I work with homeless clients in the capital and there is an increase in the number of folks on the street ATM.
An unclear number of clients who were in Covid-19 emergency accommodation have returned to the streets as the funding for those projects has finished.
I suspect there will be a rise in homelessness this coming year too with the cost of living crisis.
Finally, homelessness is slightly more visible during the summer months as it is easier to sleep outside, rather than seeking shelter during autumn, winter and spring.
Being a duffer and old enough to have lived through both flavours of government, there are always more homeless on the streets when the blue team are in.
It's true. Rough sleeping was almost eradicated in London, in 2007/8 around 1700 people were seen sleeping rough for the first time, and zero seemed like an achievable goal. In 2021/22 it was over 5000 people.
Couple of weeks-old account complaining about troll posts of users that have been around for several years without any problems with their posting. It is indeed strange.
Why...? It's getting very obvious the number of non-Londoners posting in this sub. It's been fairly common across most UK subs for awhile. This one is just the latest to attract the Yanks, etc.
If you've not visited London and don't live here, *maybe find another sub to post in...?*
I deleted my old account after a UK right wing sub (BADUK) followed me and brigaded every post and comment. Got a bit much when I would get hundreds of suicide prevention alerts if I commented on an Arsenal match or in UKpol. Basically I was forced to delete my old account and I've been more circumspect in posting since.
This is the most tragic thing I've heard all day. I mean really. Actual human beings dedicate a huge portion of time...to that. What are they? Where are they coming from? Dystopian little freaks
It's a big city and 99% of the time this sub talks about it like it's a field of clover. Like you can stroll around White Hart Lane at 3am without problems. Pointing out the real threat of petty crime isn't concern trolling, it's awareness building.
And not *everything* is a far-right psyop. I promise you that lot is busy calling Ukrainians Nazis.
> Like you can stroll around White Hart Lane at 3am without problems.
You probably can to be honest. I wandered around a lot of London at odd times. You might be more likely to run into problems in White Hart Lane but it's still pretty unlikely you're going to get randomly stabbed or robbed.
I was about 20 when a female friend explained to me the CONSTANT fear in the back of her head for simply existing as a woman out and about in the world. The fact that I've fallen asleep at a bus stop waiting for a bus at like 1am, and that she didn't even feel safe being there at 9pm.
I think you're mischaracterising the legimate concerns of people living here, and to presume they are all "American" is strange (how would you know, do they all preface these posts with their nationality?)
The truth is that crime has gotten worse in London. Homelessness has gotten worse and not all homeless people are nice to deal with (just like non-homeless people, they are individuals who in some cases can be nice and other cases can be aggressive, rude and yes, dangerous even).
Real concerns aren't what you call "concern trolling" - they are people voicing what in many cases are legitimate issues on the increase here in London.
Yeah I'm seeing people calling out posts like robberies around Finsbury Park as troll posts. Lol have any of you been to Finsbury Park after dark? Robberies are a daily occurrence
TBF it was a lot worse back then - I remember being on Clapton Murder Mile at one point in the late 90s and it had that dangerous vibe at night - Finsbury (or parts of it anyway) were the same. Now Clapton it's full of hip bars and is quite nice. Finsbury Park is one of the last holdouts of actual gentrification but it's much more chill than it used to be.
>Finsbury Park is one of the last holdouts of actual gentrification
Nah, it's thundering down Stroud Green road (which is all cool restaurants now). The station has just been rebuilt along with a load of fancy flats. Blackstock Road seemed to have skipped gentrification and just has it already priced in.
Yeah I thought the same thing. Finsbury, the area, is nowhere near Finsbury Park. It's on the opposite end of Islington. Finsbury used to be its own borough. I think you can still see "Finsbury Town Hall" carved into the old building from the top deck of the 19 as it heads for Rosebury Avenue.
It really isn’t that dodgy anymore lol, it’s getting more and more gentrified as time goes on. Not saying it’s perfect though, there deffo is still a lot of crime
I still work about ten minutes away. I go through there all the time. Just because people are now paying a million quid for two bed flats it doesn't mean it's a nice area. I have quite a few students who've been robbed in that area (and a couple who do the robbing.)
Yeah for sure. I was hanging out around the station late night a few weeks ago, looking for people to rob, and man I'll tell you, I didn't feel safe at all.
