chavs...

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Wed Sep 14, 2005 11:25 am

http://www.fat-pie.com/chavs.htm

[essay mode]

We have something of a phenomenon here in the UK (the term is standard in the mainstream media now), the 'chav'. In many ways it's nothing new, something like people known as 'white trash' in other countries. However it now seems to be, in terms of numbers, the predominant youth culture in the UK.

The first thing that strikes you is the horrific poverty from which this problem stems. Why is it a problem? Well, the problem is that people like this are probably the main cause of crime in this country, from fights in town centres across the country on Friday/Saturday nights, to petty crime to fuel drug habits and in many cases simply to aid survival.

The weird and depressing thing about chavs is that while being totally f**ked in the rear by the system, they still subscribe to it and perpetuate it by being rampantly materialistic, holding expensive cars, phones, clothes and jewellery to be by far the most important thing in life. The other striking thing about this sub-culture is the incredibly clone-like nature of its members - the Burberry and Elesse uniforms and total lack of any desire to be open minded about anything which falls outside their worldviews.

While in many ways the chavs depicted in the link above are different to those in say London (in general the poverty and employment prospects are much more bleak in the north than in the south) the problem is a ubiquitous one in this country.. even though I thankfully don't have to deal with too many people like 'Devvo' in the above link where I live. London is too cosmopolitan and open-minded to tolerate too much of that. I still get hassled by the bunch of kids that hangs around my neighbourhood to see if I want a ten-draw (£10 worth of weed).

It's a pretty strange situation.. while in theory these people are all free-thinking individuals like everyone else on this planet who can make their own choices (not everyone from a deprived background falls into such a lifestyle), the situation is an inevitable backlash from the rampant materialism of higher echelons of society - these people are told that they should aspire to the best brands and most glamourous and enviable lifestyles. When they see their reality, the chav lifestyle is some way of getting self-esteem within society.. even though in the end there really cannot be much self-esteem involved in being unemployed, hanging around in the streets committing petty crime and often extreme violence, and in many cases doing shitty drugs like glue, lighter gas and aerosols.

It's got to the point where it's even exploited for pure comedy value (for example in the link above). This is even more depressing, although in some ways perhaps ridicule can be the best way of telling these people to get the fuck out of that way of thinking? It's a strange one... I've tried not to be too judgmental here (as much as that is possible to someone who values individuality, peace and self-respect)... I was wondering what other people think.

[/essay mode]

Mr Arkadin · Post by **Mr Arkadin** » Wed Sep 14, 2005 11:40 am

[brevity mode]
Chavs are scum and stupid. Don't pity or excuse them.
[/brevity mode]

http://www.chavscum.co.uk/

[ This Message was edited by: Mr Arkadin on 2005-09-14 12:50 ]

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Wed Sep 14, 2005 12:12 pm

I hear ya but they're people too.. It's the sheer bleakness of employment prospects that makes me understand why this happens. The education system is elitist and expensive (tuition fees are pure fascism in action) so there isn't much opportunity to break out of that environment even if the will is there. At least that's how it seems to me.

The thing that makes me angry is that these people are profitable for the government. They suck the cock of the system that rapes them. They give back everything they have in tax (alcohol, cigarettes etc) and they consume a lot of product (clothes, cars, phones and talktime, pointless jewellery, satellite TV etc).

So if these people make our wonderful capitalist system work, then surely there is a lot of motivation for the government to perpetuate the situation by sitting back and watching their environments decay and descend further into bleak chaos, while counting the profits flooding in.

And when you're creating a population this stupid, you don't even need to suppress independent or progressive thinking, and you can just do whatever the fuck you want as a government.

Mr Arkadin · Post by **Mr Arkadin** » Wed Sep 14, 2005 12:24 pm

they're people too

Where'd you pick up that misconception ?

OK i wasn't poor or anything, but i did grow up on one of the roughest council estates in Birmingham, went to a comprehensive school and came out all right i think. i decided i didn't want to live there the rest of my life and that motivated me. Chavs have no motivation - they're vegetables.

You mention unemployment as a factor, well from what i see not a single one of these buggers would want to work. As long as they can get child support for eight kids and a free house they seem quite happy.

i earn a respectable living, yet i can't afford a house in London or a car - so how do these people do it? Oh, from my taxes.

