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Weekend nightime demographics/behaviour in ED (Lounged)


SeanMacGabhann

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I've started this thread as snorky made some excellent points in a thread appealing for witnesses but I felt it would end up being lounged if we continued this conversation there.. so:


Snorky said:

"There is a change in the demographic of LL at weekends - Ive comented on this ebfore, but you will find groups of rought n tumble white males trekking to LL for the " posh totty" on offer - dito, you will alos see an increasing number of visting cacking girls groups who are not locals, power drinking until the early hours


snotty arrogant gradutaes with ironic T shirts vs. leathered Working class males in groups = bother


go to Clapham or Hoxton and see it in action.


( no reflection on original posters appeal BTW )


expect more of the Friday night action as the lane gets busier.


more fighting


more litter


more broken glass


more puke


more cop cars


more ambulances


more disturbances


it is of course a licence to print money for the publicans, so they will keep schtum about the fallout from such expansion


this, sadly, is part of the baggage you get with living in such a vibrant and trendy part of London - and not something most people consider when they move here.


it makes you nostagic for the simple open thuggery of Kings on the Rye"

----------------------


Which I pretty much agree with - however I would argue that having a thriving restaurant/bar scene is A Good Thing. Bar owners shouldn't be responsible for the behaviour of idiots.


The question surely is "why can't people in Britain have a drink without behaving as appalingly as they often do?"

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Maybe one day they will.

We all grew up with the pubs-shut-at-11-quick-lets-get-tanked mentality. Best thing that happened to this country was the change in licensing laws, however I think it'll take a long time for the old mentality to ebb away, perhaps another generation.

In fact I see the necking it mentality less than I did, though we still have a tendency to stay in pubs until throwing out time / spilling our beer on the floor, whether we're enjoying ourselves or not.


Will a change in binge-drinking behaviour alter the likelihood of what Snorky describes? I doubt it sadly; I think booze and violence is inextricably linked in many people's idea of a night out. I witness it damn near every time I go back to Hitchin to visit old friends in the small town mentality there (it's amazing how much violence and threat of it was a pervasive facet of my youth, I forget sometimes) and what Snorks describes here is hardly surprising if a bit depressing.


I know Clapham pretty well and Hoxton very well, and they're not nearly as bad as is being suggested. I hope these sorts of incidents remain pretty isolated on LL, and perhaps a higher police presence at midnightish may be desired, but god knows the Met in Southwark have bigger concerns than occasional thuggery in East Dulwich, as horrible as that thuggery (re the other thread) can certainly prove to be.

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Sean - I was in Islington on Friday night and back home on LL on Saturday. While they are obviously not the same, there is a danger LL is heading that way. I think it is also only follwoing a pattern established almost every toher town/city centre across the country.


Yeah, if you live in a "trendy" or desirable area like ED it is inevitable that the "wrong sort" will want to come along to. What happens is a place becomes noted for being cool or nice to go out. Fine when it starts but of course everyone wants to go to the cool places, and they stop being cool because they're too successful.


On the wider socio-alcoholic issues, the best way to combat this is for people to police their own behaviour and that of others. I wish that we could step in and intervene without fearing for our own personal saftey though. And how do we create a culture where yobbish behaviour is unacceptable?


Most people do though go out and don't cause anyone else any bother but themselves and their livers. I still think ED is the place I moved to over a year ago, and the reason I moved here still stands: you can go out and not see any bother at all. It is relatively safe (compared to neighbouring boroughs) but it is worrying to hear about violence like that on the other thread. Does anyone know if there has been a recent actual (ie recorded) rise in attacks like this, or crime in general?

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barry - tis true what you say. Compared to many other places it's not really that bad and I'm not actually that bothered. Myself and LadyMacGabhann were able to make our way home (via dodgy take away outlet) with nary a hint of menace (or bus come to that)


But I am still interested in the psychology of the whole thing


Oh and well done Piers for so vividly bringing back memories of my youth also, having washed up in Swindon as but a slip of a lad I too forget just how intimidated I used to be

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On the upside, the main drag is relatively confined and doesn't have (and I'm sure, won't have) any nightclubs.


Were there not regular punch-ups in the ED boozeries of old anyway? Or were they good old-fashioned rose-tinted punch-ups as opposed to the new breed of Moet-quaffing, Bugaboo-style punch-ups?

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"don't the pubs have an obligation as part of their licence to stop serving the severely pissed?"

