The Feral Youth Pandemic

There is a pandemic in the UK, a disease that has spread slowly and gathered momentum like a snowball rolling down a hill in Yorkshire. It isn't regulated to one area, wherever you go in the country you will see the cause and effect.

I am of course talking about balaclava wearing young men, walking around cities with knives/machetes tucked down their trackies or, riding high powered electric motorcycles or stolen motorcycles with no helmets and often two or three cramped onto the seat.

On May 7th 2026 in Newport, Wales, two teenagers riding a motocross bike died when they were hit by a car. Neither rider was wearing a helmet and they were riding a motorcycle built for off road use which was illegal to ride on the UK roads. Two men aged 18 & 34 have been charged with murder.

This is just one of 100s of similar events, and while it is tragic that a parent must bury their child, which is something no parent should have to do. We should take into account that they were acting in an illegal manner, this doesn't excuse the actions of the car driver either and we don't know the full details as to why this happened.

In the last two years alone there have been approximately 114 young people under the age of 25 who have died while riding an illegal bike, this includes motocross bikes, Surons and similar high powered or home-made Electric bikes (not UK legal EPAC electrically pedal assisted cycles) and stolen motorcycles.

52 of these were in 2024 and a 19% increase in 2025 which saw 62 deaths. 43 of those in 2024 involved a collision with a car and in fourteen of these cases the driver has been convicted of murder, manslaughter or death by dangerous driving.

That is 114 young men who had their whole lives ahead of them, killed by playing a game of chicken with the law on illegal bikes. That is more than one per week and behind every one of those 114 deaths is an adult who was either harassed, had a bike stolen, or a driver whose life has been ruined in a split-second encounter with a 'feral' attitude. Not to mention the parents and other family members who are left to grieve the losses.

The national media tend to label these balaclava wearing bike thieves as “Bikers”. As someone who has lived the biker scene, even though I no longer ride, I see that as an insult. Bikers earn their motorcycles, they respect and look out for their brothers and sisters and although some may look intimidating, the majority are the nicest and most charitable people you could wish to meet.

During the years I was involved in the biker scene I carried a knife, a beautifully made Indian boot knife with brass cross guard and pommel with some kind of exotic wood perfectly shaped for its grip, and housed in a very comfortable leather sheath with a clip. For 20 years I carried that knife either in my boots under my leather trousers, or clipped to my belt. Never once did I feel the need to use it on a person, it was a tool of the road and was there to cut food, help make a fire, clean my nails (yes even bikers groom) or even whittle a piece of wood if I was bored and it never saw blood.

I got into many fights in those days too, and even though the knife was tucked away in my boot, it stayed there because I understood that though it was a tool, it could easily be used to take a life. I was taught from a young age about weapons and what they could do, this didn't make me want to go out and hack people to death, instead it gave me a healthy understanding of the cause and effect factor involved.

I still have a vast collection of knives as can be seen in the main image of this article, most of these are pocket knives or kitchen knives. The exceptions are the yellow handled wood carving knife or whittling knife, the small fixed blade military looking knife, the dirk and sgian-dubh's and of course the Viking style sword. Take a closer look at the below image of these knives, which would you think would be more likely to be used/carried by a teenager.

If you chose any of the knives from A-J you would be incorrect. Although any knife can be a dangerous weapon in the wrong hands it is more likely that a knife crime will be committed by someone wielding a common kitchen knife or a machete (not pictured).

For someone like me the collection you see in the picture is a combination of tools and ornaments for historic research (along with a few other historical weapons I own and display on my wall).

To a feral child they see a collection of weapons they can use to intimidate and cause harm with, do you see the difference?

Point a gun at a person and pull the trigger, or point it at a tree and shoot, we all know what happens when the bullet makes contact. We've seen it a thousand times in movies and computer games. But differentiating between the fiction and the reality seems to be difficult for today's youth.

So, what has changed? Why is it that most of my generation (I was born in the 70s) grew up with respect? We respected our elders, the Police (in most cases) and we respected other peoples possessions.

Just the sound of my Dad's voice would put the fear of God into us, I only ever recall him using his belt on me once and even then it wasn't enough to leave marks. It did however teach me not to disobey him and kept me out of trouble with the law until my late teens. Just to clarify my brushes with the law were down to being dragged into situations by friends and not directly something I did.

To anyone who opens their eyes to what is happening in our country with our children, it seems that patient zero of this pandemic is a direct result of do-gooders banning parents from disciplining their kids. As soon as the younger generations realised this, they also realised that they could do whatever they wanted without repercussions from their parents, and those parents who dared to disobey the law and gave their kids a clip round the ear, well they would have been reported to child services for abuse.

Of course there were those parents who took discipline to the extremes and went overboard, resulting in children being hurt or worse in some cases. Before the 1989 Act preventing parents disciplining kids there was on average one to two children killed by a parent or guardian each week in England and Wales.

This of course is a sad truth, but surprisingly, according to the NSPCC, that average hasn't changed since the 1989 Act. So, with that in mind it seems that discipline was not a major factor in those tragic losses.

