Do you think the UK is getting progressively more rough?
Posted by Warm_Sail_7908@reddit | AskUK | View on Reddit | 637 comments
Hi, I’m from an area near Manchester which up until recently I thought was average, but after visiting quite a few towns and cities in the past few months, I’ve come to realise it’s definitely above average.
In the past I’ve only ever visited some of the more popular places to visit like London, York, Cotswolds etc but have made an effort this year to visit more. However, I’m quickly realising that the majority of cities and towns I’ve been visiting (which are predominantly in the north) seem to surprisingly rough.
Since this is the first time I’m visiting these cities I was wondering if anyone has seen a decline in living standards within recent years or has it always been this way?
Forward_Task_198@reddit
Not really. Just happens more often up north.
PhoenixBlaze123@reddit
Nope safest its ever been
Key-Willingness-2223@reddit
Depends what you mean by rough.
If you mean like "rough and ready" in the sense of the stereotypical working class bloke willing to fight outside a pub after a couple pints, then no, that's definitely declining in overal numbers. Albeit those who are rough, are way more rough than before in many instances.
Whereas if you mean rough like "fucking hell, this area looks a bit rough and rundown" in the sense of growing financial hardship then that's absolutely skyrocketing in overall numbers.
Round_Caregiver2380@reddit
Back in the 90s when I first started going to pub, you were guaranteed to see multiple fights every time and a frequent glassing or stabbing.
It's a rare occasion these days.
StealingUrMemes@reddit
The stabbings happen in broad daylight now, with no alcohol involvement.
dotelze@reddit
Less often
mo_tag@reddit
Yeah but only if you believe in statistics
BanjoSurprise@reddit
What else would you turn to? Your feelings?
boostman@reddit
That seems to be the MO for right-wingers, feelings over facts. The experts say crime is going down? But I want to feel angry about immigrants, we’ve had enough of experts!
BanjoSurprise@reddit
That or they just cast doubt over the validity of the evidence while failing to offer alternative evidence
Rob_Greenblack83@reddit
Trust the experts not your own eyes!
Rob_Greenblack83@reddit
Or maybe you just live in a nice neighbourhood.
StealingUrMemes@reddit
Who brought immigrants in to the equation? Whats with the projecting?
blackman3694@reddit
Have you been living under a rock?
insuman@reddit
Knife crime has risen though? I think doubled over the last decade and bit no?
luckynumberstefan@reddit
How can you believe in a statistic? Belief implies you don't have all the evidence; statistics are evidence. You can't believe or not believe in a fact.
mo_tag@reddit
Not in a statistic, but statistics in general. You can have all the evidence in the world, but if it doesn't convince someone because they don't understand it well enough, they don't understand how to interpret the evidence so they need to appeal to authority. But that requires trust. People disbelieve in facts all the time, but ultimately the question of whether a claim is true in reality is a totally separate question to whether a person believes the evidence is convincing
StealingUrMemes@reddit
What are you yalking about? Knife crime is up 87% in the past 10 years.
Educational-Map-1470@reddit
That’s cause there’s more money in phone theft.
Same_Seaworthiness74@reddit
Now everyone stays at home watching YouTube or playing games. The ones picking fights down the pubs have been priced out.
GunstarGreen@reddit
I dont think I mind that.
DaveChild@reddit
Their partners probably mind it very much.
blockbuster_1234@reddit
Shouldn’t have chosen them as partners in the first place right?
Ok_icantPromise@reddit
It’s not as simple as choosing. There could be financial abuse, isolation from community/& kin, lack of mind-heart sync which makes one vulnerable in any type of interaction etc and a host of other things.
DaveChild@reddit
Wow, blaming the victims? Disgusting.
blockbuster_1234@reddit
It’s not 100 percent of cases, but many issues you can spot red flags a mile away. Call it victim blaming all you want, but the truth is, many people have choices and can decide. Again, not 100 percent of cases but a large majority
DaveChild@reddit
Wow. Disgusting.
POB_42@reddit
Oh my god the domestic abuse calls the police got over covid. Absolutely skyrocketed over quarantine.
MargThatcher12@reddit
Guess what else has a strong relationship with DV? Alcohol.
Scot_Survivor@reddit
And major football games.
Big-Combination-4732@reddit
That and increased security and technology to catch them
pencilrain99@reddit
Or their lifestyle has caught up with them and they are now old before their time , their days shuffling between the bookies and the CIU club bar. Sitting at the same table everyday talking about the same past glories to anyone who Will listen.
kylehyde84@reddit
All due to fumes leaded petrol... Apparently
Prestigious_Can_4391@reddit
It was the culture really though
Round_Caregiver2380@reddit
Also the lack of consequences. I got into a few fights when I was younger and just got called an idiot by the police and told to go home.
If the police catch you red-handed these days, there's no getting away with it which is how it should be.
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
Ngl this made me laugh. Regardless of getting caught or not even if the cops do find out who is behind the crime chances are they won't even face jail time. I've seen numerous stories about buglaries where they didn't even turn up to investigate or people having their cars stolen and written off in chases yet the scumbags responsible get the legal equivalent of a slap on the wrist.
The justice system is an abomination in this country. More kids doing drugs, getting involved with gangs and carrying weapons, more serious crime of all kinds and yet support from the police and so-called justice system is sadly all too often nowhere to be found for those who need it most. We need far more robust measures for those who are frequently a nuisance and/or danger to society and the funding to build more prisons to lock these dickheads up but that's just wishful thinking when you're in a country which seems to almost reward rather than punish repeat offenders.
bitofrock@reddit
Nah. We're just more aware. Having lived in various countries over my half century and a bit, UK policing has always had horrible gaps and been too slow at times. And locking more people up doesn't make things better. See the USA
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
There have been significant decreases in overall quality of living and access to basic services tho be it law enforcement, the GP/NHS education accommodation and so on. Less opportunity (unless you want to flout the law, steal from a supermarket or use the public road network as your own personal race track cos the cops won't even turn up) and less people would be inclined to respect or care about a society or system which they feel doesn't value them.
Maybe not but it would at least get them off the streets for a bit and something is better than mouthing. The way I see it consequences won't deter if they're not severe enough and so many people are willing and able to break the law cos they're not scared of the potential repercussions.
bitofrock@reddit
Oh, I don't doubt it's worse than 20 years ago. And better than 40 years ago, which was the end of a pretty grim spell but then wobbled in the nineties. I was in agony but couldn't find a dentist to look at me, for example. I do think we're in a worsening phase, but I don't think it's quite the freefall some make it out to be. In 1989, for instance, both my motorbike and car got stolen within months of each other. Speeding then was very rarely prosecuted...the 40mph road by my house frequently had cars doing 80mph+ on it... something I rarely see these days and I do still use that road and came back to live in the same area.
HOWEVER... And this is important. The area I live in has been one of the biggest growth areas in the UK outside of London whilst also not having such huge levels of inequality. I think that's one reason why I might feel it's not changed much compared to others. I have anecdotal evidence and some real evidence to suggest some things are worsening but that things aren't as bad as they were in my youth.
If you live in an area that's suffering economic decline it's going to feel far far worse. As a country it doesn't mean it's going to the dogs but there are definitely system issues in need of improvement.
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
According to a report by CNBC car theft in the UK has increased around 75% in the last ten years and around 60% of those are keyless entry thefts. I live in an area where I frequently hear idiots revving engines and speeding on motorbikes and dirt bikes and even the odd quad bike quote frequently. Electric scooters are also fast becoming a problem you need all or at least some of the same documentation to ride them as you do a traditional car but I doubt any of these idiots have it. Speeding today often doesn't lead to a prosecution unless it's really fast or limited to other serious crime like drug dealing or car theft.
As stated previously I don't live in a similar area that you do, I'm in an extremely bad working class (ie shit hole) town where people flouting the law is an all too common occurrence. I've seen a slow painful measurable decline in the quality of life in my town and just more generally and it doesn't seem to be improving contrary to the pathetically shallow ramblings of those who claim to lead us but don't.
I'm seeing it first hand with respect pls count yourself lucky you are a resident in a place where it seems to be under control cos in many places gosod are more concerned with silencing those who might make some personal attacks on social media rather than dealing wiith crime in the real world.
bitofrock@reddit
I do think the police around here are pretty on the ball. I had the surprise of my life when, getting a new meter fitted, the house alarm went off. The front door was ajar because of the work and two policemen turned up asking who I was and if I could prove I lived in the house. Obviously not all crime gets stopped and you get the odd scrote (often a rehomed family from Liverpool) with dodgy parents who causes six months of pain but then they just disappear.
It may also be that being a rugby/tradie town that's at a sweet spot for size where people may not know you, but probably knows somebody who does means that you can't act like too much of an idiot and at the same time plenty of hefty men who don't mind a ruck. I moved here as a teen, moved out, decided it was a nice place to be and moved back. And oddly it's a rather post industrial working class town, but unemployment has been kept low so it's avoided the worst that I've seen in some of my other childhood places that I grew up in.
I'd suggest that the stats reveal it was much much much worse when I was young than today. Although we had a bump, the long term trend is good. Compare to my youth in the late eighties and early nineties.
Of course there are bumps. But last year alone car thefts dropped a little even if we're still stuck on a peak.
A key thing to remember, however, is that policing doesn't really stop crime. It's mostly a cultural thing. If little Timmy isn't dealt with by their parents when they steal something from a friend or nicks a Curlywurly then they're more likely to push their luck when they get a bike and before you know it they're on the nick a car for £500 a pop pathway. And you'd be amazed how weak and useless many parents can be.
Blame the underfunding of social services for the past decade or so.
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
Liverpool tbf has plenty of it's own problems like gang wars and gun crime. Wonder why those families got rehomed but you would wonder if they were on in need in some kind of criminal activity and there was like reprisals or something and that's why they got moved maybe.
I know plenty of guys round here would be happy to have a go of it but many of them are out of shape, take drugs, drink too much or are too busy otherwise just being a pain in the ass. I like in a town which used be famous for a very British industry but declined circa the 50s and never really recovered even tho that was way before my time and the budget cuts from the tories really didn't help matters either.
I'm in a town where burglaries have been known to happen here and there but in a more general sense throughout the wider society car theft defo seems to be rampant here than it maybe is in some other places
I would prefer to see it go down on the whole not just a bit here or there. There was also some talk that home burglaries are apparently going down cos preferred method is increasingly digital based attacks like hacking people's bank accounts and stuff like that which is often harder to deal with and doesn't mean the perpetrators have to physically attend a crime scene to commit a robbery and put themselves at risk of being caught.
Yeah I've seen firsthand how some parents just don't give a shit about raising their kids properly and then that has consequences for the rest of society further down the line when they come of age and don't have any respect for the local community or the law. Or how they're too weak and let their kids get away with shit because the parents are just a total pushover who let the offspring get his or her own way.
Chronic underfunding is one key driving factor potentially leading kids into a life of crime but it's also a number of other contributors such as lack of integration with the rest of society as a productive law abiding member of their community who have little concern with how their actions impact others.
BanjoSurprise@reddit
More serious crimes of all kinds? The stats don’t seem to back that up
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
Stats shouldn't blindly be taken at face value. A stat might tell you one thing but being a victim who's caught in the middle of it is a whole different story entirely and these figures don't do a very good job at actually describing how devastating even quote-unquote "minor crimes" can be on one's quality of life.
And ok the stats don't seem to back it up? Take rape or sexual assault - like what a single percentage figure gets reported and the actual convictions are even less, like 0.1% or something. Those are from official figures. Again, many people don't even bother to report it in the first place cos they feel the cops/justice system will fail them like they have so many others.
Finally minor crimes can easily turn into something far more serious. Like one guy gets drunk and tries it on with someone else's GF and that plus the booze and lack of inhibition leads to an altercation in which someone gets glassed in the face with a bottle or something and ends up being hospitalised. Like the saying goes prevention is better then cure.
BanjoSurprise@reddit
Of course they shouldn’t, but they’re a pretty solid indicator, especially in lieu of any other evidence.
Sexual assault seems a weird example to bring up, as it would stand to reason that it’s reported and recorded a lot more than even 10 years ago given people are a lot more aware of what constitutes rape and SA, and victims have been more emboldened to speak out.
Seems like you’re just working off your intuition
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
I guess that can be the case but sometimes the reliability with these facts is found to be sorely lacking.
It does seem that you were in fact mostly correct I did a bit of research and found this: https://www.cps.gov.uk/publication/cps-data-summary-quarter-3-2024-2025 hoefer one worrying star did say: Completed prosecutions decreased 1.9% from 1,166 in Q2 24/25 to 1,144 in Q3 24/25.
I'll admit I somewhat was but I've seen many TV programs about this where they always seem to quote reports of SA are less and actual prosecutions are going down and so on. Seems they were wrong, at least to some extent.
david9640@reddit
Per capita, the UK already has the highest prison population in Western Europe.
There's also very little evidence that locking people up reduces overall crime. Look at the United States, for example. They imprison 5/6 times as many people as us.
Prison isn't the *real* deterrent to crime, nor is the length of sentence - criminals often think they won't be caught. The deterrent is having an effective police service that solves crimes.
It's also worth noting that the dumb focus on a sense of vengeance/punishment of criminals, actually increases crime. If you lock people up in terrible conditions and treat them as less than human, then don't be surprised when they come out worse, and continue to commit crimes. The countries with lower rates of re-offending focus on showing people that they can be a better version of themselves, and transitioning them towards that.
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
You make some very compelling arguments but victims don't care about where their attackers end up, they just want them to be put in a place where they don't have access to cause them any more harm.
The US also has a population much bigger than the UK and a culture that I would argue is more innately predicated towards violence with gun ownership, greater legal protections around lawful self defence et al being a key factor so I don't know if we had the same demographics that we'd necessarily be any different.
The idea of consequences is as a deterrent right? If you don't fear the severity of any potential punishments doled out to you by the courts etc then you're more likely to commit crime as a result. It's not just the issue of not enough "bobbies on the beat" it's also the presence of a justice system which often woefully fails victims who then feel they've been left out to dry by the legal mechanisms that were supposed to protect them. Even if they are caught, chances are they won't face jail time. Just a suspended sentence and a fine.
Yeah I've seen stories of that with Norway being one of the leading nations in that regard - they have an extremely liberal approach to law and order but I don't know if such a system could be successfully implemented here. The emphasis is also on different national cultures which means such a system might not necessarily work here in Britain as it does in some other places. Plus, there remains the issue of bad optics - how will it look to the general public if they see their taxes are being spent sending potentially dangerous people back out into society where they can unleash even more devastation on the lives of innocent victims?
Finally regardless of whatever type of prison or judicial system a country has, the focus should be on prevention not dealing with consequences in the first place. Provide more funding, education and other opportunities for people to stay on the right side of the law outside of a life of crime that's where the money should be going and will likely have the biggest impact moving forward.
boostman@reddit
Blame the tories cutting public funds including to the police for over a decade. They no longer have the resources to actually do any policing.
Strict-Print-6048@reddit
That old chestnut.
My wife works in public sector procurement at a high level. The police, in fact, every single Governmental organisation and local authority, piss money up the wall in endless ways that people wouldn't even believe.
A recent example was a £57,000 supply of peanuts that no-one can remember ordering, no-one can remember authorising, and no-one has any idea what it's for. Just sat in a buying organisation warehouse gathering dust.
If you want a police specific one, how about one of the bigger forces sending back over £100,000 worth of uniforms because the Chief Constable didn't like the style of the buttons.
There is a fresh example of profligacy like this, every single week.
If you want the actual Home Office figures, police funding cuts never went higher than 15%, and funding has risen every year since 2015. In that time, it has risen 80% in real terms.
During the Tories 14 years in power, public spending went up in 13 of them.
All this information is openly available. Which makes me wonder why people like you continue to waffle nonsense.
-SidSilver-@reddit
>Which makes me wonder why people like you continue to waffle nonsense.
Translation: Shut up about the damage the Tories have done, I voted for them because I got mine but I feel guilty about it, so it couldn't possibly be them.
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
They did cut a lot of public services and remove thousands of officers from front line duty which only further makes it worse. They peddled the usual bullshit angle saying this forced austerity nobody wanted or agreed to "was necessary" over and over again yet it never helped those who were disproportionately affected by it the most which is the most vulnerable and worse off in our society.
durtibrizzle@reddit
I don’t agree. I think lowering the bar for life changing consequences is bad for society.
Obviously habitual offenders and those who do serious harm shouldn’t be allowed to continue regardless.
But young people doing what young people are primed to do - whether that’s scrapping or some other dumb shit - and being in the unlucky % of ginger caught shouldn’t be a permanent consequence.
Captain_Kruch@reddit
That's if they did anything at all. A mate of mine would regularly get into punch-up's when we would go for a drink on a Friday. After said bruising, he and the other 'fighter' shook hands and walked away. Police nowhere to be seen.
BednaR1@reddit
...or lack of it.
Dudebroguy10000@reddit
lol, good one
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
Apparently it did more than that: https://youtu.be/IV3dnLzthDA?si=1EZw1msIbcQ-HhiI
ThurstonSonic@reddit
This is true, the level of alcohol fuelled recreational violence in the 70s/80’s and early 90’s was massive, be it football, pubs or town centres after EVERYONE was kicked out of the boozers at exactly the same time. I was chinned in boozers 3 or 4 times before I’d even left school….
RecordingFamous4947@reddit
Which area were these pubs from the 90s in?
Round_Caregiver2380@reddit
Cornwall so probably one of the least dodgy areas of the UK at the time.
TywinHouseLannister@reddit
Cornwall is a local place for local people.. like the league of gentlemen lmao.
In my experience places like this are more scrappy, more big fish small pond syndrome going about, less fear of the unknown.