Yes they do, but as Snorky suggested, there's a big financial incentive in not doing so.


As it goes the Black Cherry has suggested I might want to sleep it off once or twice and advice was duly followed.

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snorky Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> We are some way from the opening of a branch oF

> Streathams Ceasers in ED i think ( "?20 entry, all

> drinks free" )


An "eat as much as you want" buffet is also included in the entry price.

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Of course Bob, there were always punch-ups on the Lane years ago and for the most part that seems to have gone and the place is all the better for it but I think what may have happened on this occasion is two big sporting events, people spending all day drinking in the pub. Not that that should be an excuse for such boorish and thugish behaviour. Unfortunately some people get aggressive when they've had to much to drink and ruin things for everyone else.
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It always was a bit rough in LL, there were a few very nasty 'firms' that used to drink in the pubs. You kept yourself to yourself in those days. Big biker mob at the Mag in the late 60's early 70's if I remember rightly. But there weren't the middle classes in ED then that there are now and the aggression tended to be between people who knew of or knew each other. It all seems more random these days. Actually Sunday morning ED was a bit like a war zone. Nasty car crash into the bus stop opposite The Green and a bloke lying down in the road in Lordship Lane in front of a bus.
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I agree about the lisensing laws, but I think at the end of the day there is so much of this stuff going on because people are macho tw@ts. Drink and drugs (specifically coke) don't help matters, but at the end of the day, a lot of these blokes just like a fight, and would do it anyway. They are nasty bastards drink or no drink.


It's not only here though, I agree it's a problem here, but not an exclusively British one.

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"don't the pubs have an obligation as part of their licence to stop serving the severely pissed?"


Yes, that's how it's supposed to work.


I went to Budgens (it will always be Seven/11 to me) at about 1am on Friday after driving back from Highgate and Lordship Lane seemed busy, but quietly so. While I was in the shop, a group of youngish guys came in, two of who were obviously be worse for wear and loud. While I didn't perceive them as threatening (the only seemed interested in drunkenly comparing how many phone numbers they'd managed to acquire during the evening - and I bet a few were false), I wondered if they were likely to become targets for others with more malevolent intentions as they flashed their mobile phones around.


I think they fell into the demographic of those most likely to be involved in or to become the victims of violence and crime.


On the issue of Lordship Lane, it's changed beyond recognition in the last 5 years and 10 years ago it was almost a wasteland, with only the ED comedy club to attract people here. However, I do know that it could be a violent place even then, and I don't see that much has changed in that respect. It may just be that it affects different people now, and there is the internet on which to highlight incidents and theorise about them (just like I'm doing).


Oh, and when I came to live in ED (exactly 20 years ago on 30th September), I was warned by someone I worked with who lived on Barry Road that ED was a hotbed of knife crime. I never really saw it myself.

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Me neither, but remember the Mag having a terrible rep when I was a teenager (early to mid 90's).

The Castle was always well known for fights too, as was The Plough for a while when it became the horrific Goose & Granite.


Actually, the EDT was pretty rough back then too... Everywhere was really.


You should have tried drinking down the Old Kent Road back in those days... That was really scary!

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The problem does seem to be a predominantly British or at least Northern European one. I have spent some time in Mediterranean countries where drinking is mainly confined to meals. Young people gather in large groups in Italy, France and Spain as they do here, but there it is perceived to be terribly 'uncool' be to drunk rather than 'clever'. The Government cites the cheapness of alcohol here, but you can buy a litre of very drinkable wine in the supermarket in Italy for 1 Euro! You just don't get 14 years olds buying it and necking in the park.


I've been in East Dulwich for 20 years too (August bank holiday just gone), and felt that the gentrification has made it much safer - before I began reading this forum!!! Perhaps we've now gone beyond gentrification into trendification (is that a word) and have to take the consequences.


Just as long as it doesn't affect the house prices eh!

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There are problems as are highlighted here but to be honest it is certainly no worse then elsewhere in south London. I think folk tend to forget where it is they live. The internet (EDF) manages to raise awareness and sometimes unintentional hysteria/lamentation but in effect it's really not so bad. For one the prices on the Lane will put many propsective punters off. Whereas if there was a Weatherspoons on the Lane you might actually see a real increase in 'undersirables'.


I've never really seen rowdy behaviour, that might be because I go the LL on Saturday/Sunday mornings or Friday nights. Never Saturdays nights when I might want to shake a leg - there are much better areas to go to for that sort of thing which is a view I assume other people would share.

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