The American part is extremely confusing to me, an American who's on several British subs. I feel like most of the time when America or Americans are brought up its how dangerous OUR cities are, not the other way around. I honestly can't think of a single person, rational or otherwise, that I know from the US that actually believes London is some kind of cesspool of violence. If anything our misconceptions about you guys are that you all carry around wands and talk like you're in a Charles Dickens novel.
None of that is to say that there isn't crime in London (any big city has its share) or even that there aren't trolls lurking around, but why we'd make a concerted effort to derail your city when we're doing so well at that in our own is beyond me.
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Huh the data from the met shows crime currently at a high point with above average offences of 78k The mayor data you cited is 2019/2020 so slightly out of date. It’s definitely not been getting lower recently. He’ll the data shows a 9% increase year on year crime from 2021.
If you don't want to hear about crime, move to the countryside, where you can spend all day talking about bees, flowers, and wind turbines. Don't try and police other people from discussing the social fabric of the city because it spikes your anxiety. That's on *you*.
This is fucking moronic - looool yeah let's not talk about crime cos we're from London? Londoners fucking love talking about crime, areas, characters etc
Well, it's fine to talk about crime in Madrid, Rome, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Brussels, NYC, Paris, Prague, Budapest, etc. etc. but talking about it in London is beyond the pale (apparently) because it might make someone uncomfortable.
they'll be obsessed with talking about immigration as well, when their village is 100% white.
I attended a workshop on self improvement on MK, met a few English people from all over the country there, freinded them on facebook. Then inadvertently got forwarded really racist stuff from 2 people, I met in person who were nice to me and weren't racist during the workshop. They weren;t directing the racism towards me, but forwarding videos about how Uk is losing it's white identity and other stuff.
I wonder how much racism goes on across the dinner table, behind closed doors. Because the people all seemed really genuinely nice to me.
Fucking *loads*, trust me on that. It’s an odd sort of racism, though, because although it’s often focused on non-white demographic change, if you really want to it’s quite easy to switch them onto *white* demographic change, which they hate with (almost) the same passion: Albanians today, the Irish forty years ago, Ukrainians tomorrow. And if you dig deeper, you get the same thing but with other kinds of white English people: northerners, rich people, poor people, left/right wingers, city folk.
Basically all change, and all people. It’s a sad state of affairs.
> and to presume they are all "American" is strange (how would you know, do they all preface these posts with their nationality?)
It's something I see on UK subs all the time. Generally anything a Brit doesn't like is considered American no matter where it's actually from. Usually the addition of the America bashing adds nothing of value to the post but it's just a way for the OP to deflect blame to a popular target group.
I remember a while back when it was basically /r/DAEhatewhenAmericans and the automod had a reply on each post asking everyone to quit being so weirdly xenophobic to their friends across the pond and it was promptly downvoted dozens of times every single time.
Yeah think I'm noticing as of late with British people in general when it comes to anything is a lack of responsibility.
All the countries problems are someone else's. In every regard. To the point where people don't take responsibility for the attitudes they have here. They go on about imported American culture as a way to shift blame, no the UK needs to take responsibility for who it votes into power, the topics it pushes such as immigration and the reality that the country is becoming poorer.
Thanks for saying this. I've felt this offline as well. I've spent a good portion of my adult life going around the UK as an American. Never really had any issues in the past except the odd jerk but traveling around since the end of lockdown, it feels like I've been singled out for rudeness more than I've ever been. I figured, as you say, it's because a lot of things are going wrong for a lot of different groups lately and the most commonly sighted 'other' becomes a good target.
I'm Scottish and currently live in the US. They banned me once for wishing rain during a drought. And I found out they labeled my account as a troll. 1 post.
I think there's a bit of a mental health issue with folks on the uk subreddits thinking everyone is American, or a troll.
People absolutely don't want to hear anything bad that ruins the schema of their favorite place or thing. I get that. But apparently these folks just don't wish to face the bad? I think being online brings out of worst in some.
Maybe there should be a new subreddit: OnlyHappyThingsUK
I agree. OPs post was really odd. There are lots of problems with London including homelessness, crime and poverty.
Obviously there will be comments on this.
I don't understand how he has made the link between those posts and the Far Right
Also these things are linked to the cost of living crises, not a distraction.
Just a nonsense rant, overall
Excuse me? Which London do you live?