Also, the sheer fact they they don't see themselves in any of the Little Britain or Catherine Tate characters shows their complete lack of awarenes of themselves, let alone other people. Why give people like that a second thought, when they wouldn't give you one (except to maybe stab you in the eye)? They probably aspire to Little Britain thinking it's cool rather than a parody.

The chavs shall inherit the earth.

[ This Message was edited by: Mr Arkadin on 2005-09-14 13:25 ]

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Wed Sep 14, 2005 1:53 pm

Don't get me wrong, I'm not defending their actions or anything - a friend of mine had ammonia squirted in his eye by little pricks like this a few years ago. It's a sick culture.

I'm just wondering where things like this stem from.. IMHO we should be holding the state accountable. I don't get off on the 'benefit spongers' tip, although I know this happens. I think it's a situation engineered by the government for a variety of ends (for example, the fear that these kind of little twats put into people keeps them in their homes, watching that glowing advert-ridden brain programming box). A kind of unofficial martial law if you like.

Mr Arkadin · Post by **Mr Arkadin** » Wed Sep 14, 2005 2:02 pm

I think it's a situation engineered by the government for a variety of ends

Well i'm not much of a conspiracy theorist fan. Also i think that argument's flawed on two levels:
1. It assumes someone could forward plan a state system to achieve the end result of chaves - how could you predict such a thing?
2. i think it credits the government with more intelligence than they really have,

i don't like our government, but i really don't think this is a conspircay - maybe it's evolution trying to kill off mankind.

[ This Message was edited by: Mr Arkadin on 2005-09-15 00:02 ]

Post by **hubird** » Wed Sep 14, 2005 2:12 pm

I guess Darkrezin just wants to point out that if you (a society) obviously don't try to keep those simple minds on board, you'll create them...

PS., most links gave text code pages, and at the end I got afreeze...

[ This Message was edited by: hubird on 2005-09-14 15:14 ]

petal · Post by **petal** » Wed Sep 14, 2005 2:49 pm

Just watched all these small episodes of Devo. First I thought, this ain't for real - But something tells me that it's the sad truth.
Man, this is pretty scary stuff!

Counterparts · Post by **Counterparts** » Thu Sep 15, 2005 1:48 am

I think that the Chav (Council Housed And Violent?) culture we're seeing now is one of the end results of a heavily consumerist society, symptomatic of the sickness present in our society.

Peer pressure must be a powerful factor for these people too, as restrictive to their development as lack of education and opportunity.

Desensitised to violence, they are worse than a pack of hunting dogs in my opinion. Their style of violence is particularly chilling; they appear to feel nothing.

It's bad enough now, but the future is even bleaker.

Royston

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Thu Sep 15, 2005 2:04 am

On 2005-09-14 15:02, Mr Arkadin wrote:
Well i'm not much of a conspiracy theorist fan. Also i think that argument's flawed on two levels:
1. It assumes someone could forward plan a state system to achieve the end result of chaves - how could you predict such a thing?
2. i think it credits the government with more intelligence than they really have

I guess our perspectives differ. However, when housing estates were designed (just more modern looking slums) did the people in power at the time really think that it was going to work out in a nice happy way?

When they closed down industry in most areas of England so that they could import coal etc cheaper from other countries, did they just think that everyone would just create their own new economies by clicking their fingers?

And maybe I'm cynical but where money and power is concerned, the government has very intelligent persons indeed to make full use of the population to accrue more money and power. If a brainless cowboy builder has enough intelligence to rip someone off, then I think that some toffs educated in Oxford/Cambridge are *more than capable of a lot worse*.

The main point I'd like to make is that if these people are just allowed to lose their self-respect and slide further down that slope, then society as a whole loses out even more (more crime and violence, plus a culture totally corrupted by the masses of brain-dead consumers like this).