City centres, people tend to watch their lip a bit more.. that's how I see it anyway!
Drammeister@reddit
I’m from a small town in Derbyshire and they’d be fights break out quite often on the weekend. If you went into Derby there were fights pretty often at kicking out time on Saddlegate and the marketplace.
This was late 80s/early 90s.
gregd303@reddit
late 80's / early 90's is when ecstasy and rave culture came along countered the alcohol and violence you would face in pubs. Raves were peace and love (for a while) whereas pubs were like walking into wild west saloons.
Full-Veterinarian377@reddit
Still fairly often fights kicking off on Saddlergate when Blue note is kicking out.
BuckTeethedGirl@reddit
Oh wow, is the Blue Note still going? #happydays
CalmDrummer4181@reddit
Not rare where i live haha. Fight and sometimes glassing in my local every week without fail lol
turkboy@reddit
We used to be a proper country
MathematicianOnly688@reddit
Wow where did you live?
I've been pubbing since around 2000 and I could fight the number of fights I've witnessed on one hand.
guIIy@reddit
I’ve only been pubbing for 10 years and I’ve seen more fights than I can count, and I’m not even from a rough area.
English people are fighty.
Hedley_Lammarr@reddit
You saw frequent stabbings? Hmm
Cutterbuck@reddit
Drinking in London pubs at least twice a week in the late 90’s…. I would say a fight a month was common. Extreme violence to the level where multiple police would arrive, with an ambulance - at least three times a year.
guIIy@reddit
I mean, even less than 10 years ago I used to see at least one fight on a night out in a relatively posh southern town. Never stabbings though.
Dependent_Phone_8941@reddit
Nah mate, impossible, you are simply misremembering
Nothing bad happened in the past so it’s impossible you saw any fights or glassings or stabbings, the 90s was utopia
PrimaryCabbage@reddit
Well the 90s were a 1000x better than the 80s. I hated the 80s, going to a club then was hell.
Dudebroguy10000@reddit
lets not get started on the 70s.
waiting on the 60s guy now
orbital0000@reddit
Fucking hell, where'd you go out to see frequent stabbings and glassings?!
JohnyFeenix33@reddit
Good old days :) /s
Super_Matter_6139@reddit
Ah the good ol' days
nxcolecheshxre@reddit
I worked in bars and clubs for years in the SW and it was rarer to have a night with no fights, the night we opened after Covid a woman glassed someone in our pup and I remember thinking ah nothings changed then. However I’m starting to think I’m in a worse area than I’d previously realised
Fast-Concentrate-132@reddit
This. Also, as someone who lived in Old Trafford in the 90's, I can hand on heart promise that Manchester is absolutely nowhere near as rough now.
franki-pinks@reddit
Probably because most pubs are empty now
jungleboy1234@reddit
The dole money doesn't get you many pints as it used to.
walesjoseyoutlaw@reddit
Why
Snoo-84389@reddit
And hearing what they used to be like helps to explain why they are now empty...
Skitteringscamper@reddit
Unless you live in londanistan then it's daily
durtibrizzle@reddit
One to get the kids out for.
AlarmingLawyer3920@reddit
Because there’s less pubs and less pub goers now living into urban working class areas.
There’s actually more stabbing now in those areas, it just takes place elsewhere.
LightSwitch21@reddit
Go to the pub? In this economy?!
Minimum_Rice555@reddit
Perhaps changing petrol to unleaded solved that. It has been widely theoriticized that lead in petrol caused agression. NYC crime levels dropped "overnight" when they switched.
AppointmentTop3948@reddit
I grew up as rhey phased out leaded petrol, 10 years down the line, those kids that grew up without leaded petrol were still going out on a weekend and fighting.
People are very soft these days, they're told to be weak and go with the flow.
AJFxxxT@reddit
If by “overnight” you mean “in a generation” - then yes.
Vast-Heron8963@reddit
Just people getting macheted to death instead
BigDumbGreenMong@reddit
Stockport in the 90s was the same , although I do wonder how much of that was just down to being young. 18-25 year old lads out on the piss seemed to always be looking for trouble.
_Ottir_@reddit
I remember this vibe from the early to mid-2000s too. Most towns and cities, no matter where you ended up, you were guaranteed to see or get caught up in at least one proper brawl and it’s funny how normal that was.
H16HP01N7@reddit
There was a lad kicked to death outside a pub, in my (population 10k) village, in Suffolk, when I was about 15-16 (so, late 90sish).
The guy who was wanted for it, fled abroad somewhere, and afaik, never came back.
I don't think there's even been a notable fight in at least a few years.
Gildor12@reddit
Frequent? My god what pubs were you going in
bendan99@reddit
A tremendous, evidence-based, analytical assessment there. I assume you work in the public sector.
SkarKrow@reddit
A big contributor there is the general decline of alcohol consumption in millenials and especially gen-z.
I would say in the regard of things like pub scraps my town has gotten better, but has gotten grimier and there’s certainly more illicit drugs moving about. Whole place stinks of weed.
CityBanker57@reddit
Weed has the advantage that it doesn’t correlate with violence.
SkarKrow@reddit
It doesn’t, but it contributes to the place feeling rougher and grimier. I don’t really care if people want to use weed recreationally, but the town often reeks of it.
AnOtherGuy1234567@reddit
The number of pub fights has gone way down over the last 40 years. About the only thing keeping them still going, is cocaine.
Key-Willingness-2223@reddit
Not sure I think cocaine is that much of a factor, because cocaine is a not a class specific drug, but pub fights are.
If alcohol or cocaine correlated with violence, we'd expert to see it in similar numbers in upper class bars in the city of London, with all the coked up bankers etc, as we do in a pub in Birmingham with a bunch of coked up labourers.
Now, that's me pointing out that class disproves the correlation
I'm not saying that class is the key variable. And anyone who does think that kind of elitist crap can try and state it, but the data debunks it clearly.
Dudebroguy10000@reddit
i mean it's definitely related to do with class though.
don't get me wrong i'm not saying all working class people are violent. But i do think more of the violent people come from working class backgrounds.
I mean it makes sense, the more money you come from the less likely you are to risk legal trouble and drama over a fight down the pub.
Not to mention english white working class culture has this thing where it's considered almost cool for young lads to go out and start beating the shit out of each other on a Saturday night. When I'm in a club full of black lads (regardless of class background) I know I could get in a fight if i wanted but there is 9/10 times gonna be a reason the fight started where as if it's bunch of working class white lads i genuinely just get all sorts of random agg from people on a night out trying to egg you on to fight them.
It's 100% a cultural thing that says it's 'ok' to do that. I don't know why we have to act like it doesn't exist. Much the same way that there is clearly a gang culture among young black men in Londons rough estates. Or a culture of viewing women a certain way among young Asian men etc. etc.
Key-Willingness-2223@reddit
I don’t disagree that it exists
My disagreement is that it’s unique to them
I don’t know how many toffs, like actual toffs you know
But in my experience, the privately educated, rugby playing, boarding school graduates who are like 7th generation upper class, are also the kind who see fighting and getting into a scrap as a badge of honour and “cool” etc
Like the number of toffs I’ve met who will tell me some version of a story about their dad or teacher etc telling two lads to “go outside and settle it like men” is eye opening.
It seems to be the middle class who have an aversion to violence in that sense.
And I think it’s an optics issue in terms of reporting
Arthur and Rupert getting into a fight over Sophie doesn’t fit the elitist narrative of most journalists and politicians trying to paint poor people as bad and lowlife.
Same goes for how people think of smoking. You picture a council estate, working class person smoking a Marlborough
Not the private educated trust fund kid smoking a rollie on the way to the university formal
Otherwise_Living_158@reddit
Working class kids have never smoked Marlboro!
Key-Willingness-2223@reddit
Been my brand since I was 13 mate, back when you could get a pack of 10 for a couple quid
Otherwise_Living_158@reddit
Well you must have been doing very well for yourself
Dudebroguy10000@reddit
don't get me wrong it's not like posh lads don't fight. anyone could get in a fight when they're drunk or on coke or both.
and maybe you're right about the toffs but they are such a small part of this countries population that it doesn't really stand out to me. My experience of them personally has been that they are all talk, even the rugby lads. I've also seen them fight but they're not really on it like that the same way the rough lads are.
but to be frank it and to kind of summarise it. There is a very specific cultural behaviour i've noticed specifically among working class white english guys where they go out to get drunk and get in a fight and don't get me wrong its only a fraction of them that do this but it's enough to make your night out tense and you end up watching your back. They aren't hard to miss, cos they are going around being aggressive and generally being cunts, we all know what i mean cos it's standard practice for a night out in loads of parts of the country.
the key difference i've noticed between the white working class guys that makes them quite different from the Asian or Black working class, or even white middle class guys. Is that they seem to literally go out looking to fight for no reason, like they legit get a kick out of it, and they don't feel ashamed of it, like it feels acceptable to them, they celebrate it.
Where as with the other groups i mentioned, of course they get in fights, I've seen it too, but i have NEVER had them start on me or my mates for absolutely no reason, it's always something like you talked to their girlfriend, stepped on his shoes, something that makes sense that you can de-escalate, some sort of perceived disrespect.
The other group just want to cause trouble for the sake of it and they know they're being cunts and seem to think it's just acceptable behaviour for 3 of them to kick the fuck out of some guy for no reason.
Really pisses me off cos i've seen people get really hurt by people like this when they clearly didn't want to fight and it's nearly been me as well. it just seems like such a useless cultural norm that is completely unnecessary but we pass it off as 'lads being lads'. Much in the same way it's not lads being lads to grope girls on a night out, it's also not lads being lads to put batter someone with your mates and put them in a coma cos you're drunk and it's 'cool.
Hatanta@reddit
Interesting observation. You’re onto something - fights at broadly “black” events tend to be part of pre-existing problems (I’m not even talking about gang-related, I’m talking about “that’s my sister’s ex, never pays a penny for my nephew and he’s here flexing”) whereas “white” events are a lot more likely to be “what the fuck are you looking at”-type fights between two lads who didn’t know each other previously.
Grommmit@reddit
Drugs and alcohol make any class of person more likely to fight, they just have different baselines.
mata_dan@reddit
Yep, from what I've seen the violence is more related to debts people build up and the fact people who let them get into that debt are idiots too. There will be some general violence in the industry too which will be "outsourced" farther away from the wealthier customers, but that's again not the substance itself.
However, everyone I know who used to be a coke head is a total arsehole. They just cannot be a nice person anymore. So would other people me more likely to start violence with them? Probably.
Otherwise_Living_158@reddit
Good old cocaine! Let’s hear it for cocaine! Hip hip?
Icy_Zucchini_1138@reddit
I'm the same. Seeing fist fights etc was so normal growing up and not just 12 year olds but grown men. It would shock me now to see physical violence
OrangeLemonLime8@reddit
Honestly. I’d disagree. Rough people were way more rough years ago
Key-Willingness-2223@reddit
In which sense?
I remember seeing people step outside and knocking each other about in the 90s, occasionally it would spill over the other people get involved, someone might get bottled etc. but broadly speaking there was a kind of accepted practise to it.
Now, way less fights seem to happen, but the people who are up for a fight are really up for a fight. Like someone cutting the queue in a kebab shop and then instantly stabbing anyone who called them out on it.
OrangeLemonLime8@reddit
Ah, I kinda know what you mean but that’s probably because it gets more attention now?
I felt way more unsafe in the early 2000’s compared to now. Murder rates actually peaked in 2003. There’s actually fewer murders now than ever before.
Using 2003 as an example, there was 1450 murders that year with a population of 59 million. 2024 saw 570 murders with a pop of 69 million
Key-Willingness-2223@reddit
So what I’m saying is the number of people who are willing to be violent has gone down.
But the people who are willing to be violent now, are far quicker to resort to violence
That would explain all the stats
OrangeLemonLime8@reddit
Err, I disagree so nevermind
Key-Willingness-2223@reddit
If you don’t mind, I’m genuinely not trying to argue and I am actually curious about what you think
So which part of the assessment I made do you disagree with?
StoicLaddie@reddit
Absolutely spot on summary. Less likely to see violence on the streets these days but if there is violence it’s much more likely to result in a stabbing than just fisticuffs
Key-Willingness-2223@reddit
Can we all just stop to appreciate someone using the term fisticuffs, I haven’t seen that used in years and I love it
h00dman@reddit
My hometown looked like this since 1994, and preventively got even worse over the years.
I drove through there a few years ago when visiting relatives (I didn't stop to look around, desire being my hometown I have absolutely no nostalgia for the place whatsoever) and it had managed to look even worse than before.
Fuzzy_Cranberry8164@reddit
Went Blackpool a month ago for a stag do, the amount boarded up buildings and hotels, and clubs looking like they’ve been shelled. It was a sight to see.
gulfrend@reddit
To be fair this was exactly how Blackpool looked when I was there a decade ago too
No_opinion17@reddit
It wasn't like that 15 - 20 years ago, though.
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
Haha yeah my mate hates Blackpool says it's dogshit and we live in a quite a rough town not that far away. Probably best to avoid it at all costs if you're able.
Or to put it another way, there's shite and then there's Blackpool shite.
mollyProducing@reddit
Couldn’t of said it better myself mate
gapgod2001@reddit
Rough as in alot more antisocial behaviour that is getting more and more violent. Phone thefts and motorcycle thefts have become a norm in specific areas. Society in the UK is becoming a lower trust society.
Independent-Try-3080@reddit
Although the prevalence of 12 years olds gobbing off wearing balaclavas is up!
turbo_dude@reddit
Anyone would think that the UK prior to the 1980s didn't exist. This exact state of affairs happened before in the post war period.
It has not always been plain sailing.
snakeoildriller@reddit
Yeah, I've definitely noticed this more. I frequently drive through areas and just keep going rather than stopping for a look around. A lot of places seem to have an oppressive air with people just wanting to hurry along.
IIJamzyII@reddit
They mean the later
VadimH@reddit
Latter
IIJamzyII@reddit
Patter
Historical_Panda9701@reddit
Latte
EfficientAd4407@reddit
Living in the north of England yes but councils aren't helping it with random crap like relaying the roads Infront of their office. Scrapping massive local events that bring revenue in and replacing them with 20 forms of BS no one attends
Altruistic_Fox_8550@reddit
When there is an increase in poverty there is almost always an increase in crime . That along with crumbling court system. This is not in your head it really is getting worse
Stanley_OBidney@reddit
The 80s was 40 years ago for those saying things aren’t as bad as then. There’s no way UK cities haven’t gotten rougher than in the 2000’s or even 2010’s. The statistics back it up.
LondonMostly@reddit
Yes
Old-Efficiency7009@reddit
Small towns in particular have gotten worse I think.
Puzzleheaded-Ant9262@reddit
We live in a shit hole.
Special_Tree4327@reddit
Yes, in the sense that shared civic spaces such as city centres are increasingly degraded and decrepit. Homelessness, anti social behaviour and people with untreated mental illness are a feature of many city centres in a way they werent 15 years ago. I was quite shocked visiting manchester from scotland and seeing a homeless tent city built around the city hall.
It is a reversion to victorian wealth inequality. Cities are segregated by class and wealth. There are a couple of nice posh areas with trendy bars and restaurants, there are deprived estates within a 30 minute bus journey. The missing component in 21st century Britain is the city centre. The people who reshaped the country in the 60s had great ambitions for modern and innovative city centre design. Shopping malls, grand architectural projects, highways that would make access to these public spaces easy and foster economic growth.
This project failed. Instead there is ghettoisation by class, education and ethnicity. The result is that many city centres are pretty depressing whereas in the past "going to town" was quite a significant thing for people. There was a degree of glamour, you saw the city at its finest. Lamentably that is no longer true for many urban spaces. Instead, suburban people go to town and find it more dangerous, dirty and bewildering than their own neighbourhood.
Policing also is clearly an issue. Witnessing groups fighting in broad daylight or shoppers awkwardly avoiding a drug addict/mentally ill person threatening people with a busker singing nervously in the background during peak saturday shopping hours is not healthy. It would be helpful to have a few visible police patrols standing around
lesliehaigh80@reddit
Yes import the 3d world becomes the 3d world
DifficultSea4540@reddit
Crime is definitely higher Organised crime is massively higher
Classic-Gear-3533@reddit
No, but less people smile
Miercolesian@reddit
Most towns were pretty rough in the 1960s
Bumm-fluff@reddit
Complete societal breakdown because we are turning into a low trust society.
StrongLikeBull3@reddit
Things were way better when i was young. The summers were warmer, the days were longer, and the nights were lighter. All the teachers were taller too.
No_Potato_4341@reddit
Figures literally say the crime rate is only half what it was in the 90s. So no, its not getting rougher.
Hopeful-Climate-3848@reddit
I've reported crimes with video evidence, they don't appear on the police crime map.
The figures are horseshit.
Otherwise_Living_158@reddit
It’s not officially a crime if no-one is convicted of it
DeapVally@reddit
Figures don't necessarily tell the whole story. Back then police used to investigate most things, so reporting more minor crimes was far more common. Unless you're being murdered, or require a crime reference number for insurance, there's not a great deal of point reporting things these days. A lot of people won't bother.
drplokta@reddit
The British Crime Survey agrees that crime has fallen, and that's based on interviews asking about people's personal experience of crime, not on crimes reported to the police.
DameKumquat@reddit
Even that's not all - some crimes were totally ignored (domestic violence - 'sad, but nothing you can do' my mum told me growing up) or not even crimes (stalking, harassment, rape in marriage, grooming). So they weren't in the 80s crime stats.
And a lot of today's crime is down to having stuff worth stealing, which didn't happen then - no point mugging teenagers for an average of a quid.