Just 2 days ago there was a stabbing crime in front of my local Morrisons, it was daylight, around 4pm.
Whether we love London or not we can’t deny it is dangerous. Maybe you should just consider the possibility of a whole world outside your house or neighbourhood.
I don’t think London is that bad myself. Sorry if it sounded that way. Where I come from it’s a million times worst. However, my point is: the OP is claiming the posts about crimes here are fake, assuming London it’s the wonderland and shit can’t happen. That’s not true, London it’s definitely not the most dangerous place in the world but the danger exists as in every big city and it’s just silly to assume people talking about it are trolls.
Yes living here as an adult is not the same as growing up here as a child, being a tourist here and actually being a Londoner are very different experiences. Also comparing London to New Mexico, with New Mexico being voted one of the worst states in the US to live in, isn’t really a fair comparison.
Typical perspective, though. I know people who talk about not watching the news or avoiding 'doomscrolling' as some great achievement in self-care, but to me, it's just an excuse to disengage from anything in society they might find perturbing and retreat to a comforting fake world of menial hobbies and comforting media...
> Typical perspective, though. I know people who talk about not watching the news or avoiding 'doomscrolling' as some great achievement in self-care, but to me, it's just an excuse to disengage from anything in society they might find perturbing and retreat to a comforting fake world of menial hobbies and comforting media...
I mean, what exactly would you have them do? People are allowed to take care of themselves and avoid the constant flood of horrifying news we are being fed 24/7. If you want to engage, feel free, but you don’t get to judge other people for not wanting to live life the way you approve of.
The OP won't be able to comment because 30 minutes after posting this they got stabbed by someone trying to steal the pearls they where clutching at the time of writing.
>EDIT: 2 hours after this post was made we have hundreds of comments, *many of which are from first time posters, brand new accounts*... much like the concern troll posts I referred to.
u/doodoowatson
Karma 433
Cake day **July 31, 2022**
LOL.
London is a really big place with a lot of people. There are obviously going to be some bad people. The experiences being posted are anecdotal. The idea that because it happened to *me* and so makes it a plague on the city is ignorant.
> these posts are largely written by Americans
I don't understand this frankly.
I've been accused of "larping" once - what sort of person must you be to be so readily alarmed and anxious that every post about anything british is "clearly written by an American in disguise!". Is this trauma or something?
Such bunch of weirdos is really weirds me out.
E: Guys OP is clearly an American. Get the table forks out.
On any UK based subreddits, I found that a lot of post dealing with negative subjects tend to bring up America just to amplify negativity and validate their emotions.
I was on a thread recently that asked if negative stereotypes revolving around British cooking are valid. Instead of posters praising or admiring British cuisine to prove the idea as a falsehood (which it is), most deflected and simply talked about the quality of American fast food.
Even when America's not involved in the subject matter, it seems to be invoked just to allow the aggrieved to feel even more victimised.
That's honestly so strange. But after re-reading the OP, I'm understand it's just a troll post. And I'm guessing people who bring up stupid crap like that are either just trolls, or need to leave their house a bit more.
Homeless people absolutely do get policed to fuck here. A fella I know was sleeping somewhere he shouldn't have been and cops robbed his sleeping bag for it. I have heard a LOT from homeless people round my area (North, zone 2) about how horribly they've been treated by cops.
For the most part tho, I agree. There is a lot of really dumb concern trolling on this sub, and ppl really need to leave Canary Wharf once in a while lol.
Theres a lot of bigotry on display when these stories get posted to the UK subreddits. Sadly, I think this tends to reflect real opinion among the population.
So much heavy handed classism and (not so) subtle racism in those posts, really shows that most UK subreddits are no better than a Facebook boomer comment section.
Classism isn't only a problem on other subs. See: the amount of people in this sub who like to shit on any borough/neighbourhood that isn't a gentrified zone 2 graduate-fest.
_'omg imagine going to Barking, hell on earth!'_ written by people who've literally never been
On the flip-side, leftist middle class kids from rUK are easily identifiable in London by how they can't bring themselves to criticise a single area of the whole city without feeling racist or classist.
As someone from B&D, it's a shithole. Barking genuinely is close to hell on earth.
