Monday, February 18, 2008

Time for an Attitude Adjustment

“Neither new laws nor more funding is the solution for the current week of riots.”

For the last week or so “youths” have been rioting in Denmark, burning cars, stoning ambulances, torching schools, and engaging in all the other high-spirited activities that the “youths” of Europe have become notorious for in the last few years.

Ungdomshuset riots

The latest Danish intifada started out as an eruption of the autonomer, the young anarchist punks associated with Ungdomshuset. Muslim teenage gangs soon joined in the fun, later justifying it by citing the republication of the Motoons as an offense to their religious sensibilities.

The Danish government and average Danish citizens are not willing to put up with all this nonsense, and are now discussing the best ways to deal with it. The latest proposal under consideration is to force the parents of underage rioters to pay for the damage caused by their delinquent children.

Rolf Krake has translated a couple of articles on this topic. The first is from Jyllands-Posten:

Government coalition will hold parents responsible

It can in the future become costly for parents if their children under 18 years old participate in riots.

On Monday the Danish People’s Party launched a string of proposals for the prevention of new riots, and among the proposals is that parents shall be held economically responsible for the damage their offspring are inflicting.

“The youths can’t afford to pay for the cars they destroy themselves,” says the deputy leader of the Danish People’s Party, Peter Skaarup.

That is an idea that the Minister of Justice Lene Espersen views positively. She herself considered the same possibility after the earlier “Ungdomshuset riots”.

“It is totally and completely unacceptable that society has got to deal with an immense bill, all because the parents can’t live up to their responsibilities. If we can make the parents economically responsible, then they will have a much larger incentive to put their teenagers under house arrest or by other means prevent them from running around and burning cars in the streets,” says Lene Espersen.

The second article is also from Jyllands-Posten:
- - - - - - - - -
Fogh: It’s not society’s fault

Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen places the entire responsibility for the burned schools and cars on the youths and their parents.

Neither new laws nor more funding is the solution for current week of riots, in which youths over most of the country have burned cars, schools, and containers. Prime Minister Anders Fogh Rasmussen made this clear when he went on TV this evening to comment on the riots for the first time.

“Now we have to stop the old song that it is the fault of society. It is the responsibility of the youths — and their parents,” said the Prime Minister, who at the same time appealed to the youths to get started with education and working.

Lots of employment

“We are lacking in manpower, and we would like to see even more go to work. They must pull themselves together, said Fogh Rasmussen, who in clear speech warned the youths:

“You wont get any support this way — many people will turn their backs on you,” he said.

Personal decision

Political spokesman Henrik Sass Larsen (SDP opposition) says — concerning the actual events — that he agrees with the government in that the youths to some degree carry the responsibility for the burning cars.

“This will not be solved with lots of social cash or special ‘immigrant houses’. This is about the necessity for each youth to make a decision about whether he wishes to succeed in life. It is to a huge degree possible to be successful in Denmark; it is only a matter of getting started,” he said, although he also has suggestions over the longer term for improvement in integration efforts.

“We have make an effort in the area where many immigrants live. It is about social uplift and a broader coalition of inhabitants — it works,” he says, and also points to the need for more street workers.

“They can beat some common sense into the youth and aid in rebuilding their confidence in the future,” says Sass Larsen.


Photo © Snaphanen.

15 comments:

X said...

Now this is interesting. I think we're seeing a replay of the Thatcher revolution. Faced with repeated blaming of "society" for things like unemployment, lax work attitudes and crime she famously declared "there is no such thing as society", rather that there was the family and the nation, and people should be responsible for their own actions within those spheres. Quite refreshing to see this idea return to the political scene. Perhaps this time its proponents won't bottle out half way through.

Matthew Middleton said...

I'm not sure making the parent's pay for the damages will have a significant impact. It seems clear these parents either have no control over their children or support their vandalism. I don't see how making the parent's foot the bill for their children's crimes will solve the fundamental problems with the behaviour of these young people and their parents.

John Sobieski said...

Doesn't one country have a proposal that the parents of criminal youths are to be deported along with their problem child? Now that makes a lot of sense and will put the fear of 'allah' in these parents who don't control their children. The thought of their hungry mouth being ripped away from the welfare tit can be highly motivating.

Ed Mahmoud said...

Personally, I'd prefer to see more tear gas, bean-bag projectiles and, if that doesn't settle them down, fire houses and rubber bullets.


Different continent, but I could never understand how South Korean 'students' could throw petrol bombs aka 'Molotov Cocktails' at the police and not immediately draw gunfire in return. Flaming gasoline is considered a dealy weapon here in the US, and assaulting a police officer with a dealy weapon is a sure fire way to suffer lead poisoning.

Ed Mahmoud said...

fire hoses, not houses. And 'deadly', not dealy.


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Abu Abdullah said...