Hubird - sorry, WMV files

Michu · Post by **Michu** » Thu Sep 15, 2005 4:02 am

here in .pl we call such guys blokers (housing estates here are called blocks for obvious reasons). The fashion is a bit different (burberry is not a well known brand here

) but the problem is quite serious in urban areas...
I tend to think that roots of this lie in consumerist lifestyle model spoonfed by media, combined with poverty and high unemployment combined with decay of education level here.
btw i think that 2 former and the latter reason create positive feedback loop, as in you don't exactly enjoy educating bunch of buggers, that think only about latest cellphone model and how to nick money for it...

btw, i don't think cuts of founds for education and healthcare that our government did are part of some devious plan, it was just an easy way of getting quick money, and our democratic system ensures, that government doesn't exactly give a fuck about future past 4 years...

_________________

[ This Message was edited by: Michu on 2005-09-15 05:05 ]

Michu · Post by **Michu** » Thu Sep 15, 2005 4:15 am

Tony, the fact that you managed to break out and you didn't become a chav can be either interpreted as a compliment for you or as an argument against all those who live in chavhood.
i prefer to interprete it as a compliment for you

Spirit · Post by **Spirit** » Thu Sep 15, 2005 4:55 am

Plenty of these types in Australia too.

And I agree with 99% of what Darkrezin has to say on the topic. Spot on Dark. The only area where we disagree is the cause.

I believe there's a lot of contributing factors, but primary among them is the "cult of the individual". That is a preoccupation with personal "rights" over societal responsibilities.

Part of that I also think is due to the decline of formal religion, a too lenient criminal justice system, uncontrolled TV programming, bizarre welfare priorities, and a poor and powerless education system.

I'd put "government conspiracy" last. Why would any government want to engineer a society full of antisocial idiots on welfare ?

Surely it'd much better to engineer happy 1950s-style family groups buying cutain fabric and bread-makers ?

Michu · Post by **Michu** » Thu Sep 15, 2005 5:01 am

Spirit wrote:
...uncontrolled TV programming, bizarre welfare priorities, and a poor and powerless education system.

care to elaborate about possible causes for those things, Spirit?

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Thu Sep 15, 2005 5:28 am

I know I'm perhaps more cynical than most but my reasoning is this:

On 2005-09-14 13:12, darkrezin wrote:
They suck the cock of the system that rapes them. They give back everything they have in tax (alcohol, cigarettes etc) and they consume a lot of product (clothes, cars, phones and talktime, pointless jewellery, satellite TV etc).

...

And when you're creating a population this stupid, you don't even need to suppress independent or progressive thinking, and you can just do whatever the fuck you want as a government.

On top of everything else, the end result is that people end up simply hating them rather than even thinking to look at root causes.

As I said elsewhere in this thread I'm not looking to make warm fuzzy liberal excuses for their behaviour - when you've seen someone recovering from an ammonia-attack on their eyes you don't really start making excuses. The more important thing is trying to understand why the situation occurs and look at ways to change things.

[ This Message was edited by: darkrezin on 2005-09-15 06:32 ]

braincell · Post by **braincell** » Fri Sep 16, 2005 12:23 am

It's okay to hate people as long as you hate all people equally.

narly · Post by **narly** » Fri Sep 16, 2005 3:05 am

...as was pointed out in a seminar I attended on harassment in the workplace. If it can be shown that you are equally gruff with all people, nobody can effectively say that you've singled them out and targeted them to harass.

An equal-opportunity annoyer, of sorts.

[ This Message was edited by: narly on 2005-09-16 04:06 ]

Zer · Post by **Zer** » Fri Sep 16, 2005 3:06 am

Yes - so please create more wars - the more nuclear, the better...that will make poeple think, if they will survive them.

darkrezin · Post by **darkrezin** » Fri Sep 16, 2005 3:35 am

Thanks for that chicken mcnugget of wisdom Braincell

Shroomz~> · Post by **Shroomz~>** » Fri Sep 16, 2005 5:19 am

Darkrezin,

You're conspiricy theory is our reality, but who are the orchestrators & when was it orchestrated? It's mind boggling to look at it this way. How many 100 million or billion *tons* of supposed illegal drugs, such as smack, charlie, dope etc do you think have been smuggled or brought into this country (UK) since early last century? Is it a customs & exise *mistake* that's been going on for so long? Did you know that Private Eye magazine in the 60's supposedly uncovered government secrets about huge government organised drug deals abroad. Huge smack deals. Within no time heroin was a major problem in the UK. People lying all over the shop out of their minds on the stuff. It's still a big problem today amongst many many others.