Which makes it more of a disparity with 80s levels of violence. There used to be brawls in town centres every Friday and Saturday night, reliably. Doesn't happen now.
---solace2k@reddit
It's easier to get caught now.
Thomasinarina@reddit
That would be valid if the ONS (self report survey, so doesn’t involve police recorded crime) also states the same thing.
Savings-Maximum9549@reddit
Interesting. I didn’t know that. So that would assumingly include minor assaults or burglaries that went unreported?
SlaveToNoTrend@reddit
Nobody reports crime anymore. Total disconfidence in the police now.
Thomasinarina@reddit
That would be valid if the ONS (self report survey, so doesn’t involve police recorded crime) also states the same thing.
SlaveToNoTrend@reddit
So 30,000 people tells the story of 60-80 million?
Thomasinarina@reddit
Yes. That’s how sampling works.
SlaveToNoTrend@reddit
Isn't a true representation.
Thomasinarina@reddit
I don’t think you understand how statistical research works.
SlaveToNoTrend@reddit
I don't think you understand how innacurate statistical research can be.
gemunicornvr@reddit
Hey scientist here, it's not. We also do calculations for accuracy.
SlaveToNoTrend@reddit
And how do you do that? By adding the remaining population to that 30,000? If not use your eyes and ears and it'll soon become clear many now dont report crime, even shopkeepers have stopped reporting crime.
gemunicornvr@reddit
No that's not what you do, you literally calculate accuracy and then find the average.
SlaveToNoTrend@reddit
How can you possibly calculate accuracy if so many aren't reporting crime?
Isn't all the unreported crime assumed not to be a crime therefore giving a false average?
gemunicornvr@reddit
No, so two different types of statistics first off self reported reports. Where it's like a survey, so you are not taking it from public records. Then you calculate accuracy to try and account for things like people not being truthful ect.
Then on public record stats, you calculate for accuracy which can account for people who have made false reports or for people who have not reported ect.
SlaveToNoTrend@reddit
Ok thank you for your explanation. 👍🏻
gemunicornvr@reddit
Honestly if you don't and you publish your report you will be torn a new one by other scientists 😂😂. So during analysis you have to bring every possibility to the table to explain the results
gemunicornvr@reddit
You are calculating for all of those possibilities, if you don't do that some other scientist will come along and dissect your report.
When analysing data, generally you have to have to account and mention any possibility that could explain or disprove your results
gemunicornvr@reddit
Well there is self reported stats and stats that are taken from sources such as public records so it really depends on what we are talking about
---solace2k@reddit
As an engineer with a postgrad degree in maths, it is.
gemunicornvr@reddit
I mean yeah, stats aren't correct to the exact number, but it is data absolutely gives us accurate readings of trends
callisstaa@reddit
I don’t think you understand basic statistical concepts.
gemunicornvr@reddit
It is if it's a big enough sample size
---solace2k@reddit
That's how sampling works, and that's why stats are to be taken with a pinch of salt.
Tifog@reddit
Must be all the immigrants
i-am-the-duck@reddit
doing secret crime?
Tifog@reddit
You never see certain media correlate the very real drop in crime with rising immigration is my point.
i-am-the-duck@reddit
immigrants do appear to be disproportionately represented in crimes though
Tifog@reddit
Yes but they're not, just in certain media.
i-am-the-duck@reddit
statistically they are disproportionately represented in crimes
gemunicornvr@reddit
Do you have the actual report, so many stats are taken out of context from the original analysis
i-am-the-duck@reddit
i don't think it's controversial, there are systemic factors at play as well
Tifog@reddit
https://fullfact.org/immigration/are-foreign-nationals-leading-surge-crime/ Nope
Bdcollecter@reddit
13 September 2012...
In LEGAL only Migration your article is missing out on only a minor 10.4 million migrants. Nothing massive there, its only the entire population of London and Birmingham...
i-am-the-duck@reddit
that doesn't say that immigrants aren't disproportionately represented in crime
No_Potato_4341@reddit
I don't see how that's relevant to anything
wizzywoo22@reddit
I feel like the default position with other people in society now is hostility. I always think that whenever I go to the supermarket. Everyone is just on a mission and out for themselves with no consideration for others. So in the sense of society and manners yes I feel like it’s getting more rough.
Illustrious-Energy50@reddit
l stay in rural Dumfries and Galloway, couple moved up from down south love it for host reasons, they said supermarket shopping was a pleasure V down south as people there tended to be very aggressive in supermarkets and everything else, whats interesting is they said they say down south police have lost control and told them that.
Its nothing like that here, police on the ball and crime low
Mavisssss@reddit
Interestingly, it's the posh elderly people in my supermarket being the most aggressive and barging straight through you.
Otherwise_Living_158@reddit
Older people are getting properly narky, and they’re stronger and healthier now.
Illustrious-Energy50@reddit
They dont tend to have a bull x dog and a zombie knive useally !
whosthisguythinkheis@reddit
When they say police have lost control are they talking about stuff they saw?
Because I’ve noticed many measures of crime have been going down and down but sentiment went the other way.
Illustrious-Energy50@reddit
Yes, cops telling them can't wait to retire as hands tied race card and PC card. Crime increased and importantly the fear of crime has risen too. It's honestly nothing like that up here. A good way of putting it feels like the 1970s with no disrespect as an English person working up here told me . Yes modern problems have increased drugs etc but at a far lower rate. I think the community stronger and will tip off police and community will even react in some situations. You just won't get that down south, kids with big knives etc and the bottle to use them willy nilly. All rarer up here by some margin.
whosthisguythinkheis@reddit
Mate so this is a lie:
Which crime are they talking about specifically?
Because the numbers don’t back you up here for all crimes. A few have risen but only in the last 2-3 years slightly nothing crazy.
Spottyjamie@reddit
Agree about the rural parts but after the watershed dumfries and annan have a fair few idiots looking for trouble
Illustrious-Energy50@reddit
Yes probably but as a rule nothing too serious, perhaps don't hang about pub shutting time sensible be advice and they tend to fight with other local dafties to cement their reputation. Not a par on down south. Or central belt really.
Jolly-Minimum-6641@reddit
Maybe in your area.
Mr_Bo_Jandals@reddit
Glasgow? Really? The gentrification of the spreading into the east end has really changed the city. Dennistoun is now a desirable area, you’ve got the Merchant City, and east of that by the Barrowlands is rapidly changing with new construction and investment. Even on the south west of the city by Finnieston has seen major improvements over the past 20 years.
Now, I haven’t lived in Glasgow for a long time, but I do remember what it was like in the 90s, and can’t imagine it being anywhere near as bad as that.
OrangeLemonLime8@reddit
Mate trust me, I’d live in Glasgow over half the cities in England in 2025. I don’t know if you’re from Glasgow but hanging on to that 90s reputation isn’t worth it, let it go.
mata_dan@reddit
Yeah Glasgow police are notoriously a bit shite and often accused of being political. It's not like that on the East coast etc.
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
Haha went to see my friends mate who lives in Paisley like a week ago and literally a few days before we arrived she told us someone got stabbed around the corner not too far from where she lives.
gemunicornvr@reddit
Yeah it seems better now sometimes we would have to avoid certain roads when driving to highschool because petrol bombs
TremendousCoisty@reddit
Doing the big shop in Edinburgh is horrendous as well, can only imagine what it’s like down south
CrepuscularNemophile@reddit
Try being nicer to people while doing your shopping then. Sincerely, someone from 'down south'.
TremendousCoisty@reddit
Why are you assuming that I’m the problem? I’m not from Edinburgh, I’m from rural highlands. The difference in attitudes is night and day.
CrepuscularNemophile@reddit
My assumption about you is nothing when compared to your blanket assumption about people from 'down south'.
u/TremendousCoisty :
TremendousCoisty@reddit
My assumption that a much more busy and less friendly part of the UK has much busier shops? Yeah, what a mental assumption.
CrepuscularNemophile@reddit
There you go again.
TremendousCoisty@reddit
Well it’s true I’m afraid, sorry that’s offended you so much.
CrepuscularNemophile@reddit
You cannot seriously contend that an entire area of the country is 'unfriendly'. If you find that whenever and wherever you go 'down south' you experience people being unfriendly, then I'm sorry to say, but that really does point to you being the problem.
I grew up in the Midlands, went to university in Manchester, have lived in Surrey 33 years, have traveled around the country to stay family who live all over, and have worked across Europe. Most people everywhere are kind and friendly if you are kind and friendly yourself.
I am genuinely astonished that you can, metaphorically, wave your hand in a southerly direction and declare that everyone is unfriendly. That really is on you.
Illustrious-Energy50@reddit
It could be the arsey nature of Edinburghers lol
If u bumped into someone in a Glasgow supermarket then chances are they laugh and say its fine big man.
They saying the police kept clear of somalian drug dealers as they were almost always armed , armed police need called for a stop and if none available they got away with it lots time and the gangsters knew it he said pretty common.
One_Nectarine3077@reddit
I miss that term, "The big shop."
driven_user@reddit
Lol, aggressive in the supermarket. That couple are talking shit. Police are shit everywhere. You're comparing rural Scotland crime numbers to what? Sorry but nah that's all jibberish
Houseofsun5@reddit
I live between London and Scotland and have not noticed any difference in getting the groceries in Egham or the groceries in Prestwick. I don't see any higher aggression levels between the two places, just spent the weekend in Kent and my next weekend will be spent in South Ayrshire,.I expect the Waitrose/Sainsbury's/ Tesco and general retail experience will be much the same. The one thing I do notice is Scottish drivers are cuntishly shit at driving in heavy traffic, chill guys what you're experiencing is my day to day normal,.horns, not letting people out and trying to overtake isn't gonna help!! Learn to bloody zip merge!!!! I can see why there seems to be a strong traffic police presence around Scotland!
pigeonJS@reddit
So true
CeeApostropheD@reddit
Very well said - the default position being hostility. When someone is really kind these days it kinda catches me off guard and makes me think they could have become a friend in a different walk of life.
JennyW93@reddit
I always say “Hi, how are you?” Before I ask a receptionist/cashier/whoever for what I need. Usually it’s a completely unremarkable exchange.
Did it on Friday to a GP receptionist and to a cashier at Tesco and they both seemed so taken aback to the point where I genuinely started wondering if I’d said something offensive
MammothAccomplished7@reddit
Does seem a bit strange, bordering on American levels of niceness.
JennyW93@reddit
Oh god no. I don’t say it particularly cheerfully, at least. What do you say when you greet a cashier?
MammothAccomplished7@reddit
Hiya
JennyW93@reddit
D’y’know I’ve just realised I was wearing a Dollywood shirt on Friday, so you’re right - I probably was coming off American
ktitten@reddit
I'll counter this. I work in hospitality, and 95% of people I speak to are lovely and have manners. I'll rarely have an annoying customer, and if I do it's usually because of some miscommunication or they expect more for some reason.
And I'm small and often have problems reaching things in the supermarket, and people often help me out :)
slade364@reddit
I don't work in hospitality - I'm a recruiter, and everyone apparently hates us, but I'm treated respectfully by pretty much everyone. Can't remember the last time someone said something rude.
I think, in large part, people will aim to mimic how you're coming across. So if you're being treated like an arse on a regular basis, it's probably you. Sure some people are having a bad day, but we all have them.
StaticChocolate@reddit
Yes I’ve noticed if I go out of my way to smile and say hi to people I’m passing in the park or whatever, then generally they will do that back.
When I’m out running I typically say hi to most people or smile and nod, 95% reciprocate, some even initiate. When I’m walking though, I tend to have my head down as I’d rather not attract attention.
This probably seems a bit nonsensical, but I’m a small lady so I guess when I’m running I feel like I could get out of trouble and I’m normally somewhere on a hillside or something. Vs when walking I’ve got somewhere to be and wanting to avoid attention.
Illustrious-Energy50@reddit
Since Covid, all changed manners dropped, its the me me me society..
lm alright Jack and just stuff everyone else.
If you think back to Covid when it all started in supermarkets, perhaps you got the last milk and loaf and it was well l ok stuff everyone else as its every dog for himself..
Staff at local supermarket called terrible names, this has never really left, its still there, in people that are pushed will lash out verbally.
cryotekk@reddit
I strongly disagree, I come across far more friendly and polite people than I do rude and hostile ones. I work in hospitality, so I see a lot people everyday. Sure we get rude people, but for every one of those, there are 100 people who are friendly, make small talk, have a laugh, and are polite.
I think people spend too much time online and think that what they see there actually reflects the real world, it really doesn't.
Kind-Enthusiasm-7799@reddit
Manners cost nothing, you are exactly right and the aggression is not confined to solely supermarkets either.
Something has gone terribly wrong with our society since they shut the world down and social media has eroded ours and our children’s futures.
HiddenFolder1@reddit
Except it isnt like that in other parts of the world. Every supermarket, high street and public place in the UK feels like a hostile place filled with coke up wankers
slade364@reddit
I dont think that's true, tbh. Birmingham has quite an endemic coke issue, but if you walk down the high street or go to Tesco, it's not full of coke heads. They're normally in pubs or bars, popping to the toilet every 20 minutes, distressed when their gear runs out.
In fact, the thing people hate the most about central Birmingham is the religious preachers using sound systems to inform the public they're going to hell.
slade364@reddit
I think headphones are a big factor here. So many people are in their own world 24/7 unless they're with friends or at work, they wouldn't here you if you screamed at them.
And I count myself in this. When I commuted on the train, I'd have headphones on from the moment I left the house until I walked into the office.
JayR_97@reddit
Yeah, it's like people forgot how to behave in public since lockdown
TurnGloomy@reddit
This is the culture of poverty. Where crime is rife the smart thing is to look threatening so as not to be a victim. Do this long enough and it becomes your standard demeanour. Racists like to claim it's religion or race that drives this but its just poverty. Glasgow in the 80s/90s - exactly the same vibe. The parts of Reading that you avoided in the 90s, ditto.
Breeny04@reddit
I often think similarly, but I was pleasantly surprised by the Warhammer shop in London the other day. All the staff there were some of the nicest shop workers I've spoken to lol.
TurnGloomy@reddit
This is the culture of poverty. Where crime is rife the smart thing is to look threatening so as not to be a victim. Do this long enough and it becomes your standard demeanour. Racists like to claim it's religion or race that drives this but its just poverty. Glasgow in the 80s/90s - exactly the same vibe. The parts of Reading that you avoided in the 90s, ditto.
AshenArcher91@reddit
I don't think its hostility, more self-centered obliviousness...
The supermarket, for example, I always see kids running around screaming and bumping into people with the parents stood nearby not giving the slightest fuck. That's not hostility, they just can't be arsed to deal it.
Similarly I always see people just suddenly stopping in the middle of an aisle blocking the entire thing instead of just moving to one side. Or people walking 3-abreast and just blocking the entire aisle then not moving aside when someone wants to pass. Or people turning out of an aisle pushing a massive trolley of stuff without even looking first and almost bumping into someone.
All these things make me shudder when I think that these people are more than likely about to jump into a car and drive home, when they can't even drive a trolley without hitting someone, but I wouldn't think of these things as hostile. Just self-centered and oblivious behaviour.
bottle-of-sket@reddit
Things used to feel so much more hostile.
When I started going out drinking 15 years ago, the amount of fights I'd see was higher, being out late generally felt more threatening. I actually feel like things are a lot less rough today
Iamthe0c3an2@reddit
Depends where you are, tends to be truer in cities than in the countryside
ReaceNovello@reddit
Well, the wealth gap is growing.
Fantastic-Emu991@reddit
From memory it was rougher in the 1990s. Significantly so. At least in Manchester - maybe it’s just that Manchester has got better?
Some northern towns I’ve visited have always been rough.
WolfPuzzled@reddit
I was in Manchester for a concert yesterday, we stopped at McDs at Wall Way (according to payment location). It was rough in there, oh, my, jeez, it was dirty. I was amazed people was sat eating inside like it was normal to be that gross.
SwimmingOdd3228@reddit
Yes. Massive EU immigration from the roughest and poorest parts of the EU. Some like the Polish have integrated well and others will take several generations
Apart from that 30k illegals comprising of poor newly urbanised in their country people.
And ofc all that immigration knocking onto every place in the UK where previously most places were not this "diverse"/full of drugs and have become a new market for EU and other criminals like how Europeans felt seeing the Americas
1Marmalade@reddit
I’m British. Lived in the uk until I was 22. I’ve been in the states for 25 yrs. I’ve visited the UK many times since.
THE UK is rougher. Dirtier. Poorer. More graffiti. More litter. Fewer well-dressed/stylish people. More obesity.
I didn’t realize hot big the difference was until visiting Ireland - where in writing from. Ireland is -as far as I’ve seen in 8 days traveling - almost free of litter, homelessness, graffiti, loutish behavior, public intoxication, the stench of urine. The houses along our long journey are almost entirely well-kept, clean with neat gardens. Idyllic. Enviable.
It’s all quite familiar (looks a lot like Cornwall, Devon), but more like how I remember the from the 80’s-2000.
Anyway, just my observations.
Becci92xo@reddit
You have to be high or trolling
1Marmalade@reddit
Just giving a disinterested honest opinion. Sorry it doesn’t agree with yours. Here’s some data from chat GPT to help raise my opinion into more palatable data. I know you’ll not like this, so I included references.