Here's an obvious measure: impose a curfew on the trouble spots and shoot any curfew breaker on sight.

Frank said...

I can just see it now...angry welfare parents joining the "youths" on the street to burn yet more cars in demand for more welfare to pay the fines for burning cars...

painlord2k@gmail.com said...

The "youths" are under 18 age. SO they are a responsibility of their parents. They live in the parents home, eat there, and so on.
So the parents have the tools to impose his/her authority on the youth. If they are unable, they could go to a judge and give up their authority on their son(s), so the state will step in with its tools. Or they could simply beat in their son(s) a lesson about "good and evil" when they start risking their home.
I suppose that being homeless in winter in Denmark it is very romantic but not very healthy.

ole said...

From my point of view the best measures " against" these riots would be those , that would cause them to increase as much as possible.
The more the muslims and their allies burn and destroy,the more they expose their true nature. Cracks are beginning to appear in the Danish variation of PC'ness.
Here and there an individual politician brake away from the official party line and start to demand REAL measures against the rioters.
I can't get enough of it!
If only it would go on for ever !
Give it a few more weeks and they'd be dipping the young jihaddists in tar and rolling them in fethers,or what ever it was they used to do in the wild west..
Well ; when it stops we'll just have to think of a new ,improoved cartoon-like way to expose their pre-historic madness ,and make them start BURNING themselves again..

Zenster said...

Denmark: “You wont get any support this way — many people will turn their backs on you,” he said.

America: “You wont get any support this way — many people will turn their GUNS on you,” he said.

Matthew Middleton: I'm not sure making the parent's pay for the damages will have a significant impact. It seems clear these parents either have no control over their children or support their vandalism.

You're putting the cart before the horse.

Lack of parental discipline—or willful hostility to Danish culture, you pick—is what creates this situation. These children's crimes are largely a reflection of their parents' own attitude. Penalizing such lax child-rearing—not to mention outright incitement to riot—is the only way to send a clear message that Islamic aggression will not be tolerated.

Do you honestly think that many of these young rioters are being punished by their parents after the fact?

John Sobieski: Doesn't one country have a proposal that the parents of criminal youths are to be deported along with their problem child?

This needs to be a routine feature of immigration law. Islam's intrinsically hostile nature requires installation of some very sensitive tripwires to trigger removal of those who demonstrate any refusal to integrate.

Ole: From my point of view the best measures " against" these riots would be those , that would cause them to increase as much as possible.
The more the muslims and their allies burn and destroy,the more they expose their true nature. Cracks are beginning to appear in the Danish variation of PC'ness.


Sadly, it is increasingly apparent that only the most flagrant demonstrations of aggression will get the attention of European multiculturalists. Better that a few thousand cars are torched than major landmarks being dynamited. That will be the logical progression if Danes and other Europeans do not awaken to the Islamic threat.

Tuan Jim said...

Ed - regarding S Korea (ROK), I think in general the cops have learnt pretty well about exercising the proper amount of restraint after years and years of experience (the vast majority of the riot cops are young guys carrying out their mandatory two year conscription service the same as the privates in the army and elsewhere).

Although the country has liberalized considerably from the dictatorships between the 50s and 80s, these guys are well trained and know how to keep the protests contained. They're not afraid to break heads as you might have seen in the free trade protests in 2005 or the Pyongtaek riots in 2006, but they don't want to unnecessarily risk killing protesters again after some of the fiascos in the 80s.

That said, charging the parents for this vandalism is brilliant. Sarkozy could learn from these guys - although I wonder in both cases if the parents of these "youths" have any source of income beyond the dole?

Timbre said...

Shoot the rioters.

laine said...

How about publishing the full names of the parents and their wayward youths, as well as their occupation including Welfare recipient? It might be very instructive for Danish taxpayers.

And/or as in all cases where people don't have the money to pay, let them work it off but as a family i.e. Mom, Dad and the kid all pick garbage for a month.

DaToad said...

I agree: "shoot the rioters." Of course that isn't PC. So, expell any rioter arrested, along with their family, (down to third cousin), to their country of origin.

(I think this was proposed by the Swiss Peoples Party, which was promptly accused of being racist)

Muslim countries have called for a boycott of Danish products. Just wait until plane loads of the new Danish exports start arriving: muslim vandals on welfare.

Zenster said...

Laine: And/or as in all cases where people don't have the money to pay, let them work it off but as a family i.e. Mom, Dad and the kid all pick garbage for a month.

Permit me to suggest some very un-halal tasks like cleaning out pig sties or dog kennels.

I also concur with others here about the efficacy provided by a "whiff of grape". At the very least, European countries need to take a page from Islamic Indonesia's playbook and use water cannons laced with an indelible dye. Anybody exiting a riot area with traces of dye on them is taken into custody.

I also like the second line of defense that is sometimes used which involves loading the water cannon tanks with raw sewage.