no balls, on 30 October 2011 - 06:33 PM, said:

Sadly (Halloween) seems to be taking over from Bonfire night.

 

 

There seems to be no 'independent' bonfires these days, either because the kids are too fooking lazy to collect bommy wood (eeeeh, when I were a lad a rusty nail right through yer foot were a right of passage) or lack of supervising adults - giving the lads in the Fire Service no choice but to be party poopers.

 

So the waning in importance of a British tradition, to be usurped by a North American one, I forward, is due to...

 

A. The majority of kids these days are bone idle and collecting wood is too much like hard work.

 

B. A lot of children are wrapped in cotton wool, even if they wanted to organize a fire, they'd be forbidden from doing so.

 

C. Adults are also too fecking lazy or engrossed in the latest shite on the telly to help supervise, giving the Firemen a major ballache.

 

and

 

D. Many Adults who would help out are too paranoid - of being viewed as some sinister, nonce type figure, for associating with children in normal, healthy pursuits - like having a Bonfire. This situation being totally counter-productive, almost granting a beasts' charter. The less 'normal' folk willing to get involved and keep an eye out for 'suspects', one may argue will increase the chances of a nonce...

 

This isn't coming from someone of the Bill Naughton era - I'm barely into my mid 30s. And when I was a kid we had STs (that's Atari STs NOT STDs, well some did...), Amigas, BMXs/Mountain bikes, Gameboys, Segas, Videoshops (remember them?) and loads of other distractions - The Water Place was newly built for example, the town centre had a cinema etc. but nearly every gang/area would still have a bonfire (and would nick wood from each other). Adults would come along with pasties (from ye olde pastie shop), black peas, homemade meat potato pie and other stuff - this is mid to late 1980s too, not the 1930s...

Edited November 1, 201114 yr by Youri McAnespie

Xmas = Crossmas surely?