🇬🇧🇮🇪 UK vs Ireland: Economy, Homelessness, Poverty, and Social Strain (% of population, 2023–2025)
📈 GDP per capita: – UK: ~$54,950
– Ireland: ~$107,243 (95% higher, but inflated by multinationals)
🏠 Homelessness (% of population): – UK: 387,600 people → 0.57%
– Ireland: 15,580 people → 0.30%
– Children make up ~31–33% of the homeless in both countries
– UK had 155 rough sleeper deaths in 2023 (+42% from 2022)
💷 Poverty: – Relative poverty: UK 21% vs Ireland 19.2%
– Child poverty: UK 31% vs Ireland 15.2%
– Working poor: UK ~13% vs Ireland ~10%
– Consistent poverty: Ireland 6.7% (UK doesn’t measure this)
🚨 Anti-social issues: – UK: increasing street deaths, encampments, ASB orders
– Ireland: rising housing strain, but fewer public signs of disorder
Sources:
– UK Parliament, JRF, ONS, Irish CSO, SEAI, The Guardian, The Sun (Ireland), Eurostat, IMF, Wikipedia, FT
Becci92xo@reddit
A few public signs of disorder like burning down houses and kicking doors in looking for immigrants. Also no one is reading your chat gpt nonsense
1Marmalade@reddit
I’m only comparing my 22yrs in the uk until 2000 to how it is each year when I visit. I’m sorry if that wasn’t clearer.
I’m also sorry the objective offered data upsets you.
Jolly-Minimum-6641@reddit
So what parts of the US have you been in? Because I can give you plenty of examples of this in the US.
1Marmalade@reddit
I’m not comparing to the US That isn’t what this thread is about. The question is about whether the UK has become rougher over time.
Jolly-Minimum-6641@reddit
But you were comparing to the US.
1Marmalade@reddit
I mentioned being away for 25 years to highlight how I’ve seen the uk change.
I see how that was not clear now.
I could talk at length about US/UK comparisons, but that’s for another day.
One-Constant420@reddit
It sounds like you have only been to nice parts of rural Ireland. Quite large areas of Dublin, Cork and Limerick are rough as fuck. Dublin also famously has quite a serious homelessness problem.
I lived in Ireland for 8 years, wouldn't even think about moving back. The UK is a superior place to live in just about every sense.
1Marmalade@reddit
I appreciate your perspective. Yes, I’m not choosing to visit indigent areas on vacation. I’m sure there are all too many. However, statistics to lend credibility to my observations, as I show in a reply to someone earlier.
Ireland is considerably more lovely than I’d anticipated. I honestly thought it was going to be the rough place vs the uk.
No-Cow-9571@reddit
Are you certain you’re not in Iceland?
1Marmalade@reddit
Iceland is lovely. But definitely Ireland. I wasn’t expecting to be this charmed. It’s just lovely.
Outside_Ad_3679@reddit
Peoples opinions and definitions of rough vary but I’d say so. Many more areas are becoming dilapidated up north and even in the ‘oh so glorious’ London petty theft is rampant with a complete inability for law enforcement to do anything
Background-Unit-8393@reddit
Dude I live in fucking Myanmar for work and parts of Myanmar are significantly less rough than parts of the UK. Especially the hospitals fuck me NHS hospitals look worse than hospitals in the third world sometimes.
Anxious-Molasses9456@reddit
having a military running the country that freely jails people will do that
Son_of_Mogh@reddit
Next people will be using Duterte's police summary executions in the Philippines as an example of how things are better outside the UK.
Background-Unit-8393@reddit
The government has nothing to do with it. I can sit in a coffee shop outside in Yangon and enjoy the weather and see less trash and homelessness and drug addicts than in parts of the Uk
MammothAccomplished7@reddit
Dont know about Myanmar, it's not really on my list of places to visit. But whenever I see other places around there on documentaries, news etc it's shit central for rubbish. Vietnam, Cambodia, Laos Phillipines, Indonesia, even Malaysia.
Background-Unit-8393@reddit
Used to live in Saigon. Downtown Saigon is clean and developed as fuck now. Sky rises and huge malls. Much more so than the north of England. Spotless in many places
Upstairs-Hedgehog575@reddit
The best parts of anywhere will look better than the worst of another.
Is that a state hospital or private?
MagnificentBollocks@reddit
I love that country. Only been once but it made a mark. I’ll go back one day.
Background-Unit-8393@reddit
Indeed. Myanmar is an incredible place to live and the people are so wonderful. Shame what’s happened to them.
EasternFly2210@reddit
What are the other parts of Myanmar like?
Sinister_Grape@reddit
Liverpool city centre is starting to get grimy and a little tattered round the edges again which isn’t a good sign really, and the litter, my God, the litter everywhere.
All symptomatic of an unhappy, ropey country.
od1nsrav3n@reddit
Couldn’t agree more. The city centre is becoming an absolute shithole.
The rest of the city is crumbling Old Swan Tuebrook, Anfield, Everton, Wavertree and Walton are absolutely minty. The rubbish and litter in Tuebrook is genuinely alarming.
MammothAccomplished7@reddit
Tuebrook has changed beyond recognition the last 15-20 years, I dont remember it being that bad when going the market or car auctions up until 2005-ish. Anfield is always a bit minging as it seems a bit of a ghost town whenever the match isnt on, local roads subserviant to the club rather than being places of their own when you see the old derelict clubs, halls and churches. I still find the city centre to be clean and tidy.
GetYourRockCoat@reddit
I visited Liverpool for the first time this weekend and did not see this at all. The back alley clubs etc seemed a bit rough but overall it looked lovely and very heavily invested in.
Only thing I would say is it absolutely stunk of weed everywhere I went. Didn't matter if it was lunch time when we arrived, out for food in the late afternoon or out out in the night. Never more than two minutes from a massive waft of bud q
FoxesFan91@reddit
I walked through Liverpool yesterday from the ferry terminal to Lime Street and I found the amount of litter and the number of seemingly destitute people very noticeable
GetYourRockCoat@reddit
Fair enough. Saturday night was heaving everywhere and I imagine the mess afterwards is remarkable.
CaptainHindsight92@reddit
I visited Liverpool and thought, man if this city was clean, it would be a really nice place. Sadly, I have watched Nottingham go the same way, it is now nearly always filthy in the city centre. Anecdotally, it seems cities like Newcastle and Edinburgh are able to keep them a lot cleaner, but I don't know what they could be doing differently.
No_Potato_4341@reddit
Liverpool is far better than it used to be.
Gwladys_Street_Blue@reddit
I feel like it is, I was fishing in Preston yesterday and had to listen to the constant noise of off road motorbikes, at one point saw a group of about 20 lads on them riding on a footpath, ended up leaving early after speaking to some locals that said things like “you’re not leaving your car there are you?” and “make sure you’re away before dark” another angler told me how he had be threatened multiple times and was shot at by lads with air rifles, I don’t remember this being the way we had to live our lives 20 or 30 years ago!
Fragrant-Anybody5899@reddit
any bites?
Gwladys_Street_Blue@reddit
Locals or fish? 😂
Fragrant-Anybody5899@reddit
either?
OrangeSodaMoustache@reddit
My dad says stuff like this, and I'm not having a go - just playing devil's advocate, but I always hear stories from my Dad's generation about driving Mum's mini at night, 4 lads in the back, squeezed in with no seatbelts, shooting air rifles in the woods, swapping parts on their motorbikes to make them faster when they were 16. Kids haven't changed, they've always been free-spirited/psychopaths, you just grew up.
Gwladys_Street_Blue@reddit
I understand where you are coming from, when we were younger we had 7 people in a Metro 😂 and we all had air rifles and went shooting in the woods, what we didn’t do was vandalise/break into cars, shoot at people or threaten people with violence that we met while we were out. We knew the consequences of our actions and we were afraid of the police, that’s what had changed, also when we were doing these things we were aged 14-18, we all then grew up, I’m seeing men in their mid 20’s behaving like this, we had kids and mortgages to pay at that age. (Old man/Gen X rant over) 😉
OrangeSodaMoustache@reddit
Fair point! I was thinking about the general stuff that could be seen as anti-social rather than the actual crime.
ShefScientist@reddit
in the mid 2000's I went to look at a flat in central Manchester and a car slowed down whilst the teenage son took potshots at me with an air rifle. Didn't rent that flat.
No_Potato_4341@reddit
Preston is like the prime example of a dump in that area. There's other places that are much nicer nearby.
bowak@reddit
Depends which bits. Large areas of Preston are absolutely fine. We have some seriously nice parks too.
swan--song@reddit
I work in and around Chorley, it's nice! Loathe going to Preston!!
Illustrious-Energy50@reddit
Preston is where the problems tend to change l have been told this before, any further North you dont really get this in places perhaps but rare..
Lancaster different altogether then up Penrith Kendal even Carlisle not as rough
JAD4995@reddit
I think many towns are rough because a lot of towns and cities used to be based around one industry (manufacturing, steel, mines, etc.), and when those jobs left the town, they never had a real industry replacement for the jobs lost.
Therefore, many businesses and the areas suffered, which is why lots of towns are rough. This is similar to Detroit and many of the Midwestern cities in the United States.
throwawaygoof9@reddit
I think we tried to move to a high education service economy, but as the brits usually do, we forgot that working class people will still exist. And those people will still need jobs too.
JAD4995@reddit
True I also think making all the major industries based in and around London was a mistake. Canary Wharf could’ve easily been centred around another city similar to how Germany have Frankfurt as their financial capital.
random23448@reddit
No, it couldn’t. Canary Wharf only exists because the City ran out office space when banks (and other professional services firms) needed a lot for more space for their operations.
It would have been impossible to move to an entire workforce from London to other cities. Most banks would of would just stayed put.
JAD4995@reddit
I’m just saying as an example not in principle. Just saying for these rough towns there should’ve been a push to move jobs with particular industries to their area to help with the regeneration. Incentives could’ve been used to push businesses to relocate to these places.
BobbyP27@reddit
There have been government initiatives of all kinds to push jobs out of London to other towns and cities for easily 40 years. The problem is industries that actually make money based on educated workforces benefit massively from the concentration factor of a large conurbation. Companies want to be in London because their suppliers, their customers and their pool of potential employees are all in the London area. The downside of not being located in the same urban area as all those others is massive, so there is a huge disincentive to them for moving out.
Admirable-Chip-174@reddit
There's been plenty of incentives.
Companies just don't want to move there.
Admirable-Chip-174@reddit
Canary Wharf was being developed in the 80s at a time when everyone wanted out of London.
Yes, there was still more work around there at the time, but London was still somewhat livable on a low wage.
Things really started getting out of hand in the late 2000s. Too much cheap money looking for a use.
throwawaygoof9@reddit
100%, they forgot that there is a whole country aside from London. In my area we have basically no decent jobs. You either work in the new mega prison or you work in some shit dead end job.
scoschooo@reddit
Why is the UK government letting that happen - poverty and no jobs outside London? Is it that UK leaders don't care about this - care more about the rich and helping businesses? (I have no idea).
Why is the government not able to raid the standard of living in the UK?
slade364@reddit
London has tech, finance and consulting. But plenty of major industries lie outside of it.
Engineering & manufacturing - Mids, NW, Yorkshire
Pharma/life sciences - Oxford / Cambridge, NW
Logistics / shipping - port cities, east mids for freight
Agriculture - anywhere but london
Energy - nuclear sites, Aberdeen O&G, Yorkshire wind
throwawaygoof9@reddit
The engineering and manufacturing thing for the midlands is not true. They closed down most of the factories and replaced them with a job centre and uber eats driving.
slade364@reddit
Might not be as large as it was, but that's largely driven by automation, and the fact we can do things more efficiently without 10,000-person production lines.
The point also stands that it's a major UK industry outside of London.
Automotive in particular is incredibly Midlands-centric. OEMs with R&D or manufacturing presence: JLR, Toyota, AML, Lotus, LEVC, Polestar, Dennis Eagle, BMW. Probably over 200 1st/2nd tier manufacturers between Brum & Cov alone (educated guess here, don't have the data.
In fact, the UK has more R&D centres for automotive than most countries in Europe.
Curiousinsomeways@reddit
Since cities began the major gain is from activity clustering. The UK has created all sorts of disasters trying to push businesses away from the location that works best for them. There was no "making" when it came to firms choosing London, it's that it's location is better suited to modern business - hell there were forecasts telling us that joining the EEC would hit our regions.
dotelze@reddit
Germany has had a very different history with a much more recent unification and then being split in half again. Canary Wharf would’ve never worked in a different city as the banks wanted to stay in London, but the city was running out of space for them
Ambry@reddit
It was a fucking disastrous policy. Not actually being able to manufacture much has had insane implications to this very day. Plus, when cheaper countries start to offer their services (see IT in the Philippines, India, etc) the temptation is to outsource for less money.
Prestigious-Gold6759@reddit
I don't the the working class were deliberately forgotten, the Government just didn't/doesn't care.
Green-6588_fem@reddit
Newport South Wales UK, is like that, used to be wealthy but never recovered from the end of coal industry. So much poverty and people living off benefits!
WRA1THLORD@reddit
I remember being sent to work in Newport for a week about 10 years ago to cover someones holidays by a company I worked for. I asked the regional manager if he had any advice and in complete deadpan he replied "id take a stab vest". I thought he was joking, and then I got there. Only about 1/5 shops on the high street were even open, and most of the ones that were open were bookies and dodgy cheap takeaways.
I can only imagine how bad it is now
OrangeLemonLime8@reddit
Basically half of northern England and a bunch of Wales
Digital-XAU@reddit
UK inequality is out of control.
Docxx214@reddit
Compared to the 80s and 90s, the UK is a paradise. The people who are saying yes clearly did not live in those decades.
Frequent_Bag9260@reddit
There's been a noticeable lack of punishment for petty crime and unsocial behaviour in the UK, in my opinion. Lack of investment, fear of repercussion, whatever it is, it's made life worse particularly in London.
berejser@reddit
No. And in my experience the people who will tell you that it is are also the same people who will tell you there is a crisis in masculinity and we're all getting more wussy and feminine, so they're probably not worth listening to.
deanotown@reddit
Yes it’s a sht hole. There are more families bringing their kids up like sht, which in turn make their kids sht and very few break that cycle.
It feels like the Gaza Strip in some parts of the north and immigration is out of control.
kylehyde84@reddit
I live in a post industrial northern shithole. It's got progressively worse in terms of how unkempt it is, especially the terraced areas near the town centre
coffeewalnut08@reddit
Post industrial here too, I honestly wouldn’t even find my area that bad if it was at least kept clean and tidy. People make the public spaces messy and dirty, and it’s such a turn-off.
TurnGloomy@reddit
IMO there is a VERY simple solution to the littering that seems to infested British culture. There's cameras everywhere anyway so caught littering, even allowing something to spill out of a full bin rather than take it home. £1000 fine. Camera holder gets half, council gets the other half. The problem would go away so quickly and its a money earner for councils. It works for speeding, why not littering. I lived in Croydon for 6 years, some lovely areas but the litter got to the point we left. Don't want to bring my kid up in a depressing environment.
Burned_Flame@reddit
Right Intention, poor idea. Would quickly lead to hostility between neighbours, neighbours surveillance. WE have 1 bellend on our cul de sac who's camerad up to fk and thinks he owns the place, surveilling everyone and questioning everyone about everything. It's extremely frustrating and has ruined the social fabric of our cul de sac. Imagine everyone was like that? Would be a horror show.
TurnGloomy@reddit
Oh I didn't mean in residential areas hahaha. I meant public spaces. Yeah residential would encourage the worst people ever. 'Er Gary your bin seems to have lost a hula hoops wrapper, I'm afraid I've let the council know and sent in the clip. It's nothing personal.' Doesn't the US have a nightmare with this stuff with housing associations?
jtodd128@reddit
I feel like if you fined people for stuff falling out of a full bin, it would be taken as bad faith and would result in vandalism of the cameras similar to ulez
12EggsADay@reddit
Where are we failing in our society that littering is considered okay? It is depressing that we can't follow basic functions.
TurnGloomy@reddit
I'm from Reading originally, then lived all over London for a decade before buying a one bed in Croydon and then moving to Horsham in Sussex for our family home. It's a cultural issue as well as poverty driving a 'protect yourself' attitude where everyone else is a potential enemy.
EasternFly2210@reddit
Notice anything about the demographic?
Euphoric_Raisin_312@reddit
Very white in my case
kitaj19@reddit
Are you saying York is rough?
Warm_Sail_7908@reddit (OP)
No areas I’ve been in York definitely aren’t rough. I’m saying I’ve only ever visited areas like York, Cotswolds etc and I live in what I know realise to be an above average area and as a result been under a bit of an illusion that majority of areas are of a similar standard. This year though I’ve made an effort to visit more places and found out that is definitely not the case.
kitaj19@reddit
Oh! Right! Thankyou for clarifying ❤️
aktivist007@reddit
It’s rough because people don’t care about anything anymore. People can blame bad economy and the government. They also blame the immigrants, they blame the lower classes, they blame the riches and they blame the middle classes.
To me self-respect and self-discipline are crucial to maintain a functional society.
People always praise counties like Japan is safe and clean; and funny enough being very shocked that counties like Poland is actually very clean and peaceful. Not long ago a lot of clever Brits think the Poles took away their jobs; now a lot of them have returned to Poland, actually having a better life than most of the Brits in 2025.
Pricks are everywhere, I feel like when people don’t have dignity to just do the basics and have considerations over the others, we wouldn’t have what we see now. Living in a low crime and clean society isn’t a middle class/ posh thing if people care enough to just act normal.
Again, people love blaming everyone but themselves.
Savings-Maximum9549@reddit
I felt safe walking around at night in Poland. I felt very safe walking around at night in Germany and Spain. I even felt safe walking around at night in the US as long as I avoid dodgy areas.
In the UK, even during the day, I fear low level crime all the time. Wastemen threatening me with their skateboard for no reason at all, some woman with her out of control dog verbally abusing me for telling her to control it or children throwing milkshakes at pedestrians.