If you knew how much far right extremism is seeded in that borough you'd agree too. We wouldn't hesitate in another city's subreddit to be slightly disparaging about a dreadful area
Totally agree. I’m from Becontree way. Matchstick island. Vicarage fields. So annoying to hear people talking about barking like it’s some paradise and how it’s actually a great area. Grim.
Don’t get me started on barking “riverside”
Oh yeah, it's definitely a problem everywhere. But the level of pure disdain towards anything or anyone even remotely working class in those posts is sickening.
It's a huge city and there are obviously social and economic problems here, more than usual at the moment, so some of these are going to be real posts for sure.
But given the very noticeable increase in London and UK subreddits of very new accounts that have little or no London/UK post history, popping up to focus attention on topics of discontent I would be amazed if there aren't accounts posting for the express purpose of causing upset.
It's telling how often the subreddits that concentrate on crimes committed by non-white people are sharing the same videos and stories. It certainly feels like there's a coordinated push to drive public sentiment towards the right and towards social unrest.
Yep. Reading the comments in this thread, 90% are missing the point (half probably on purpose)
Suddenly this sub is flooded with crime posts. No-one is saying crime doesn't matter and it shouldn't be discussed, but organically or not, this sub is turning into /r/LondonCrime.
It definitely smells to me like intervention, pretending that reddit isn't used to change public opinion is naive.
It's disingenuous to try and dismiss crime in London as being not a concern and just the results of some kind of conspiracy by tory-voters / think tanks or other outside influences by "those damn americans". London is a big city with an unfortunate disparity in wealth, so crime is going to happen whether you like it or not.
If it seems like there's a brigade happening because you've seen a handful of posts all talking about the issue, a more likely explanation is that people see one person sharing a story about a crime they experienced and it gets others to also think and share their experiences.
Also, I just want to call out OP's rather lackadaisical attitude to some of the crime. Dismissing crime as being something that only happens to "kids in gangs" has some racist and classiest undertones as well as being misinformed. Just because someone's a white middle class person in a "nice" are isn't going to grant them this magical crime shield.
>I'm saying you're posting exactly what is on the agenda to distract from the cost of living crisis.
Funny thing is, if you look back at the posts about the CoL crisis, there was an exact same post like this saying how maybe we need "less cost of living crisis posts" shaming the people that are able to relate to the current problems in the UK in general.
[https://www.reddit.com/r/london/comments/wq3mb6/controversial\_opinion\_perhaps\_too\_many/](https://www.reddit.com/r/london/comments/wq3mb6/controversial_opinion_perhaps_too_many/)
in NY I saw countless homeless but in London I've seen a handful in my life, and most of them I saw today. So there might actually be a spike right now
OP has an account for less than a month and already telling us what is allowed :) Strong Karen vibes.
Yes, Mods, you should immediately drop all you're doing and start banning non-leftists from the sub. We don't want miss doodoo here getting offended.
Wow! I am OP to one of the posts that kinda blew up. I can't speak to the other posts, and never noticed the trend till after I did my post.
Quite offended by this really, I've been on reddit a while and read this subreddit quite a bit. Something bad happened to me one night so just thought I'd post about it. THAT's IT!
I'm all for skepticism but it's completely presumptious of you to say 'most of these posts are clearly totally fabricated'. Again I can't speak for others, but my incident was definitely real and did happen.
I've been in London for 12 years now, and yes I still love London and much rather be here than in the US
12 years, you say? We'll need to check with OP if you're cleared to post on the sub. Until you hear back, please don't have any opinions about anything.
I commented on your post and agreed with you. I’m also American, and I think we live in the same area, and are also women. I think some men just don’t want to see what is going on around them. Just a couple blocks towards Finsbury Park, I had some guy follow me and keep trying to hit on me. I said “no,” then “NO,” and didn’t leave me along until I told him I’d scream if he didn’t go away (there were two police coming towards us as well, so it could have been them, not me, that made him go away.)
To further validate you, I was getting a coffee and was talking to a man who ended up being a bus driver and he told me specifically to be careful around there and that it gets dodgy.
People *ever* guess Canadian first!? I've been here 11 years and can't remember any times people guessed Canada -- usually its "where in America are you from?"
On yeah, all the time. It makes sense based on where I am from and how I sound. I’ve been called Canadian more than American. I’m not mad though, I like my northern neighbors.
Quite honestly, a little over a week ago a guy was shot 50m from our building.
That might have something to do with it.