The statistics will tell you that youth crime is down, because the court rooms are emptier. While it may be true that less under 25's are being called to court, the reality is that knife admissions to hospital for kids are up 33% from a decade ago. The 1989 Act didn't make kids safer it just made them realise that the voice of authority had been silenced. They no longer had to answer to anyone or pay a price for their actions.

We traded a generation of disciplined young men for a generation where 91% of crimes result in no charge at all. I don't see that as progress I see its surrender. We have been forced to stepped aside and allow the state to parent our children, and then the actual parents are blamed for the actions of their children.

Is this right? Should a parent who has been stripped of all authority by the Government, now take responsibility for the actions of a feral child? There will be those parents and others out there now reading this probably pulling their hair out and screaming at the screen “BUT THEY'RE JUST CHILDREN!” or “THE PARENTS SHOULD BE HELD TO ACCOUNT” or even “WELL MY KIDS AREN'T LIKE THAT AND I NEVER HAD TO HIT THEM”.

While this may be true, there are other factors at play. Peer pressure being the main one. How many children have been victims of bullying? Often this bullying results in the victim being forced to do things they don't want to. In other cases the child wants to be accepted by the pack, and this too can cause them to do things they wouldn't normally consider doing. We could also look at movies and games that show violence as being fun or cool, young minds are impressionistic and often fear not fitting in or being accepted by their peers. Although we too, as children, were exposed to violence in movies and on TV, and in the 1980s video games, it seems however that my generation had the sense to separate the fiction from reality.

Back in the 70s and 80s no one battered an eyelid at a kid wielding a wooden stick, a toy sword or a toy gun. You could even walk down the street carrying an air rifle and people knew automatically you were going out shooting bottles/targets or if you were into hunting going after vermin like rats, rabbit and pigeon. It was more likely that a kid carrying a weapon (or something perceived as a weapon) would be on their way to a patch of open land or woodland to play at being Soldiers or Cowboys & Indians.

If we are to place the blame anywhere though, I would place it firmly on those who abolished discipline in the home in 1989. We now live in a country where the youth run wild, carry deadly weapons and are violent and abusive on a daily basis to adults and authority. Where the fear of defending yourself against a gang of masked youths is prevalent in the minds of anyone who has been confronted by them. An adult cannot defend themselves against a child according to the law, even if that child is 6ft and built like Mike Tyson and brandishing a 2ft razor sharp machete.

We fear defending our hard earned possessions and homes, our transportation and our lives. The way I see it is we, as adults have several options.

Option 1: Take back control, to do this the laws need to be changed and parents should have their discipline privileges reinstated with the provision that only certain forms of physical punishment be used such as a slipper or newspaper. Something that will hurt but not leave a mark or damage the child. All that should be damaged is their attitude problem and lack of respect.

Option 2: Allow adults and victims of feral youths to fight back. If these boys think they are men enough to wield a weapon or steal a bike should be given a good hiding. Remove their mask and weapon and they are nothing but scared little boys hiding behind those tools and their pack of like-minded rabble.

Option 3: This seems to be the perfect solution to me. Military School. Now before all those who are opposed to war jump on the bandwagon and start spouting about not sending our kids to war. I am not referring to full blown military training, the last thing these youths need is being trained to kill. No, I am referring to a disciplined regime similar to military training without being trained in self defence and weapons training.

A school where they must call the adults Sir or Madam, where bad behaviour is punished with extra chores or exercise. A place where they can be taught how to repair and build the motorcycles instead of stealing them, or be taught another trade. Somewhere they can be taught real life skills like how to pay taxes, cook, clean and look after your health among other things.

I am not from a military background myself. Unfortunately when I went to join up at 17yrs old, I was told they wouldn't take me due to being colourblind. I wanted to join the Royal Signals just like my Dad had, but unlike my Dad I wanted to join to be one of the White Helmets, the Signals motorcycle display team.

My Dad was in the Royal Signals. My Maternal Grandfather was in the Royal Engineers during WWII. My Paternal Grandfather was in the Lancashire Fusiliers and was killed in WWII serving his county. And my Australian Cousin is still serving in the military, my cousin being a high ranking officer in the Australian Navy. All disciplined and respectful men.

I took another path to learn respect, the path of Bikers. Much like the military we had a hierarchy in the clubs although the types of MCC and association clubs I was in are much less disciplined than the MC back patch clubs.

You wouldn't place the White Helmets in the same category as a balaclava/tracksuit wearing youth on a stolen motorcycle, so why put them in the same category as an MC or MCC club member, or a solo rider who has earned every scar, every bit of gravel rash, every rally or run they attended? And every patch they wear with pride.

These youths are not bikers, and the media should not refer to them as such, they should be called exactly what they are “Motorcycle thieves” “Illegal bike Riders” or just plain old “Feral youths”.

There are people calling for more power to stop bike thefts, they are pissed to say the least with the lack of response and/or help from the Police or local authorities. To the point many are wanting to take the law into their own hands....and who can blame them.

I see reports on Social Media every day showing CCTV of young men (predominantly) with their hoods or balaclava hiding their features. Usually involved in theft of a bike or breaking into/stealing cars/vans. Then there are the almost daily media reports and YouTube videos of Feral youths running around town hacking at each other or attacking members of the public. The age group is prevalent and obvious to those who care to look, as is the sex as these crimes tend to be committed by young men a lot more than young women.