Here’s the thing though: you can’t fix people’s attitudes. These are predominantly working class people who grew up with a “I’ll do as I please” attitude. The only thing you can hope for is to push education on them, make sure they become wealthy and hope that in a generation or two they grow out of it.
In any of the aforementioned countries the crime rates may actually be higher but even children in the US are usually much better behaved than in the UK. It feels safer as well because (I assume) people will fear the consequences. Messing with the wrong person may get you shot/maced/roughed up in other countries. In the UK there’s a high threshold to call the police, probably because many crimes aren’t actioned further. This will lead to burglaries or assaults be underreported. Other countries take any crime seriously and will send out officers for even the most minor crime AND actually prosecute.
Tl;dr: It’s a mess.
aktivist007@reddit
People aren’t punished when they commit crime; people aren’t being called out when they behave badly; the most importantly the good aren’t rewarded when they do well, instead they’re punished in so many different ways. This is how one crates a dysfunctional society.
Not just the super rich are leaving the U.K. with their assets; the middle class are considering to follow as well. To be honest the middle class is true backbone of a country, they’re educated, skilled and self-sufficient. The poor simply can’t afford to leave, mentally, financially and physically.
I feel like people have lost their patience here; the clock is ticking.
It’s such a shame to see how Britain becomes what we are now. Rough/ dodgy places aren’t the root of problem but the surface. People have lost the meaning of being a Brit, they don’t see a future here, they don’t see themselves as a Brit, they hate this British identity, they don’t see the value in Britishness.
People make Britain. It’s such a shame to see people only see one side of history, it’s a shame for people not feeling they can be British with dignity or even pride.
Why would they respect their surroundings when they don’t see the point of cherishing it?
It’s really a shame.
Savings-Maximum9549@reddit
I’m not originally from the UK but from another Western European country. People from my country usually do think that the UK is on par with other high income countries so you can imagine the culture shock sometimes. I still like it here and this country still has so many things that are better than many other high income countries but I completely agree with you that it feels like a ticking time bomb in some ways.
But walking through (especially Northern, including all of Scotland) cities makes you feel like you are in some weird 2nd world country. I don’t get why people litter so much here, you’d almost certainly get yelled at if you did that in public elsewhere. Let alone the homelessness and other issues.
ShefScientist@reddit
It was a lot worse in recent history. When I went to university in Manchester 90% of people I knew were violently mugged - including being kidnapped at knife point to hand over card pin (released on extraction of cash), knocked out when assaulted from behind with metal poles walking home at night, house burnt down by burglars, approached by machete wielding mugger at a phone box etc etc. Having been back it actually feels far safer than in those days at night.
Savings-Maximum9549@reddit
That wasn’t my experience at all. I’ve heard a lot about burglaries and one case of people trying to mug someone but apart from that I thought it was pretty safe. That was only a few years ago though.
ShefScientist@reddit
This was more than 20 years ago. Which I think proves my point that it is far, far safer now.
Savings-Maximum9549@reddit
Oh yeah I had heard it being referred to as Gunchester!
ShefScientist@reddit
and the year before I moved there a large part of the city centre was destroyed by an IRA bomb. Another reason its safer now - there is basically no chance of a city centre being bombed, whilst in the 1980's and 1990's this was not unusual in England.
---solace2k@reddit
The sad thing is historically we were not just "on par" but superior.
Savings-Maximum9549@reddit
I did have the impression you were superior prior to coming here. I thought you were second to the US. You still enjoy a lot of good reputation from much of Europe as well as jealousy because the UK traditionally did its own thing and managed, refusing to go with the rest of the EU. I really like it here and this country has so much potential. I just think it’s unlikely anything will be done about it. Cities like London and Manchester are great (in general) as long you avoid dodgy areas but everything else is on a lifeline and is just funded enough to barely function. I also can’t wrap my head around how all of Scotland managed to just turn out rough. Edinburgh city centre apart (which is just touristy and not a real representation of Scotland) all other major Scottish towns appear rundown. Although maybe Dundee is about manage to turn the tide around with their investment in the city centre.
---solace2k@reddit
Last 15-20 years here it's been massively downhill. I do agree it's a shit hole now.
Honest-Squirrel6877@reddit
british people dont have pride anymore because they get arrested for waving union jacks while its fine to fly hamas flags. (inb4 muh reform propaganda, ive not started disbelieving my own ears and eyes). and yes, to an extent it is immigrants at fault. i find it bizarre they flee "oppressive, terrible countries" then proceed to trash the ones they flee to.
Top-Weakness-9316@reddit
I think the decline in policing and law and order is a big part of it.
There’s a general perception now that the old bill just aren’t going to do anything except issue you a crime number for insurance.
Security won’t physically stop a shoplifter.
Kids can kick off at school and the parents back them up rather than the teaching staff.
GrandMasterBash@reddit
This. Dignity, dignity, dignity. I see it in all areas regardless of race/migrant status. Where people take pride and do things off their own back and concentrate on the positive, things improve. Waiting for others, blaming others, not taking action, 'admiring' problems aka talking about them without doing anything - that's where many choose to dwell and it manifests physically.
gregd303@reddit
Absolute truth. I inadvertently moved to Poland ten years ago. It's safe, clean, and core things like transport etc actually work. It makes your day to day life feel better. Like you say, people in UK don't care and blame anything but themselves . Here there's more of a 'tow the line' mentality, rather then individualism en mass. Strong family connections and community help, and you never see bad behaviour or trashing stuff just for the sake of it. There's just general respect, and that goes a long way.
I almost don't want to touch the immigration button, but there isn't that problem here, and it's only in the past year, say that there's noticeable foreigners around. Who knows if that will change things over time , but for now Poland is a great place to live. Cleanliness, safety, and things actually working, go a long way to overall satisfaction and wellbeing.
Jennifersausage@reddit
15 years of Tories does that to northern towns.
One_Nectarine3077@reddit
You should have been around in the 80s and early 90s. You'd shit your pants. Before the gentrification trend, things were awful, and not "we're ironically poor," rather more a "candles are a food source" level of poor.
Jolly-Minimum-6641@reddit
Even 40 years ago, places like Brixton still had people living whole families to a single room and cooking on the communal landings.
TheDawiWhisperer@reddit
I went to Brixton to see Iron Maiden a depressingly long time ago (it was about 2001 i think) and i don't think i've ever seen a more depressed looking area, it genuinely looked like a slum, every shop had the windows boarded up or kicked in and was covering in graffiti, homeless people rooting through bags of rubbish for scraps...it was horrible
charleydaves@reddit
Got lost in Brixton coming back from mates in clapham, actually dead friendly and people helped me get the right bus back to central. No aggro or anything.
iGenie@reddit
Funny enough I saw maiden around the same time at Brixton and thought it was very run down and depressed. I’ve heard it’s a lot better now.
Davski88@reddit
I used to frequent Brixton for gigs around the same time and it was proper shitty. I went there a couple years ago and it seems all the hipsters have moved in now.
monkeyclaw77@reddit
Whereas now it’s only half like that, the rest has been redeveloped to appeal to the young professionals who now inhabit the area.
Both states were an improvement on how it looked in the 50’s & 60’s when my mum grew up there. That was an actual slum.
-SidSilver-@reddit
That's because the educated young professionals can't afford to be anywhere else. The standard has gone up in one way (smart young people inhabit the area) while the actual level of destitution is basically the same, if not worse. There are still tons of people renting tiny homes. Slapping a nice coffee shop over that problem because that's what young workers want hasn't solved the problem, it's just made it more polite.
magicwilliams@reddit
Hopefully things have got better in general but I know at least one family living like that in Haringey
Turbulent-Pop-3393@reddit
lived in edmonton, totty, upton park and dagenham all through the 90s and mid 2000s, it was a different animal altogether back then
katbess@reddit
I grew up in east Enfield and Edmonton in the early 90s and some older kids tried to set fire to my hair at the local playground when I was about 4. We also used to play in a derelict house down the street by jumping out the first floor window on to piles of mattresses. And my street wasn’t even considered especially bad for the area.
Crandom@reddit
Even place that you'd think of as very nice now, like Tufnell Park, were kinda grim back in the 90s.
David-Cassette-alt@reddit
Do you seriously think people right now are just "ironically poor"? The wage gap is bigger than it's ever been, inflation is in the stratosphere and the housing market is more inaccessible for poor people than pretty much anytime in the last hundred years...
One_Nectarine3077@reddit
No, but the Thatcher years were gruesome in Scotland, the north of England, and n most inner cities. Crime was high, and inflation far outstipped pay if you were earning a wage. The media romanticised being working class, but I think that was just propaganda to keep the peasants in their place.
No-one was ever ironically poor, just how we are presented. But I will say that the systemic hopelessness of that time has not returned yet. It might though, and I think the austerity movement was scarily reminiscent of what was happening to the US a few years before. Fwiw, I give the US 20 years tops before some kind of revolution destroys it, and it either gets remade sensibly, or fascism wins out and secures its hold properly
One-Staff5504@reddit
But middle earners back then were so much better off than today and house prices weren’t absolutely ridiculous.
Ill-Reputation7424@reddit
I agree, I occasionally watch the video on BBC archive YouTube channels, and yeah even I sometimes forget how things were back then.
lBlack111@reddit
Yeah but at least back then there was a sense of community and people banded together. People knew their neighbours and helped each other out.
These days we just suffer alone!
H16HP01N7@reddit
I know my neighbours, and help them out.
If you don't mate, that's on you to change that.
Maybe being a miserable bastard makes people less inclined to help you...?
spacecatbiscuits@reddit
Lmao did you read that somewhere?
Recent_Schedule_6819@reddit
It depends if you live in social housing, as I do.
Even though my wife and I both work, some (not all) of our neighbours are a bane on society. Last week a group of 14 year olds attacked another neighbour. One of them had a zombie knife.
Thankfully no-one was actually hurt, but the fact that kids are carrying these things in my neighbourhood really frightens me.
I have CCTV and a ring doorbell, but I can't rely on that to keep us safe.
Difficult-Chard9224@reddit
I remember everything being considerably rougher in the 1980s
OldManHavingAStroke@reddit
In the 80s people were literally digging waste out of landfills to find things to sell. It was common on Merseyside to see fires set on the side of roads and cars on fire. In comparison we live in much better times, although poverty and homelessness is rife.
scoschooo@reddit
Why is there so much poverty in the Uk? The job market and mobility are really bad so people can't get out of poverty?
Ambry@reddit
Cost of living increases whilst wages stagnate, there’s less council housing available so normal people need to rely on the private rental market or somehow afford to buy when before it was very, very common for regular people to live in a council house.
Illustrious-Energy50@reddit
drugs sold by more people too
Educational-Map-1470@reddit
There’s literally nothing else to do in this country, then meet the boys and bun a zoot. Like I cba to spend £20 every time I wanna drink
ReditMcGogg@reddit
Yes. I travel to various EU cities for work and I hate coming home more and more with each trip.
We just don’t seem to respect anything or anyone. Streets are dirtier. People are more rude. Crime is higher. Granted there will be outliers but this is my general feeling.
Apart from Paris. In Paris I couldn’t wait to get home…
ChampionSkips@reddit
Being from the Manchester area myself its crazy how the ex really rough areas have become gentrified and are actually quite well to do (Ancoats, Salford, parts of Moss Side) where as the places a few miles out that were mid range have become poverty stricken shit holes. I think this is what gentrification does though, just pushes the problems further out and exacerbates them.
JohnCasey3306@reddit
Yeah it's getting pretty rancid down here in Sussex
1FlamingBurrito@reddit
Absolutely. We are turning into a very unequal society so enclaves of wealth will develop and the rest will descend into ghettos.
I’m wealthy and just moved out of a big city to a wealthier more rural area to escape the deprivation and crime.
Fragile_reddit_mods@reddit
When I grew up I didn’t have any reason to fear for my safety. Now I have in the past few years had guns and knives pointed at me for no reason.
bakeyyy18@reddit
People are regularly pointing guns at you? Are you in an organised crime group?
Fragile_reddit_mods@reddit
I am not. On 2 seperate occasions I’ve had a firearm aimed at my head, and on 3 I’ve been threatened with blades.
This area is just that rough.
Son_of_Mogh@reddit
What area?
Fragile_reddit_mods@reddit
Not about to reveal that
Son_of_Mogh@reddit
Sure, because actual information would dispell your vibe based bullshit.
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
They are under no obligation to reveal such info to you, move on.
Upstairs-Hedgehog575@reddit
Of course not, but the reader is under no obligation to take their unlikely story seriously.
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
Then the reader should realise that it's unlikely someone else is gonna care to disclose personnel info online for security reasons. You wouldn't just shout your WiFi access code at the top of your voice on the street for everyone to hear it would you?
Upstairs-Hedgehog575@reddit
Great false equivalence!
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
Nope, wrong answer but thanks for playing.
Fragile_reddit_mods@reddit
Want my bank details too? How about my NI number? Need my mother’s maiden name too?
Opinelrock@reddit
I believe it's the village of pretendingshire, just outside of imagination-on-the-wold.
Dudebroguy10000@reddit
just something to think about, you've been threatened with weapons more often than most criminals lol.
da fuck
Fragile_reddit_mods@reddit
In the same small area to be fair. Giving you the general location wouldn’t tell you anything given that I believe it’s the largest town in the country.
Dudebroguy10000@reddit
just looked up the largest town in the country, if i've got that right then..... wtf lol.
Fragile_reddit_mods@reddit
What did it tell you?
Dudebroguy10000@reddit
reading
Fragile_reddit_mods@reddit
Oh I was wrong then. It’s part of greater Manchester
Dudebroguy10000@reddit
ok yeah well you see this makes a lot more sense than it being reading hahahah
myspiritanimalisadog@reddit
😂😂
Becci92xo@reddit
Now you don't actually think anyone is going to believe that
Fragile_reddit_mods@reddit
I don’t care: it’s the truth.
DadBodGeneral@reddit
In terms of fights and confrontations, I'd say some areas are still as rough as the 80s and 90s, but in terms of financial difficulties producing drabby, run-down areas, there probably has been an increase.
It's all about the area though, Britain isn't that tiny so there is bound to be some variation.
mizcello@reddit
This is small scale, but A few years ago I moved into a terraced house, my first place alone, and on day 1, my dad arrived and told me I needed to wash my door and my step while he would pick the weeds off the path.. interestingly, he got chatting to neighbours and by the summer, basically the whole street were weeding their part of the street and it looked really nice.
I really hate that people wait for the council to fix the streets, if everyone did their little square outside their house, picked up the little bit of litter, the whole country would look totally different. A bit of pride.
Carinwe_Lysa@reddit
This is something I've experienced to be honest. I've always liked to keep my garden and front of the property tidy, so picking up litter and so on, same with my next door neighbours.
But the rest of the street absolutely don't give a shit, so all the litter we pick just gets replaced the following day and so on, or they let their properties overgrow and spill out onto the pavements so it looks really bad.
ariokiasamy@reddit
I have the same experience on my street, there’s no taking pride in where people live. However I think this is due to huge rents from scumbag land lords. What are people to do, if the landlord doesn’t give a shit about the state of the house why would they care about weeding their yard? It’s sad but I get it.
BadMachine@reddit
self-respect
Some-Air1274@reddit
I think people are becoming more brazen and self centred
DiscountDifferent133@reddit
Exeter city centre has definitely become worse. People high on drugs everywhere, police constantly arresting them. Two years ago k felt fairly safe, even in the evenings, but now the day time is barely safe.
CrowApprehensive204@reddit
I live in Stoke-on-Trent, it's always been rough, can't say it's gotten any worse apart from the amount of dust heads
wildcharmander1992@reddit
I think back in 2005/06 in my town it was the one of the most dangerous places in the UK
Nowadays it's nowhere near half as bad as that but compared to the last 6 or 7 years its worse yeh
But our town is an anomaly as it doesn't have. Hospital or a police station
So in theory you could get robbed/battered stabbed or w.e and by time police or ambulance come from next town over you're pretty much fucked & the bigger scumbags about take advantage of that
But that's thankfully due to change
Also if you're wondering what about those criminals who are on tag or need to report to a police station due to the conditions of their bail , they were advised to go to a local council building and take a selfie proving there where there and send that over and sign a bit of paper
As you can imagine that gets easily exploited
Mountain-Distance576@reddit
decline. by design. the ruling and ownership class are sucking wealth away from everyone else. more and more people are effected every year. we are moving in the direction of pre ww2 britain with widespread poverty and a rich handful of upper class wealthy people who have everything and pretend they deserve it.
Fun-Swimmer2998@reddit
I feel that there is definitely an increase in nuisance behaviour and I feel that consideration for others is hugely on the decline.
Nick_chops@reddit
Everything looks grimy and depressed in my home town. It has been on the slide since I can remember (1980's).
TheAlbertBrennerman@reddit
Yeah it's a shit hole. Expect lootings, stabbings, street drug dealers everywhere pretty soon.
XavierSaviour@reddit
In London, there’s a lot of youth pretending to be hardened gangsters snatching phones, mugging people and stabbing them.
No_Tip3425@reddit
Youth
Mavisssss@reddit
I feel like maybe they're not 'pretending' if they're actually going around stabbing people.
Significant_Tea_4431@reddit
People will point to the figures and say crime has halved or whatever but low-level crimes have skyrocketed. Stuff that you wouldnt bother to report but that reminds you you're living in a place where no-one respects anyone else.
People spitting on the floor in front of you, graffiti, poor driving, shoplifting, riding illegal e-bikes, dumping stuff out of their cars. Its undeniable
LogicalReasoning1@reddit
Except that the crime surveys (which don’t involve reports to the police) just don’t validate this whatsoever.
There has been an increase post-Covid but nothing sending it far beyond years prior.
