Daily Times

Whether it is because of fear of the Conservatives gaining the upper hand, or whether because of genuine conviction, the liberal Left is making disingenuous arguments when identifying the causes behind the London riots — or rather riots across Britain — that began the previous Thursday. Their arguments reveal a huge blind spot towards a phenomenon that has been taking root in the country for the past two to three decades.

Journalists and politicians on the Left have, incorrectly in my opinion, tried to contextualise these riots with rising unemployment and massive cuts in government spending, specifically cuts in spending on education, youth services, health, legal aid, and policing infrastructure including pay and conditions, etc.

Nina Power’s piece, ‘There is a context to London’s riots that can’t be ignored’ (August 8, 2011, The Guardian), actually makes for a fairly comprehensive illustration of the argument the Left is making, i.e. of there being political reasons behind the riots. Many liberal voices like hers have linked the riots of August 2011 with forced austerity measures, the historically troubled relationship between the youth and the police and the police’s treatment of minority ethnic backgrounds, the increasing inequality of society and increasing lack of hope for the younger generation.

Now I am in a bit of a soup, since I am politically and philosophically liberal in my views too. Arguing against my political kin is not going to be easy therefore.

I start with the simple argument that everything the Left is saying has, at one time or another in the past, been the cause of social and political unrest and violence (the Brixton riots of 1981 being just one example) — and it certainly has the potential to do so again. But the riots of August 2011 were neither political in nature, nor owing to the reasons being outlined.

As a Left-leaning liberal I support higher levels of government spending on the social sector per se and, therefore, do not disagree with the fundamentals underpinning arguments by Nina and others — but not in the name of the London riots.

To do so would be a huge mistake because it would obviate the need to identify one of the real causes — that being the one sided social contract the children of Britain have with everyone around them, be it parents, teachers, communities or the state.

During my eight years in London I observed this phenomenon. It confounded and bothered me very much but never became the subject of public debate. Even then, 1998 through 2005, I recognised gangs or the state increasingly replace parents, with obvious consequences, but no one seemed to notice.

It is very important to note here that gang culture and gang violence were in full swing even then in the heyday of Tony Blair’s Labour government, booming markets and high expenditure on social services. This is contrary to The Guardian implying the gang culture is a result of youth centres being shut down (‘Farewell youth clubs, hello street life — and gang warfare’, July 29, 2011). I support youth centres wholeheartedly, but insist that the decline of parenting, not youth centres, led to the gang culture of British youth.

What I saw in the making was an entire generation growing up with a severe sense of entitlement, very aware of their rights, but not of their responsibilities. Indeed, they were cluelessness as to their responsibilities. And I thought, ‘My God, is Britain nurturing a monster for itself?’

The state had relieved parents of any parenting duties, if they so wished. It was only the upper, upper-middle or upwardly mobile classes that could visibly be seen actively parenting their children, because it was a choice they made.

The rest of the lumpenproletariat, under the opiate of the nanny state, gladly allowed the state to break the social contract of their children with themselves, with teachers, with the community and with adult society in general.

These parents felt entitled to give birth to children, at the state’s expense, and then have the state take the responsibility for not only feeding, clothing, educating and providing healthcare, but also for providing any pastoral care involving imparting values or moral compasses to their children.

The state was supposedly fostering values in children, increasingly outside the family structure, via youth centres, youth workers, health workers, social workers, teachers and the police, without simultaneously empowering these people or organisations.

As an example, teachers I knew personally in the British state school system, spoke of being utterly powerless to take any disciplinary action against children who either refused to work (be it for class-work or homework), or were abusive or violent towards them, or played truant.

It was the opposite in fact. Were a child given detention for, say, not doing homework, typically the parents would demand an explanation and teachers were accused of emotional/psychological abuse, with the school ending up extending apologies to the parents.

In the runaway, unfettered, social-benefits-without-responsibilities nanny Britain, children face absolutely no consequences for bad behaviour or lack of respect for authority — either at home or outside: it is a criminal offence for a parent to slap a child; schools cannot ‘fail’ children in any grade, only ‘assess’ them year after year, in many cases graduating them with O Level certificates without basic numeracy or literacy skills to their names; 16-year-olds have the legal right to produce babies, with counselling, healthcare, housing, etc, guaranteed by the state; no school child may be suspended from a state school, for any reason, except in very, very extenuating circumstances, and then for a day or so max; calling your teacher, ‘you stupid cow’ or ‘b***h’ (or anything else for that matter) is not a disciplinable offence. Try telling the kids anything, and you face a volley of abuse if not physical violence, with impunity on their side. No responsibility. No consequences. Ever.

The Left needs to recognise that the state, with its unbalanced, invasive and pervasive laws (clearly well intentioned with child rights and protections in mind) has broken several different levels of social contracts for children that foster healthy societies. They have got to admit that the recent riots were in fact a manifestation of the self-entitled yobbishness the underbelly of a family-stripped, rights-without-responsibilities culture has produced.

This is, one must reiterate, not to argue against a social security state. Instead, it is a plea to rethink the one-sidedness of it, to encourage bringing back of family structures, parenting and respect for authority without letting go of the principles of social justice, to incorporate consequences and responsibilities back into the equation for the youth, whom many on the Right now label as ‘feral children’ or ‘beasts’, for British society of the future to consist of productive, responsible citizens.

The writer is a journalist and can be reached at gulnbukhari@gmail.com. She tweets at http://twitter.com/gulbukhari