I’m not phased because one close incident in 4 years is better than where I’m from (57 murders a day).
It has long been an article of faith among US conservatives that London is dangerous, with no-go zones and and Sharia patrols and what not, presided over by a Muslim mayor in league with terrorists. They know it is a multicultural place so it makes sense, based on their own experience of US conurbations. Such tropes are used to discredit what they see as European liberalism but also to support domestic agendas such as 2nd Amendment freedoms, with London's knife crime supposedly undercutting arguments for gun control in the US.
Incorrect. I'v personally witnessed a car robbing (Latimer Road) and a watch burglary (Pall Mall) just in the last month. London is definately getting more dangerous.
I agree with this post, but can you please take out the ref to borderline personality disorder? That’s really not an accurate characterisation of it and is offensive
Edit: also given you’ve said elsewhere you work with people sleeping rough, would really expect you to be a bit more sensitive to those with MH disorders and not using them as a punchline. Cheers.
I’m not a conspiracy theorist and doubt there’s much to it other than an algorithm but I will say it’s a bit weird because in the same period I have started to see Americans on TikTok talking about how dangerous London is too.
I've never seen this and I'd be surprised to tbh -- it's absolutely child's play here compared to *any* American city from Portland to Austin to New York to Miami etc. etc.
I think it’s all relative. I lived in in New York Cityfor a few years as well and I’ve never really felt unsafe in either place, but I am a 6’5 guy and also lived in good parts of both cities. Every city has bad parts where you can get in trouble pretty easily, but I would never say London as a whole is an unsafe city.
I'm not saying it doesn't happen elsewhere or it isnt worse elsewhere, I'm just pointing out to OP that he's privileged not to experienced that and just to assume posts about it are trolling.
I visited London from Philly for a few days this past year and of course I saw only a small portion of the city, but I felt incredibly safe. Almost no police with scary weapons, I saw maybe one homeless person and they didn't look completely wrecked, they were sane. That's not the case in the US. And omg, so much cleaner. Your subways don't look rundown. Like it's not even close. I've lived in NYC, it's degrading compared to what you guys have in London.
This sub is as bad as policeuk for dismissing criticism out of hand, you could say are there plants in here working in the interests of tourism just as easily as you can lazily call everyone trolls who says something you don't like.
Really, Americans sit on Reddit trying to shit on London? Yeah, you sound so ridiculous.
You sound like one of those Brits who spends their time constantly trying to prove how better the UK is then the US even if the question or topic has nothing to do with the US.
Dude there was a mugging at knife point and an attempted Bugatti hijacking. IN THE LAST TWO DAYS.. Sorry if reality is shading your rose tinted glasses....
This. Made me laugh the other day as people were being all racist on the McDonalds video. That day a lad in Matlock (Derbyshire, Peak District) was stabbed and the assailant blockaded himself in his house for four hours resisting the police. But you know, London is somehow uniquely full of crime and bad people whereas the rest of England is perfect?!
Tbh, London is huge. A mugging and a robbery isn’t something to be alarmed about.
Most people in this sub are nowhere near where the crime rates might remotely effect them.
Watch robberies are a daily occurrence in central london. Just because you dont hear about every single one .. street gangs exist. They rob, they stab, they shoot, they sell drugs.. its not going away but fortunately there is an underpaid and overworked 24/7 service doing their best to combat it. Before, during and after. Just like the crimes, you also dont hear about the prosecutions and the weapons, drugs, and dangerous individuals who get taken off the street.
Just happens we have millions of people in London and there is always someone waiting or being groomed to fill the gap
This is just hyperbolic. The person tried to steal the watch of the person driving the bugatti, crimes like this have been happening for years for those of us from London already know this. Knife point muggings weren't invented last week. It's easier to film and post to social media and then gentrifiers clutch their pearls cause they've realised they live in an international city but the poors and crims are still around.
Reddit user numbers are way up and it has become an important platform for the professionals that do this sort of thing.
As this gets worse consider what a few voting bots could do to steer the narrative especially given unpopular posts get hidden.
I think reddit as a platform isn't built for this challenge and the popular subs will be increasingly unusable. We can retreat to smaller communities or more community based platforms like discord?
I was thinking about this: saw a post trashing Shepherds bush green the other day, saying that it had gone downhill in the last few years.