Having said that would still like it much reduced of course
No_Potato_4341@reddit
Yes but stabbings and stuff like that are down.
St2Crank@reddit
Absolutely not. You say you’re from Manchester but it is no where near as rough as it was. Even in the early 2000’s you’d been looking over your shoulder constantly, places like ancoats and northern quarter are unrecognisable compared to 25 years ago. I grew up in Salford and it could be practically lawless at times, these days it pretty nice. People like to look at the old days through rose tinted glasses but Manchester has never been safer.
jalopity@reddit
Manchester might have some new buildings and gentrified areas that the locals can’t afford, but the city centre is infinitely worse than it was in the 90s and early 00s.
We’ve got a crackhead zoo in the middle and tent cities now. We didn’t have that 20 years ago.
St2Crank@reddit
Disagree completely, everything that is now the Northern Quarter was rough and full of drugs addicts.
Manchester homeless situation has got worse there’s no denying that, but people being off their head in the city centre is nothing new.
jalopity@reddit
As someone who worked in the NQ in the 90s/early 00s I can confirm there were indeed junkies and crime. Mainly car radio thefts.
It wasn’t rough per se, as there was largely nothing in the bar textile shops and most of them were closed
The northern quarter is still a dump with junkies and crime. It’s just now they’ve converted the textile shops into bars and added more graffiti and piss on the streets.
Back then I could walk around without issue. I could even walk across the gardens at night without issue. That area of town is a lot worse than 20+ years ago.
Even as an entertainment area it’s gone down the pan. Particularly since Covid.
St2Crank@reddit
Piccadilly gardens was well known for being a place of people got up to no good. That’s part of the reason they got rid of the gardens aspect, to make it more open.
jalopity@reddit
It wasn’t always like that
And it’s worse now than it’s ever been. A magnet for the dregs of society.
PrestigiousLoad6098@reddit
I don't know about 'rough' in the old school sense but incivility and general bad manners are definitely on the rise, at least in my experience.
AFriendRemembers@reddit
I grew up in the west Midlands.
I lived in a nice village, near a nice town, in the nicer side of birmignham. Yet - because I lived in a 'normal' detached house whilst some people at my school had literally mansions (6+ bedrooms was not uncommon) I always felt i had a bit of inferiority complex compared to the rich guys who dominated my secondary school.
Yet - compared to UK average i was very well off.
Places change - some get better, some degrade.
I do think- compared to 2025 a lot have been degrading faster than others improved. I go back and the place I grew up is still there but few of the people I grew up with can afford to live in the area - so the community is now dominated by retirement homes and there are very few under 30s living locally. Few - but not none. The local schools are cutting back though.
It has its burdens - unique to it- but there are problems anywhere.
LoquaciousLascivious@reddit
I also think people are becoming rider and less likeable, but not necessarily rougher.
LoquaciousLascivious@reddit
Crime rates are actually still way down from the 2000s.
I specifically remember the early to mid 2000s was a time where our parents weren't letting us out too late due to the slashings and assaults. Want to know why? Because if you were from the 'scheme' (council estate) next to the one you were walking around in? That warranted a kicking.
Then chav/Ned culture seemed to go on the back burner up until the late 2010's and we have some right feral little bastards running about now.
I have a theory that the scumbags of the 2000s are now parents to their own howl at the moon delinquents.
Btw, in some cases - "deprivation" my eye. I live in the second worst area of the large town near the city that I am from. we do not have a community centre, library, supermarket or anything of that nature in our community, but the number one hellhole? They have all of the things mentioned above plus better general access to GP's, bus routes etc. And guess what? The kids are still buckwild along that way too. It's lousy, hands off parenting.and a lack of guidance imo.
Mark56m24@reddit
Manchester City centre is now often unsafe even during the day . If you’re not street wise you can easily become unstuck . One wrong word , look around Piccadilly gardens can spell trouble . At night time it’s a no go area. Regular stabbings, beatings , mugging which largely go unreported. Our city is now full of vermin. No good news, it be getting worse. Petty crime ignored, so your average scrote will push boundaries, meaning more serious crime will be ignored. Police? Sadly not enough, hands tied in this woke society.
Charming_Ad2323@reddit
Having just spent a night in hospital after a group of youths set about me and my uncle on Lowestoft high street, I’d say a big ‘yes’!
Federal-Command-8636@reddit
Depends on where you are but mostly what can see is more and more homeless people, crack heads and crazies… I live in zone 3 and even this whole already is starting to fill up with creeps… just 3 days ago I was followed by two old Muslim men outside my house, had to go to the bus stop and they followed me there. Literally called my partner and he came out of our house and I instructed him to walk … guess what they also walked… didn’t take the bus and i narrowly escaped these perverts. Next time I’m calling the cops instantly…
SnooBooks1701@reddit
The UK crime rate has been steadily declining (with a post-pandemic exception) for decades. It's down nearly 90% since the 1995 peak
The reasons why aren't completely known, I subscribe to the lead theory, which is that the lead from leaded petrol and leaded paint caused developmental disorders that caused aggression and lowered intelligence, two things linked to criminality either directly or indirectly via poverty. Another theory is that better home and vehicle security has resulted in a decline in teens engaging in "gateway" crimes that led to a lifetime of crime.
Source
The UK has an ultra low crime rate, it's extremely safe, for example, the headline figure is always murder rates but we're 174th in the world for murder rate. Our decline in crime is common across all western nations (which fits my lead theory), this is despite encouraging more people to report crimes and efforts to improve cyber literacy
metechgood@reddit
Weirdly enough it depends. I live in the country and I don’t see as many chavs as we used to have. I mean our generation were taking drugs and all sorts. Being rowdy on the streets. I think cities are getting worse but where I am, I look at teenagers and wonder how they became such pussies and dorks
Gullible_Air2230@reddit
Two years ago, my wife and I moved back to a city we had lived in 5 years earlier. And I couldn’t believe how much it had changed in the intervening years. Completely agree with you on this.
David-Cassette-alt@reddit
This sounds kind of like a relatively comfortable middle-class person who's been sheltered from reality. Yes, lots of areas of the UK are rundown and falling into decline. We've had 15 years of tories privatising public resources, presiding over massive cuts to infrastructure and enforcing a growing inequality gap. The current labour party seem intent on continuing down that path. So yes, it is extremely hard for a lot of poor people in the UK right now (particularly up north) and has been getting worse for quite some time. It's kind of baffling that you're only noticing this now...
turnipbrick@reddit
The cost of living is higher and is creating more poverty and I’ve seen a lot more signs of it like an increase in rough sleeping, begging and so on. It’s sad to see the country going this way.
These_Thing7371@reddit
Just watch Charlie V lol.
Fresh-Research3450@reddit
Yes, the internet has given people ideas especially young men that they can do anything and get away with it, post a fight on social media for views, even women are more rough now I used to work in a pub in London and I definitely wouldn't do that now!
mustard5man7max3@reddit
No. Street violence has fallen for decades. It is a shade of what it used to be.
AstroChet@reddit
Nah honestly, apart from the far right nonces, the uk is pretty safe
zeeke87@reddit
No way.
People getting poorer and councils having less and less money over literal decades is making stuff worse?
Not to mention the planet in general is full of AI assholes designed to feed and anger real assholes on websites like this.
johnsonboro@reddit
No, I don't even think that statistics give a true reflection of how 'rough' it is in the UK. In the 80's and 90's it felt and looked much rougher than it is now. Football matches are a good indication of the difference between now and then. These days, there may be a few coked up young lads mouthing off, but back then if you were in the wrong place at the wrong time you'd be in serious danger.
A lot has been done to improve life standards since then, and crime is no longer worth the risk when CCTV and mobiles/dashcam footage can catch you much easier than 30-40 years ago when criminals could get away with all sorts with less fear of being caught. Whilst there is still poverty, it's not at the levels it was before, and you can have a better life scrimping on UC than you would have as a petty criminal constantly risking prison.
The media does an impeccable job of creating fear because lets face it, who is going to want to read reports about how much safer it is these days?
Maybe since Covid, town centres are more dilapidated, but most places are much nicer overall than they were compared to the 80s/90s. If you compare now to say 2018 then places do look worse, but on the whole there have been major improvements to society.
Idlewants@reddit
yes, during COVID many people realised that politicians don't give a fuck about the rules, so why should they? that plus the ever increasing funnelling of wealth to the rich and the disparity between wages and housing costs are leading (have led) to the social contract breaking. none of my kids see the point in going to work, as there is no upside to doing so.
AstroBlush8715@reddit
The whole middle band of the UK from East to West:
Grimsby, Hull, Scunthorpe, Wakefield, Barnsley, Huddersfield, Bradford, Burnley, Stockport, Oldham, Rochdale, Southport, Preston, Blackpool and Liverpool are all just an uninterrupted belt of utter shit.
It's so much worse than it used to be.
SwitchSea181@reddit
Too many people and not enough housing.
I'm from Nottingham. It's never been great but it's definitely deteriorated.
Overall, I'm very concerned about how things will go as AI takes over more and more jobs. I can't see any alternative except a universal basic income and as the beneficiaries of AI will be corporations, they should pay it.
No-Cow-9571@reddit
It’s so dystopian here in South London. I need to get up and go to work now but I’m terrified to step ou- no, wait, it’s fucking great
Jinglekeys100@reddit
Sounds like you haven't lived in London very long. As it's a nightmare compared to in the 90's when it was quite literally the best city in the world.
No-Cow-9571@reddit
Mate, 3/4 of my grandparents were born a stones throw from Walthamstow and Stoke Newington… not that that makes me any more or less qualified to comment than someone who moved here yesterday. I don’t remember much of the 90’s, but it’s hardly dystopian
Jinglekeys100@reddit
Right so you dont have anywhere else to compare it to then. Boiled rice is a luxury meal to someone who’s never eaten
rlaw1234qq@reddit
The shrinking local council funding has left most towns looking rougher - less litter collection, shabby buildings and apathy. People don’t realise how much social care spending has ballooned - it’s invisible to people who don’t need access to those services. Councils can’t raise council tax above an amount specified by central government. In our last local elections pot holes apparently worried people far more than all the frail elderly people being stuck at home with inadequate care.
Wisegoat@reddit
I think generally it’s been on a down trend.
But the last few years I think wealth inequality has made it worse (shoplifting being on the up) and you do have certain areas where Brits have moved and the areas become a hotspot for immigrants from the same part of the world - and if it’s a place with a more barbaric culture they can appear much worse as well.
ImpossibleSky3923@reddit
Definitely. Without the economy of London we would be a third world country.
mcf_@reddit
It does feel like chavs are the majority
jacktalife@reddit
The UK is just getting soft
raccoon-overlord@reddit
I would say yes, but more noticeable in the bigger cities
Trycheesecake@reddit
When world leaders openly promote violence don’t expect little people to be peaceful. No one understand how it’s going be in few years, you be look back and probably appreciate woke generation
z0i2d@reddit
No.
It's propaganda
odysseusnz@reddit
Yes, even here in London, as local government, transport and infrastructure spending has been slashed more and more for austerity, all the good work from the 90s/00s that we paid for has been left to slowly rot away, all so the rich can pay less tax.
There's no better example than TfL where a small fortune was spent to refurbish the tube and bring it up to world class standards, but since the Tories slashed funding regular cleaning and maintenance has been neglected and it's all starting to look very tired and worn. It will cost far more in the future to bring it back up to scratch than the ongoing maintenance would have.
Another great example is my local town centre of Woolwich which received some of that performative levelling-up funding intended to revive failing high streets. They've spent a fortune on new paving and shops fronts, but there's no money in the local council budget to pay for any street cleaning so it's already looking like a tip.
The simple answer is if we want our communities to look nice, we simply have to collect more tax to invest in maintaining our communities. And that includes a higher level of investment in our Northern communities who have long been disproportionately neglected.
JoJoeyJoJo@reddit
"Run down" is probably a better word, but yes.
AmeliaSofiax19@reddit
Some areas are getting worse and worse as time goes on tbh!
ThinkSpend7452@reddit
As a larger population, we live in the country we deserve. The UK public has, over the last few decades, become more decadent, with lower moral values, less reverence for the family unit, more atheistic, more socially isolated and less community oriented, therefore the fact our country is going to the dogs reflects that.
Consistent_Photo_248@reddit
Not at all, the opposite in fact. It seems to me to be trending towards lower violet crimes. And that which does exist is more likely than not to be drugs and organised crime related. Which is also trending down.
GoldenAmmonite@reddit
My brother lived in Moss Side in the early 1990s... I don't think we're at that level yet.
L3Niflheim@reddit
This user seems to almost completely inactive for a year apart from this post. Randomly generated username. Russian bot farm most likely stiring discontent.
Warm_Sail_7908@reddit (OP)
Yeah I do have a random username but I’m not a bot 😂 I just don’t use Reddit that often
twoLegsJimmy@reddit
No the complete opposite. Fighting was a part of life in the 90s when I grew up. If you went out drinking in the town centre on Friday or Saturday (which you almost always did), you were pretty much guaranteed some kind of trouble. The market square in my town after the nightclubs had closed was like some sort of medeival melee.
themissingelf@reddit
We watched a lovely area decline over a period of 20ish years; eventually moving because of the rot setting in.
NamiXion@reddit
I feel it is and a reason for it may just be because more shops are closing down (at least where I am) and more people online shop. So a lot of the people who are out are the regular pub dwellers.
Massive_Chipmunk5131@reddit
I grew up in the 70s and there was a lot more alcohol fuelled violence around then . People now however seem more ill mannered and ignorant
AdExtension917@reddit
No I think people because of the news and social media are becoming more soft and inpatient..
EchoDiscombobulated1@reddit
Does those phone snatching Nigerians in London and Albanian criminal gangs count as rough?
PristineRutabaga7711@reddit
I mean where you live in Manchester and where abouts you hung out when you were young is gonna have a massive impact on this, especially being as there's part of Manchester where one side of a main road is risky and the other is totally fine. Plus how old you are, some areas in Manchester have been gentrified in a big way over the last 20 years
the_sneaky_one123@reddit
It's not just the UK, same situation in Ireland. Dublin seems to be degrading by the month.
Beginning-Two9785@reddit
Majority of the money going down to south, lack of public transport, infrastructure and regeneration in everything North of Watford has led to a talent drain. Either stay in the North and accept lower paying jobs or move to south.
Jolly-Minimum-6641@reddit
People are definitely becoming snippier, curt, generally ruder no matter where you go. Even in areas stereotyped to hell and back as "super duper friendly", you will always meet at least 2-3 total twats.
Honest-Squirrel6877@reddit
its me. im that asshole.
LandscapeOk2586@reddit
Shit hole of a country. But it’s ok the Lake District is getting a lovely new mosque!
TurnGloomy@reddit
It's the litter. I'm from a middle class area of Reading that borders a more working class area. I went to a super multicultural school growing up that had kids from all different classes and I loved the diversity in Reading. That working class area is now predominantly south asian as there was a mosque built nearby. The white people have slowly left over the last 20 years and muslims have understandably taken their place. The big long run of shops are now all indian/pakistani which makes for fantastic groceries and access to ingredients. However all of the shops refuse to keep their commercial bins behind the shop despite the council fining them for it multiple times. They've all just decided that its easier to keep the out the front. The local shopping road is now absolutely filthy, litter everywhere with overflowing bins.
It's really depressing to go back to, especially as those shops are opposite the primary school I went to and my mother taught at. Same number of shops as when I grew up, same population number, but a different cultural attitude to rubbish. The school I went to has also gone down hill and gone from being a top primary to one of the lowest in Reading because so many kids hear English as a second language at home and communication both in school and with parents is very difficult. These are the realities of multiculturalism when it segregates. The issue is segregation. It's such a shame because growing up in Reading in the 90s, whilst it was a bit a rough around the edges before gentrification the multiculturalism was something I loved and was so proud of.
TheHeroYouNeed247@reddit
Nah, almost everywhere is much safer.
Some people may be more sensitive to seeing youths of a different colour.
TurnGloomy@reddit
It's the litter. I'm from a middle class area of Reading that borders a more working class area. I went to a super multicultural school growing up that had kids from all different classes and I loved the diversity in Reading. That working class area is now predominantly south asian as there was a mosque built nearby. The white people have slowly left over the last 20 years and muslims have understandably taken their place. The big long run of shops are now all indian/pakistani which makes for fantastic groceries and access to ingredients. However all of the shops refuse to keep their commercial bins behind the shop despite the council fining them for it multiple times. They've all just decided that its easier to keep the out the front. The local shopping road is now absolutely filthy, litter everywhere with overflowing bins.
It's really depressing to go back to, especially as those shops are opposite the primary school I went to and my mother taught at. Same number of shops as when I grew up, same population number, but a different cultural attitude to rubbish. The school I went to has also gone down hill and gone from being a top primary to one of the lowest in Reading because so many kids hear English as a second language at home and communication both in school and with parents is very difficult. These are the realities of multiculturalism when it segregates. The issue is segregation. It's such a shame because growing up in Reading in the 90s, whilst it was a bit a rough around the edges before gentrification the multiculturalism was something I loved and was so proud of.
Human_Subject_5483@reddit
No, I think it's getting roughly more progressive.
poshbakerloo@reddit
I thought everywhere was a lot nicer than it was in the 70s and 80s. Look at old photos during that period, a lot of our cities were like the ghetto!
Alternative-Fox-7255@reddit
I feel like we are becoming less socially developed / more feral
LambonaHam@reddit
The police are getting lazier / worse every year, because they know they won't be forced to do their jobs.
Crime goes up, people participate less in society.
