In an article on English yoofery (to coin a word), the Economist comments, "It is true that more teenage British wenches are got with child than other European ones, and that British teenagers are unusually prone to taking drugs, fighting, venereal disease and boozing..."; and "there is something else peculiar to British families, at least among Europeans—an oddity that is especially salient at this time of year. Visitors to piazzas or plazas are likely to see several generations of continental families happily talking, eating and even dancing together. British children, by contrast, spend relatively little time with their parents, and not only because the parents aren't around: many see fraternising with them in public as a fate worse than a mobile phone without a camera. Meanwhile, as that senior policeman complained this week, many British parents, whether there are one or two of them, seem indifferent to their children's antics, or incurious about them. Since the clubs and churches that once thrust them together have withered, unrelated youngsters and older people don't talk much either."
A caveat. The Economist also says, "But few who drink or smoke pot graduate to knife crime. Many do none of these things; most are better-off and better-educated than ever."
http://www.economist.com/world/britain/displaystory.cfm?story_id=9653083
