Oxenholme

On Saturday on my way back from Edinburgh something happened. It has been reported in the press, and I don’t wish to go into my own experiences of it here, largely because I think they would be unhelpful, such is the way when a large body of people witness something.

This morning I received a letter from Virgin trains. During the event I felt that the company and the members of the staff performed brilliantly. Just before the incident happened, whilst dealing with a passenger without a ticket, I had heard a guard say how hard his day had been so far, and I was thinking how well he was representing the company in dealing with her.

However the letter today has increasingly concerned me. To start with, I was a little surprised that the company felt it should offer me compensation at all. Had the two hour delay been caused by some error on their part, I naturally would have taken them up on their absurdly generous offer of refunding my outward and return journeys, but this obviously was outside of their hands. What really troubles me, however, is the following paragraph in the letter:

I would like to reassure you that this type of serious crime is extremely rare on our trains. However, in an increasingly violent society the potential for this type of incident is, unfortunately, always present.

They have moved me from wanting to write a letter of thanks for their handling of the situation, to one of complaint. Increasingly violent, indeed. Perhaps then I should take to living on their trains where such things are 'extremely rare’.

Comments

[dearieme]

Sorry, I don't understand your objection to "increasingly violent".

[JRWB]

My objection firstly is that a letter of customer service is hardly the place for a political comment. Secondly, I don't believe there's any real proof that 'society' is becoming 'increasingly violent', if such things could even be proved.

[TIS]

I agree that it's an alarming, stupid thing for them to say. My guess is that it's been written by a legal person. Hence the bizarre shift from reassurance to apportioning blame to something large/external/un-sue-able. This also fits with offering compensation.

[tc]

i think this refund policy is a dangerous one. It will only encourage more people to incite violent crime in order to get their money back.

[dearieme]

"Secondly, I don't believe there's any real proof that 'society' is becoming 'increasingly violent'." Quite right. It's the members of society who are becoming increasingly violent.

[JRWB]

Are they?

[AJE]

I agree with James - I don't see any evidence that "society is becoming more violent", and believe it's a classic information cascade.

Here's John Stossel for a related example

MYTH: Schools are violent.

TRUTH: Schools are pretty safe.

Media bad news bears love crime and violence. Turn on the television or pick up a tabloid, and you will be convinced that you have more to fear than ever before. Terrible things are happening, and everyone knows they're happening much more often. These stories are more candidates for the shovel. The gory pictures and the excited copy conceal the actual TRUTH: America is safer than almost any country in human history.

The Columbine, Jonesboro, and Paducah school shootings during the late 1990s triggered a regular spate of stories about "spreading school violence." But school violence in America had been steadily decreasing. Violent crimes in schools dropped by half between 1992 and 2002, although reporting about school violence increased.

The shooting incidents were awful, but aberrations; more Americans die from lightning strikes than from school violence. More kids die in bathtubs. But the media had become obsessed with school violence. In the wake of Columbine, my network aired 383 stories about the tragedy. Sam Donaldson warned wary parents and students about "angry teens turning up in other towns." CBS News correspondent Bob McNamara called school shootings "an American nightmare that too many schools know too well."

But it wasn't a nightmare that schools knew well. In fact, students are probably safer in school than they are at home or at the mall. Crime statistics show that kids are twice as likely to be victims of violence away from school than they are in school.

The media hysteria encouraged people who run schools to do crazy things, like spend thousands of dollars on security cameras, and hire police officers to guard the doors. Some schools terrified students by running SWAT team drills; cops burst into classrooms and ordered kids down to the floor. The result? Kids in school felt less secure than ever before. Though school violence was down, studies show kids were more scared. "They can't learn under these conditions," says Dr. Frank Farley, former head of the American Psychological Association. To listen to the media, Dr. Farley told me, you'd have to believe that Chicken Little was right: "The sky is truly falling. America is in terrible straits and our schools are a mess and they're violent. But they are not violent. I don't know why there is all this press coverage, other than the need for a story."

That's it. The media beast must be fed. Scares drive up circulation and ratings.

[tc]

It's always pleasantly surprised me that, in nearly five years of living in Liverpool and Manchester, I have never been party to, witnessed, or been the victim of any violent act or crime. However I do feel that society is becoming increasingly VIOLET; which is a symptom of poor diet, too little excercise and the combined stresses of work and family life.

[AJE]

cheers Thomas, you get mugged every time you walk into H&M

(mwah ha ha...)

[JRWB]

Thomas, are you bored?

[tc]

Pretty. It's half term you see. I've no one to entertain me. I'm so bored I even read Tim Worstall's blog. Pendant.

[JRWB]

Pendant?

[Matthew Whitfield]

Yeah, pendant. That's what he meant, okay? You pedant. What a trying shame.

[TC]

Polly Toynbee called him a 'Pendant', which of course he loved. She claims it was a typo, but I wondered about a freudian slip of the finger? Perhaps she was thinking about hanging him, or piercing? Could the pendant be a phallic symbol - a hanging jewell? Perhaps she was trying to say that he's a cock.

[JRWB]

I was going to text you, but this is quicker - I think it's my favourite episode of the Simpsons ever on tonight at 6pm. Oh, and Julian Clarey's on Paul O'Grady (no pun intended) which Matthew's excited about.

[TC]

This has basically become one of the message boards that 'young people' use to chat to their friends hasn't it. Sorry Anthony. And sorry Tim Worstall for suggesting your blog is boring; it's not, I was being characteristically facetious. Is the Simpsons on BBC2? I'll try and watch it. Does anyone else really really want Sezer to get voted off Big Brother?
I know I do.

[JRWB]

YEAH M8 SEZA 2 GO! MAKOSI 2 WIN!!!1 LOL ROFL!!!!!1

It's on Channel 4, at 6.

[TC]

Thank you. It was excellent and I'm not sure that I'd seen it before. I particularly enjoyed the tall man in the small car at the end - "Do you find something amusing about my appearence?...that's the largest automobile that I could afford to buy" I found his formality of speech most amusing.

[Quinn]

That'll be the "22 short films about Springfield" episode then? My favourite part is the "Skinner and the Superintendent" bit...
"Seymour, the kitchen's on fire"
"No Mother, it's just the Northern Lights".

Tim Worstall's blog certainly isn't boring, but I admit I require a degree of boredom before I bother to read it, mainly because he is so unnecessarily prolific.