Nok1a_@reddit
For me, it's getting worse and more out of control than it was 12 years ago when I arrived. Those videos of people stealing from shops without any problem like what happens in the States or people stealing bikes and phones in London don't help at all. It's only a matter of time before that spreads to the rest of the country, if it hasn't already.
But is just my impression
addicted-2-cameltoe@reddit
Ruf as hell...its fully dangerous....manny centre is dodgy but always has been tbh
Remarkable_Misty@reddit
More violent crime for sure
haphazard_chore@reddit
We’ve imported millions from the third world. They not only require subsidised living, but they bring their culture with them. You can’t expect western values to be easily instilled into millions of migrants. This leads to a fundamental decline at every level. Moral, legal, social and environmental Britain is in a spiral of decline fuelled by low skilled migration from nations that are fundamentally incompatible with western values.
melonofknowledge@reddit
I wonder if you can hear your own farts over the sound of your dogwhistle?
Leading_Exercise3155@reddit
Truth isn’t racism
melonofknowledge@reddit
And racism isn't truth, so there we go! Super weird to be simping for a racist, honestly.
djashjones@reddit
Blair opened the doors to the EU too, that's why if have the best and brightest from all the world here. Town centres are full of foreign shops because integration works.
Metrobolist3@reddit
I went back to my New Town hometown to visit my dad today and was rather more concerned about the dilapidated 50% vacant shopping centre in the middle of it and the fact a lot of the manufacturing and light industry that used to provide jobs in the town disappeared over the last 20 years than the fact there are a few more brown faces around now than in the past.
nemma88@reddit
Shut up shops happen when there's not enough economically active people in the area. It's an age thing primarily.
Saw it in my home town, because myself & peers all moved away... As did you I guess? We moved to where the jobs we want are. Industry moves on.
Brown people is just shoving them where it's cheap - not the cause.
haphazard_chore@reddit
You think colour is the issue? It’s culture and education that’s the problem
thebaronharkkonen@reddit
Nixe try, Bezos. It's the billionaire class extracting all the excess value through globalisation.
handtoglandwombat@reddit
Your dog whistle is a bit too low pitched mate.
KowakianDonkeyWizard@reddit
I think you're talking utter bollocks.
younevershouldnt@reddit
Honestly, not really.
It was rougher most places in the 80s and 90s.
Can you give us some examples of what you're seeing?
Becci92xo@reddit
Don't bother, they said York is rough and previously they'd only visited areas like the cotswolds
Crazy-Bluebird6099@reddit
Gitsurfing
bob_dazz@reddit
The world is improving every decade. Socially we are better off today than we have ever been, and will be better off again tomorrow. Healthcare, government support, life expectancy, equality and personal freedoms are better than they have ever been. It may not feel like that AT ALL where you live. But look at the same suburb/neighbourhood 50 years ago, and then 50 years before that. What about the devastating poverty and life expectancy for blue collar workers and women dying in childbirth in Victorian times - and the massively oppressive government that went with it.
It’s shit on the surface in so many places at the moment and I’m not trying to diminish anyone’s personal experience but I’d rather be alive now than at any time in human history.
Sorry if that was all a bit macro…🫠
WRA1THLORD@reddit
Where I am certainly is. I'm in a town just outside of Newcastle and anti social behaviour and public drug use are rampant, there's gangs of teenagers who terrorise people in the high st and the police do very little about it, you see people fly tipping everywhere, and there seems to be loads more homeless people sleeping rough.
It seems like the bottom 1/3 of society has just been beaten into the floor, and when people feel they have no prospects then why bother trying to keep their environment nice or give a shit about anyone else?
Becci92xo@reddit
I don't think ive ever rolled my eyes so hard in my life
-Xserco-@reddit
Increasingly far right
Increasingly hopeless for youth prospects
Yeah, just a bit
Educational-Map-1470@reddit
The UK is fucked, I lived in a peaceful town in Outer London and since the end of 2024/start of 2025 we’ve been having issues with thugs walking around with there “Face Covering”, constant theft attempt on are garage(Trying to steal my motorcycle)(weekly issue) and then you got these Council Cunts riding around knocking off boys of there bikes and mopeds stealing there stuff whilst there down and injured and then using that stolen equipment to rob more people. And then don’t get me started on TFL, shittest service I’ve ever witnessed. And then immigration is atrocious, these “People” have no clue how to integrate with west society.
Mindless-Ad3841@reddit
It’s called austerity and underinvestment x
Cold94DFA@reddit
Where I'm from, the main source of income for the establishment of my areas success is no longer operating, think coal, pottery, etc.
Our high streets are 50/50 up for rent and empty or have the usual immortal shit like charity shops and chains.
Our entire area is kinda rough and it's worse than 25 years ago by a lot.
Comprehensive_Slip71@reddit
Nah, it's actually a lot less rough than when I was younger, maybe that's just where I am tho. Manchester used to be rough as fuck but now it's just the town centre that's a bit shit, surrounding areas aren't too bad
Little_Richard98@reddit
Lack of financial investment in tidying areas up/improving older buildings etc, combined with a lack of respect from a growing amount of the population. Scruffy fuckers that have never been punished for anti social behaviour aswell as a lot of other things
heliotropic@reddit
I live abroad but I am back in the South Yorkshire town I grew up in this week. I was last here 2.5 years ago and in general over the last 15 years or so I’ve made it here every few years.
It’s definitely gotten nicer IMO! Less of a sense of underlying menace, the kids all seem much more productively engaged than they used to be (on bikes at the skatepark instead of hanging around in front of shops), and the town seems to have turned around the decline: it lost a lot of small retail over the last 30 years but has had a resurgence of cafes and restaurants and little bars.
reedy2903@reddit
Its rough I’ve lived here forever and it’s getting worse. I live in Newcastle area so north east and you have the city centre and you have areas within it which are super nice the quayside grey street etc. then you have areas outside the city that are nice around 4/5 areas jesmond, Gosforth, tynemouth and Ponteland area.
I’ve travelled all over the world and we started saying we live in a bubble where we area because it’s really nice old village which has shops plenty of restaurants and been looked after clean and tidy. Schools are all good one has just been rebuilt has a Leisure centre attached to to so kids have access to pool gym etc.
You go outside of these areas and you basically keep your windows up and doors locked it’s rough rubbish everywhere woman can’t walk or go certain places alone in my opinion it’s bad.
We have the opposites on each end we have well off areas and then dumps no standard across the board just bad or really nice and you need lots of money to live in the good bits.
Most people don’t realise how bad it is because a lot have not travelled further than Spain.
Also people don’t have as much money currently and people buy property but they neglect them so many need work a lot of them need new roofs but people don’t want to shell out 10k for a roof so the quality of the property just declines.
MysteriousTelephone@reddit
By ONS, violent crime is down nearly 90% over the last 30 years. It might ‘feel’ more rough, but statistically it’s pretty good.
1995LexusLS400@reddit
A good reason why it feels more rough, is a lot more violent crime is “accessible” because everyone and their mum had a 4K camera on them at all times now along with CCTV being absolutely everywhere.
Violent crime is down significantly, but the violent crime that does happen is a lot easier to report now and it’s a lot easier to have access to those reports than it was 30+ years ago. Even 15+ years ago.
explorer9898@reddit
Pretty much this - I’m not saying there aren’t some real issues in the country but the fact everyone’s on their phones 24/7 consuming media about the latest stabbing or about how society’s going to shit etc the latest doom and gloom isn’t good for everyone’s mental health. Get off your phone and talk to people in real life and you’ll realise life’s pretty good
RudePragmatist@reddit
It’s not getting more rough. It’s about seeing the bigger picture. There’s a dirty war going on bank rolled by foreign state actors using the uneducated, poor and criminals.
bowak@reddit
It'd help to know which area near Manchester as there's quite the variance! But no worries if you don't want to be too specific online of course.
TheatrePlode@reddit
Things are pretty famously getting worse? Especially in the North, it's always been neglected in favour of spending money in the south.
gefex@reddit
That is not really true. As a percentage of GDP per region, the north receives almost twice that of London.
https://ifs.org.uk/articles/exploring-regional-differences-public-spending-across-england
maddy273@reddit
The article you've linked shows less spending per person and less on transport in the North.
Bantabury97@reddit
They won't admit it, but if the north completely collapsed, the powers that be wouldn't lose any sleep outside of the financial consequences to come from it.
Bacon4Lyf@reddit
statistically its the complete opposite to all those points
Flatulancey@reddit
Reduced provisions for people with mental health and addiction problems, reduced police presence, struggling NHS, cost of living problems and the economy being very stagnant and regressive have meant that there is more obvious criminal activity in more and more places.
Shoplifting is very common now. It’s rarely tackled and it’s increasingly blatant- and you can attribute the big rise in it to many of the above points. People develop drug problems because they have mental health issues and cannot find support, they cannot afford food so they steal it and the police are so stretched they cannot stop it. Other people see this and shoplift too knowing there is little consequence
ParkingTiny6301@reddit
I love your take on this, may I add. What you wrote perfectly sums up the collapse of society to me. It just goes downhill from here with the climate catastrophe incoming, or is there going to me a monumental shift in how life works in the next ten years? I don't personally see it and I'm scared for future generations... I'm only 30.
Flatulancey@reddit
I think seeing it as the collapse of society is a bit of a stretch - it’s more that it’s getting frayed around the edges.
BillyJoeDubuluw@reddit
I think the level of friendliness has dropped, actually…
We have a more pressing sense of alert and a daily sense of stranger danger.
If you had gone to Manchester in the eighties or nineties you would have almost definitely thought it was “more rough” then vs. now in many ways but with that said, it’s also not really that straightforward…
Types of crime change over the years and so do the places as a whole and the people within them.
ArtichokeDesperate68@reddit
Yes. More stupid people reproduce than ‘clever’. The snowball continues… watch ‘Idiocracy’.
LLanders1@reddit
Hmmm I wonder if this anything to do with the rapid demographic shift in the UK of people whose culture isn't compatible with our own.
What a mystery.
doc1442@reddit
I’m a Brit that emigrated about five years ago. Every time I’m back to visit friends/family it strikes me that the place is becoming more of a dump.
Some self reflection to caveat this: I emigrated to a very rich European country known for high quality of life, and live in what is now deemed the most liveable city in the world. I’m also aware rose-tinted glasses exist. Even with this things in mind, all the bits of the UK I re-visit seem much worse than I remember.
Dyrenforth@reddit
'From an area near Manchester'? Not Moss Side then, cos that was never rough at all.
OldManHavingAStroke@reddit
For those not convinced whether times are better now, here is an interesting article on the Bidston Moss waste tip on the Wirral
https://gerryco23.wordpress.com/2014/02/11/through-the-edgelands-of-north-wirral-complicated-unexamined-places-that-thrive-on-disregard/
herefortheworst@reddit
I don’t know if it’s because I’m getting older and I’m noticing things more but I feel like the UK is in a pretty dire decline at the moment. Councils have no money so there is litter and dilapidation everywhere.
EtTuBrotus@reddit
I think it’s a been happening for a while up North. Mass de-industrialisation in the 80s gutted a lot of these communities. The mines and factories that brought investment and money into these areas closed and there has been nothing to replace them.
Additionally there’s been chronic under-investment in community projects. This leads to people feeling disconnected and isolated, and people don’t care so much about looking after their home town if they don’t feel any connection to their community or society at large
People will always also point to immigration as a cause of this erosion of community and decline. I don’t agree it’s a cause of these problems, but I do admit that non-integration is a visible symptom of that lack of investment in bringing people together. Some people think that kicking the immigrants out will solve all their problems but it won’t address the root cause of these issues.
The_39th_Step@reddit
Depends where you are - unlike OP, my part of Manchester has had a massive glow up and is much improved
ettabriest@reddit
Absolutely. Immigration and lack of integration aren’t the root cause of the decline of certain areas, haven’t helped though.
warp10warp10@reddit
Yes , I live in a town in Kent and its population has massively increased due to loads of house building and it’s gone down hill bad , people have been saying for years and I generally ignored it , but there is no denying it’s not a particularly nice place to live.. Considering moving at some point
moreboredthanyouare@reddit
Dear God no. The 80s and early 90s where rough as arseholes. Guaranteed a kick off every weekend. Pills and cctv plus the smoking ban calmed us right down
ginger-tiger108@reddit
Yeah unfortunately your not wrong about that but if you mention the elephant in the room mysteriously your the cause of the problem
jizzyjugsjohnson@reddit
I’ve visited a large number of medium / small towns around the UK and the majority of them are unmitigated shitholes OP
reise123rr@reddit
South Wales is the same and in the south west too.
TiredWiredAndHired@reddit
UK's a shithole mate
Piss-Flaps220@reddit
Look up the demographics for the city you feel is rough and compare it to one that you don't and you will see a correlation
No-Cow-9571@reddit
London is brilliant, Preston is shit. I see a very clear correlation. Is that what you mean?
hoopjoness@reddit
I live in Lewisham. In the last month I’ve witnessed a man jump off a 15 storey building, a fight in the street and multiple anti social, odd interactions. So depends where in London
djashjones@reddit
You are not allowed to say that!!! It's not quite 100% true but 99% correct.
Tommy-ctid-mancblue@reddit
What do you mean? You mean poverty levels? Or something else?
QuajuPeg@reddit
Thatcher’s ’managed decline’ has simply been extended to every aspect of British society. It’s essentially a slow and steady robbery!
Tirisian88@reddit
I lived in Manchester until a couple of years ago, my wife had just given birth to our daughter and it was weekly we were hearing about some sort of attack.
We moved because we didn't think it was safe for our kids and in the 3 years since I've only seen it getting worse.
In regards to UK as a whole I think it comes down to communities, we don't have the same willingness to interact with our neighbours as we used to and it's causing a huge divide.
We've become so focused on pointing out everyone's differences and celebrating the minute uniqueness that we can't seem to come together for anything.
Gabble_Rachet1973@reddit
Getting?
simundo86@reddit
Yes it’s more rough due to the amount of road men/people walking about in balaclavas
ettabriest@reddit
Do you mean a certain coarseness ? That’s the only word I can describe it as. Loud, gobby. Not giving a shite. I’m a nurse and back in the day you’d never hear nurses swearing on the ward in front of patients. Now, you hear it all the time. And the noise, especially on nights. Erm, pts are trying to sleep, just maybe keep the voices down.
AnyOlUsername@reddit
No one’s starting fights with me personally but I have noticed many towns starting to look a bit underfunded.
GreatBritishHedgehog@reddit
Well sexual assaults and violent crimes are up. We’ve imported tons of criminals so hardly surprising. 1/48 Albanians are in prison for example
Turbulent-Pop-3393@reddit
maybe slightly in the last few years but nowhere near as bad as the mid 2000s, anyone who lived in london back then will remember how crazy it was compared to now, sprawling concrete jungle estates, hardly any cctv, massive gangs all over the place out in the open, gunshots being let off like the gang members thought it was 90s LA lol
Serious_Question_158@reddit
Yes. As wages continue to fail to match inflation, more people find themselves living in poverty. Poverty breeds crime.
West-Ad-1532@reddit
Yes/no.
Some Northern mill towns and cities have attempted gentrification. I'm originally from Calderdale, which is a classic Northern ex-mill town. Money has been spent on improvements; however, the old values are still embedded in the community. There is a certain grit and a suspicion of change. On one hand, there is a strong sense of historic community. On the other hand, it's this heirloom of the past that slowly suffocates these areas from modernisation.
A friend is responsible for business development in the area, a globally well-travelled, experienced professional from Europe. We blame Thatcher for the decline in these areas; however, it's clear from talking and discussing these matters that the native ingrained attitudes stifle opportunity and growth. Poor leadership and direction, the USP for the majority of these places is being 'Northern', it's embarrassing, and celebrating an antiquated mindset is hardly the foundation for attracting global investment and interest.
That's why my family and I are moving to the Home Counties. We want more space, better opportunities, improved transportation, and a cleaner environment. Additionally, London and Europe will be close by. My fiancée enjoys this place, but the area is heavily influenced by a mix of flat cap and chav culture. I've recently started DJing again, and I've only received interest from people in London, Europe, and South America—essentially, it's a global response. Unfortunately, no one from the North has reached out to collaborate. They're all too busy reliving retro, smoking roll-ups and drinking Carling.
So I agree, it's rough/tough up north. The people embrace it as part of their identity. However, it's the reason no progress has been made. Decline is terminal...
Dingleville inc.
Wise-Application-144@reddit
Yes. I spent years in Glasgow when it was the murder capital of Europe and never had any bother, it was a safe and chill place for people like me. My perception of pre-2008 UK was that violence was quite predictable and localised - pubs and football games. If you went looking for trouble you'd quickly find it, but there was a kinda unwritten rule that "civilians" like me were excluded from any trouble.
It probably sounds weird, but my memory was that it was almost kinda consensual - guys would escalate slowly until it turned into a punch-up. And there was a reasonable expectation that passers-by would intervene and break things up. So whilst violence existed, I had no expectation of getting caught up in it.
I moved to England and often felt unsafe. Now, there's a real sense of menace and predition, even in small towns. There are places I walk (and I'm a 6'3" guy) where I'm aware there are loads of creepy lone men staring at me. That seems new, the sense of open predition and opportunistic crime against normal folk.
I also see way more public meltdowns and explosive rage over nothing. Again, I don't remember that ever being a thing. And there seems to be a lot more random violence that goes from 0-100 with no warning and no way to avoid it.
So I think the crime stats maybe mask a problem. We've seen some types of violence and disorder drop, but my feeling is that the general public is much less safe than they were a decade or two ago.
I used to feel safe walking around Glasgow at 1am, now I feel unsafe walking around Bedford at 1pm.
