not castigating anyone for being paranoid, I was questioning the validity of the article, something about which smelt like a load of old marsh gas to me. I can't quite put my finger on why but there have been a lot of good points so far. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=12935#post-156099 Thu, 05 Jun 2014 20:31:18 +0000 Morningsider 156099@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Roibeard - I see clear links between this issue and Thatcherism (not all directly linked to Mrs T herself). During the 1980's and early 90's the then Tory Government mounted an all out assault on collectivism in all its guises, key issues for me are:</p> <p>1. The right to buy - housing tenure in Scotland fundamentally changed from around two thirds public sector to two thirds owner occupied in less than 20 years. This meant that the remaining public housing stock was generally the worst quality and let to those least able to afford an alternative. Effectively this destroyed many mixed tenure/social class communities, as those who could fled these areas and left behind a number of sink estates, which exist to this day.</p> <p>2. Unions - the Tory Government set out to destroy the unions and, aided in part by a series of idiotic decisions by major unions themselves, did a pretty good job. Breaking the unions reduced collective bargaining and resulted in a steady slide in earnings for working class communities, which has now spread to middle class communities. When there is no collective bargaining then it's every man for himself - not really conducive to community building.</p> <p>3. Privatisation - The break-up and sell off of collectively owned enterprises for knock down prices enriched the few, at the expense of the service provided to the many. The fundamental attack on the idea of collectively owned services, and the claim that the private sector is inherently superior to the public sector, continues to this day - think SERCO, G4S, Capita. Almost everyone is worse off because of this (apart from large shareholders in these companies). It is difficult to quantify, but knowing that you have no say, no control over any of these major services has diminished that feeling of all being in it together.</p> <p>4. De-industrialisation - the wanton destruction of major nationalised industries (coal, steel, car production) laid waste to the economic engine of swathes of central Scotland and other areas of the UK. These communities were then effectively abandoned, people parked on Incapacity Benefit to reduce the unemployment figures. Depression, drug use, alcoholism and other ills have plagued many of these areas ever since. I'm not saying change wasn't needed - but many of these jobs and industries could have been saved, as happened in France, Germany and elsewhere during the 1980's.</p> <p>6. The City - the flip side of de-industrialisation. The cult of money and greed for the few.</p> <p>To me, this has resulted in a coarsening of society, a cutting of community connections and a retreat to the bunker of home and family. You are right, communities do still exist in some areas, including communities of interest. That is despite of what happened, not because of it.</p> <p>I don't expect everyone to agree with me - that would be very boring. However, before people castigate parents for being "paranoid" - it is worth thinking how we arrived at this point. </p>