When common contributors to youth crime like drug and alcohol abuse, poverty, and family dysfunction seemingly become impossible to combat, what can those responsible for fixing it do? In the Victoria Police’s case, you take a tired and unproven old excuse from the 90s and rewrap it: you blame the Internet.
About 10,000 Victorian children aged 10 to 14 have been cautioned by police, arrested or ordered to appear in court in the past year, as a surge in youth crime continues.
Victoria Police say the escalation in juvenile crimes ? ranging from break and enters to drug offences and assaults ? is being fuelled by children’s growing exposure to sexual and violent images on the internet.
[…]
The head of the police youth affairs office, Inspector Steve Soden, said too many children were viewing inappropriate content on the internet and this, coupled with boredom due to a lack of community services on Melbourne’s fringes, was behind the alarming rise in youth crime.
No evidence of a causal relationship between the two or proof that youth crime is even rising necessary; Just the word of one Inspector. The media never forgets how fun a witch hunt can be.