PhysicalHighlight271@reddit
It’s less white so yeah it’s more rough generally
Tough_Spirit_819@reddit
It's definitely more vibrant and has more culture now. The English 'culture' is definitely going away in a more diverse direction. It's beautiful
ifonlymarmalade@reddit
I travel around England following my football team and it’s eye-opening how much variation there is between towns and cities. Poverty and overall decline of places has without question increased in the past 10 years. It amazes me how many people I live around who exist in a bubble of their own experience because they never have a reason to visit anywhere in the country that will show them anything different. Not to offend anyone but the contrasts between, say Stoke and Norwich, or Burnley and Newcastle can be staggering.
Mysterious-Pup555@reddit
I'm wondering if the death of the high Street has something to do with it. That and despite all of the knowledge we now have, people generally seem less warm, friendly and understanding. Maybe it's just my town and area.
Dull_Glove4066@reddit
Yes because immigrants
lambaroo@reddit
it's always been that way, maybe even more so. the death of the high street just makes it look worse now. i was a teen in the 80's in a smallish town and it could be rough af.
Son_of_Mogh@reddit
Hey mate, I went to Uni in Manchester. One evening we watched a documentary on heroin addicts and prositution in Manchester. The next day while taking a bus from Chorlton to uni I saw the woman who was extensively followed in the documentary get on the bus. 20 years later I've been back to Manchesternumerous times and everytime things look nicer an have become more developed. I don't know if it's necessarily for the better but it's definitely now as rough. The only place that seems to have survived the 20 years is the vodka Reveloution bar.
aDogCalledLizard@reddit
That's cos Manchester like many other cities is slowly becoming increasingly gentrified - they technically haven't stopped or reduced crime, they've just outsourced it to areas where it's less obvious.
jalopity@reddit
It seems that way.
The influx of groups of undocumented men living in hotels and HMO is also a concern. They seem to just loiter everywhere
boobsnwillies@reddit
yeah i do, i feel unsafe in Leeds city centre now but maybe im just getting old
No_Potato_4341@reddit
I've never felt unsafe in Leeds City centre.
CryptographerMore944@reddit
Leeds city centre seemed a lot more rough in the 1990s and early 2000s.
EasternFly2210@reddit
This is bonkers
ReluctantRev@reddit
Yes. No one likes to ask why though… 😳😒
Double-Gain1019@reddit
My dads quote from the 90's and 00's in glasgow
"seeing burned out cars in certain areas was entirely normal, or literally burning cars"
Chemists had metal bars protecting the area where employees and actual drugs were etc.
No, not at all.
maybe in the last 2 or 3 years some areas have gotten worse but in the same timeframe many have gotten better.
Local council corruption and missmanagement is a HUGE issue though. Just look at how many resources are spent by the council on clarksons farm that go towards preventing growth just because the guy wanting to do the growth is a bit of a dick.
Hezza_21@reddit
It’s just the north mate. It’s always been pretty rough.
fredwhoisflatulent@reddit
Yes - when I was at university in the late 80s we stayed in college Fri/ Sat nights. Student bashing was a popular sport. Mostly it has improved dramatically.
Historically, UK was famous for being rough and violent - just without guns. Football hooliganism etc. I once had to explain to Japanese colleagues the concept of recreational violence… Heck - football/ rugby were both ways to clean up the violence of existing ball games, which (apart from Italy) seem to have been a British phenomenon.
And talk to any older football or rugby fan and they will bemoan the good old days when ‘real men’ played the sports. Football teams would have enforcers as a specialist role, rugby scrums were organised punch ups.
cat793@reddit
A lot if places were worse in the 70s, 80s and early 90s. Things improved from the late 80s till around the financial crisis in 2008.
rmas1974@reddit
No. I can’t say that I do. As a Gen X man, I have observed that generations younger than myself (Millenials and Gen Z) are cleaner living than we were. Every generation seems to think that those younger than themselves are causing society to go to the dogs but this isn’t the case anymore. Younger generations seem to have given up on binge drinking; taking hard drugs and teenage pregnancy.
Inner_Farmer_4554@reddit
I've only ever seen one pub fight, and that was 35 yrs ago. I've never seen a street fight.
But my town has seen at least 2 fatal stabbings where the victims were 16 or under in the last 2 years. So, I, as a 51 yr old woman, feel pretty safe. But if I had a teenage boy I wouldn't rest till he was home...
DeCyantist@reddit
I think you need to check your history… remember the IRA?
lBlack111@reddit
Yes. Import the third world… become the third world.
Lybertyne2@reddit
The country's been getting exponentially rougher since 1947.
PowerApp101@reddit
Why that year?
Crazy-Bluebird6099@reddit
Kalashnikov rifles flooding the UK
irv81@reddit
I don't think so, when I was a kid I lived on one of Gateshead's most deprived council estates.
It was nicknamed The Bronx.
It had an unemployment rate of 23.5% in 2000 and burglary rates were 3 times the national average.
There were 795 houses on the estate and in one three year period in the 90s, 246 burglaries were recorded by Northumbria Police.
Heroin was a huge problem on the estate, street dealing was commonplace.
Most of the estate was flattened and it's now a mixture of private estates, in all my travels as an adult, and I've been up and down the country and I've never seen an estate quite like the one I grew up on.
I used to liken the estate to the Back to The Future, alternative 80s where Biff was a multi millionaire and Hill Valley was a war zone.
These days you never see houses with bars on the windows and doors, even in "rough" estates.
Crazy-Bluebird6099@reddit
Key-Alternative5175@reddit
I have been working as a steward for a couple of years at my local football club and have seen more fights there than in any pub and it's mostly old geezers it's so embarrassing
PowerApp101@reddit
They're probably the same geezers who used to fight in pubs when they were younger
Key-Alternative5175@reddit
Yeah your probably right I think they are stuck in a time warp
MattDubh@reddit
I had the misfortune to visit a northern town a few years back. I shit ye not, used babies' nappies biffed in a car park. Not even put in a bin. Broken glass everywhere. Litter. Not been back since.
razza357@reddit
The British Isles were seen as a poor and somewhat weird place in the corner of Europe for most of its history. The industrial revolution happened - and these islands built an empire that they used to extract wealth from other parts of the world. That empire is no more and we're defaulting to the mean again. It's happening slowly though.
PowerApp101@reddit
I mean Julius Caesar thought it was worth invading. Dunno what he saw in it though.
razza357@reddit
For sure. But on the whole it's always been this weird poor place in the corner of Europe. There was a period of time when it wasn't - but that was more of a blip than anything. And it's slowly coming to an end.
UndeadZips@reddit
Yes.
The UK is gradually turning in to a shit hole.
A major problem is that we have a lot of seasonal workers that send all of the profits of their labour back to their country of origin, instead of spending it in the local economy.
Another huge problem is the grouping of races in certain towns.
No speanding in the local economy means slow degredation of buisiness.
No business means less taxes, which leads to less government spending in the local area.
You can see this most concentrated in places like 'Luton', 'Bradford', 'Northampton', Leicester etc.
A controversial opinion, but an honest one from somebody that has lived in these these areas his whole life!
BOBBY_SCHMURDAS_HAT@reddit
Absolutely not it’s less violent than it’s ever been for the most part it’s just the instant reporting of the instances that do happen is now possible in a way that wasn’t possible before
SlaveToNoTrend@reddit
Yes, the uk in many places is lawless. crackheads everywhere some openly using. Gangs of men loitering in public spaces during weekdays, graffiti everywhere and police nowhere to be seen.
EasternFly2210@reddit
Have you been to America
SlaveToNoTrend@reddit
Yes and the u.k is heading that way.
parasoralophus@reddit
Many town and city centres look like shit since COVID and the advent of online shopping.
Also many people who could afford it moved to the countryside.
coffeewalnut08@reddit
What indicators do you classify as rough, specifically?
Warm_Sail_7908@reddit (OP)
Drug addicts, litter everywhere and the “feeling people are wanting to fight u” (in the words of my mum when we went to a seaside town the other week).
coffeewalnut08@reddit
Fair. Yeah the litter is pretty bad in a lot of places. I try doing my bit to clean up, I submit clean-up requests to the council very often, but it’s gonna take a community effort to get community-level results.
I think a lot of our problems would improve if there was more grassroots activism, but sadly, a lot of people don’t even feel like they’re a part of the community. Hence the littering and vandalism.
Drug addiction is pretty bad I think yeah, because as a country we have a history with alcohol which is like a gateway into drugs for many people. This is especially bad in the north. If that’s something we work on, perhaps less people would be drawn into drugs.
Warm_Sail_7908@reddit (OP)
Yeah there definitely needs to be a community effort to fix the litter situation, as it’s going to be a big undertaking initially to clean up some of these cities. It doesn’t help that councils won’t empty public bins as often as they should be.
Another surprising observation is the amount of obesity. I’m well aware unhealthy food is often cheaper than healthy food but still you’d assume the majority of people would make an effort to try and stay at least moderately healthy but obesity seems so widespread in some towns.
AgileSloth9@reddit
Regarding the North, look at whats happened to it.
It was absolutely decimated by Thatcher in particular, then was never helped up again. Towns declined, investment outside of large town areas pretty much didn't exist, and its already more sparsely populated so required more investment to help out more towns.
We now have a situation where, Northumberland being a huge example, all of the investment goes into Morpeth or Alnwick. Everywhere else is an afterthought.
When the area you grew up in and live in is neglected that badly, the common outlet is drinking and drugs, predominently drinking. This impacts every area of their lives, and as a result, people care less about their own health, where they live, etc...
Stats may show more money being pumped up north, but until we get accurate stats of how it is spent, how its helping the north, etc... its pointless stats.
VHS_Pulsewave@reddit
Statistically, crime is at an all time low according to this source.
From an anecdotal point of view, I work in pubs and pretty much all of the older people (gen x, some older millenials) I serve or work with concur that there is nowhere near as much violence as there used to be in say, the 80s and 90s. Possibly just a wee bit of hyperbole, but couple of the older tech guys at work say that you could moreless expect a multi person brawl most nights in a lot of pubs (I suspect cameras everywhere have helped with this).
I personally find that where I live (East Mids), you'll pretty much be fine if you mind your own business and have even a basic level of street smarts about you. A common target of muggings for example are usually freshers who are new to the cities, there's always a noticeable spike in September/October.
I would imagine that information in general being more easily accessible than ever before means that people are more aware of crime than they potentially would have been historically. This is probably a good thing overall, but has perhaps skewed the perception a bit (rose tinted glasses and all that). It'll be quite interesting to see in 30 years what surveys like the one in the link show about public perception of crime.
Illustrious-Engine23@reddit
Have you been living under Rick the past 10 years??
Yeah obviously places are more fun down, we've had a significant decline in living quality in the UK for the last 10 years.
Pleasant-Ad-1379@reddit
Hmmm I wonder what it could be?
Kingkamehameha11@reddit
I live in an area of London that is supposed to be statistically safe. 3 times in the last few weeks I've seen men hiding in bushes and behind trees when I've gone for a walk. I don't know what the fuck they were doing in there.
I've lost count of the amount of times I've been accosted by some weirdo. I have been attacked before, but that was usually when I went somewhere with a known crime problem. 10-15 years ago, I would never have looked over my shoulder in my local area. Now there seems to be this constant, low-level anti-social behaviour.
Pztch@reddit
The whole e we old is fucked, and so our intrinsic personality is coming to the fore.
And here in the U.K., our intrinsic personality, unfortunately, is pretty confrontational…
AcademyBorg@reddit
I don't think places are getting more 'rough', if anything everything is getting more gentrified and bland, especially around the centres.
However, a fair few people in society are struggling more and more due to the cost of living. I wouldn't call that getting 'rougher' though, so it would be dependent on what you consider rough is.
Any-Skill-5128@reddit
Wouldn’t say bland
AcademyBorg@reddit
Obviously everyone has their own opinion and are welcome to it!
I think western culture is 100% more bland and uniformed than say pre-internet boom (just as an example). Originality seems to be laughed at and looked down at more, and everybody pretty much acts and thinks the same.
No_Aesthetic@reddit
Seems like a very shortsighted take when we consider that the west is a whole hell of a lot more diverse today and those voices are very often celebrated instead of denigrated.
AcademyBorg@reddit
I disagree (politely). There might be differences due to somebody's upbringing and cultural diversity. However, today's society has a strong emphasis on standardisation and gentrification, from education up to architecture.
Any-Skill-5128@reddit
I mean if you see the world through the internet like most do then you’ll think that way for sure , the internet highlights how similar we really are , no group of people have ever liked anything different and we’ve always fought change
Educational-Angle717@reddit
Yes and sadly intollerant - blame you know who...
blackcoffee17@reddit
I have lived in the UK for the past 13 years, and when I visit other cities, I notice how unkempt and filthy some places are. Even city centers are full of dirt, trash, rusted metal, and weed growing everywhere....not nice.
ImpressNice299@reddit
Not really. The nice towns are still nice, the rough ones are still rough. If you see a lot of abandoned factories on the way in, it's probably in the latter group.
No_Potato_4341@reddit
This is a really funny but accurate rule.
iwantmuscle@reddit
Birmingham city centre has improved beyond recognition over the last 20 years and for the better.
People are spending their money differently these day's and shops are suffering, hence the decline in major areas.
Also, councils are under increasing pressure with their budgets, 75% of which has to be spent on statutory legal requirements, i.e child services etc etc. Successive governments have reduced the amount paid to them. Hence, money is tight, so nicities like making a place look decent go out of the window
Delicious_Ad9844@reddit
It's weird to be honest, on the one hand, living standards are probably at their potential best, but as a result people are starting to feel the effects of the deep wealth inequality of the UK even more, and the last decade of austerity really, really didn't help
theabominablewonder@reddit
What I think is that it’s becoming increasingly common for people to need a ‘side hustle’ to make ends meet or to try and reach their goals like buying a house. I would expect a nation of hustlers in a developing nation, not in one of the world’s richest. However I don’t think this trend is exclusive to the UK.
joan2468@reddit
Some areas have definitely been in decline. For example, I went to Cardiff about a decade ago and remember it being very pleasant. I went again recently and was absolutely shocked at how much it had declined.
melonofknowledge@reddit
Cardiff is fine, for the most part. I've lived here for 33 years without issue. What has got worse in recent years is the number of severely mentally unwell homeless people in the city centre, plus an increase in vacant lots in the city centre. I think these two things in particular give a really awful impression when you're around the main shopping streets. There's lots about it that's improved over the past decade, though. Public transport is generally better, there are some really great places to eat, more independent shops in the arcades, and more events. It's 6 of one and half a dozen of another, really.
joan2468@reddit
I think the two things you mentioned are what gave me a bad impression. I remember walking down one of the main streets and being shocked at how many people were rough sleeping out and drunk, and just overall feeling like the place was shabby.
melonofknowledge@reddit
That's fair; the rough sleeping issue is definitely worse than it was pre-Covid. There's also certainly a large proportion of rough sleepers with really severe mental health issues who aren't getting the support they need at all. I don't think that's unique to Cardiff, though. I had the same impression when I went to Bath recently. I feel like many cities are suffering from a lack of mental health resources and housing at the moment.
RumJackson@reddit
From my experience, Cardiff is one of the better faring cities these days. Make of that what you will.
RedPill86@reddit
I wonder if this could easily be answered in the form of a visual representation of a time-lapse of the U.K. map with the growth of bookies and/or vape shops
DropDeadDigsy@reddit
More racists
EatingCoooolo@reddit
I live in London (since 2015. From Brighton) and have maybe seen people fighting after a night out maybe one two or three times a year. I guess it depends what you’re into and get exposed to.
zoomoovoodoo@reddit
Portsmouth used to be just kind of shitty but now people are putting rambo knives in each other in broad daylight so.. fun times. Can't believe I used to walk those streets as a kid.
Royal_IDunno@reddit
You only just noticed?
Equal-Competition930@reddit
Well where I live now and where I brought up is always been rough and they are big problems with anti social behaviour including knife crime, robbery etc but believe some people are getting better, soon I predict with closed of correct shops may get worst, some are definitely declining due to circumstances and some it unknown how they end up . But I come from up north south yorkshire. No telling which city but someone who very outspoken comes from there. And actually village which famously infamous in the media.
Greybur@reddit
Nah mate.
I'll admit that I'm older now, don't spend my day doing what I used to do, and am doing alright financially, but...
90s were fucking mental mate, just had to be a teen growing up in it.
Media coverage is massively up though. I think that bit started in the 90s and they have perfected it now.
cheekynandos85@reddit
It’s hard to say feels like it but I think it’s always been bad in some parts of the country. I’d argue places like Manchester have improved with less gun violence and gang violence than it did in the 90s. One thing we don’t take into account is that we see it more now via social media, YouTube etc crime is more in our face. One thing I will say I think as a country we have become more accepting of it especially petty crimes.
jez_24@reddit
I guess it depends what you mean by rough. Trashy (tan, lashes, those filters that make you look like an elf thing) or actually dangerous? As in proper knife crime dangerous?
JoeDaStudd@reddit
They always have been, it's just winos are being replaced with spiceheads/monkeydust users.
Some places are getting gentrified and new developments built but a lot of the traditionally rough areas are just getting more concentrated with worse drug use and poverty.
FarArtist927@reddit
It does feel that way in many areas. Recent cost of living rises, council cuts, and crime rates have impacted local life. Some towns have always been rough, but austerity since 2010 made it worse. ONS data shows deprivation growing in parts of the North and Midlands.
Royal-Jackfruit-2556@reddit
Yes, year by year things get worse. As the divide of those that have over those that will never have continues it will only carry on getting worse.
ta-maku@reddit
It’s grim up north. I actually think a lot of places in the north are getting nicer aesthetically but there’s far more homeless or social nuisances knocking about which can make it seem rougher.
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