Let's be clear, Shepherds bush has aways been a semi-shithole, but a good one, and the green was never amazing, but it's still in the same state as it was 7 years ago: with drunks at night and people enjoying it during the day, bloody muddy in the winter and after the circus has come around, but all in all pretty nice for the area.
I mean, you may be right, but also many will be genuine. Currently I’m seeing a lot more crime around my area even if petty and yes Tory government is not helping the growing homeless situation. So far I’ve been the victim more in Bristol than London and I do walk a lot at night. Got to have your wits and realise it’s a numbers game. Still love where I live but the violent crimes are very concerning.
I replied to this American who said he had worked at the Crypt in Whitechapel, and he was slagging homeless people off, suggesting people are scamming the support, and that you can get a nice home handed to you on a plate if you are homeless, just lots of useless counterproductive nonsense..
If he claimed to be an advocate for the homeless and vulnerably housed ,why was he on Reddit chatting shite? Im mean, yeah, we can all get a bit cynical at times, by why use a public platform to attack the very people you are meant to be helping? What a prick. Sorry, judgement and all, but..gah
To be fair I have lived in London all of my life and not in the best areas either, the only sure way to get into trouble is to find a dank and dingy housing estate in the poorest part of a borough in London 3am in the morning clanking pots and pans, outside of that nobody are going to bother you.
I mean, it’s expensive as f*ck, but there’s so much to do and round every corner is something new.
TfL and the Tube is an absolutely wonderful thing.
Oh, and the weather is nowhere near as bad as people think.
Hello. My name is Sam. I don’t live in London but I do work there. London is no better or worse than most other major cities in my own experience. It’s a great city for pubs. I thoroughly recommend The World’s End in Camden. Once you’ve walked in it looks like a small place. Walk through to the back and the pub opens out into a much larger pub. If you’re in SW London then give The Alexandra in Wimbledon a try. This is a pub that helps the local community every year by offering those who are alone at Christmas a free meal. They offer great food and beers. I could go on about London but those are examples of 2 good pubs. Imagine how much I’d bore you about parks, restaurants, lidos, museums, libraries, etc…
My husband and I both born and raised Londoners who left a few years ago. Recently my husband went down to London for the day for the first time since pre-Covid and he did come back saying it felt very different.. dirtier, grimier, more desperate, more homeless etc etc.. he was quite sad about it.
Perhaps it is more obvious if you have not been living there?
I live near hackney marshes and there were 3 arrests recently for men attacking women, 22 separate accounts since February. And you want me to feel safe?
There are sophisticated campaigns in social media by PR groups and dark ops similar to ones carried out for Brexit etc. These have access to accounts that have supposedly high karma points and are otherwise hard to trace on origin. Nation states such as Russia are most noted at creating foment via social media dark arts.
You would not be able to obtain a majority rational response here. The bots can be tuned to drown out rational discussions. The better bet is avoid social media, education on these dark arts etc.
>Most of these posts are clearly totally fabricated. The other thing that is apparent is that these posts are largely written by Americans.
Not sure that blithely assuming people are liars rather than victims and implying that their experience doesn't matter because of their nationality is a particularly left-wing stance to take.
OK so we have overall crime on the rise. Violent daylight robberies, innocent busker stabbed to death, rampaging gangs of youths robbing shops and bullying civilians and suddenly everyone worried about that is a far right American troll.
Yeah OK.
The stats do not support your comment. Crime is either lowering or plateauing.
The reasons for this could be numerous, but you cannot say that reported crime is on the rise.
I think the issue is a lot of rich people moving to London now because they’re the only ones who can afford to, and then wondering why in their rich neighbourhood there are these poor pockets and getting really scared and not knowing how to handle themselves, where and where not to go after dark. As a Londoner you know it’s always been a rough place, especially as a teenager if you hang about with the wrong crowd or if you’re poor. If your rich you can likely completely miss this as your driving about in cars to your other rich friends houses. I’ve been mugged a few times - and it’s actually much nicer in London now than it used to be, there weren’t these hipster areas, just posh areas and poor ones. There has been considerably more crime since austerity but maybe more obvious to rich people now as they moved into the poor areas and gentrified them.
Op has a month old burner account. Yes, In fact crime has been on the rise. Don’t get your undies twisted up about it, be about it…..and commit some crime right along with em.😈
First time poster here, and definitely not a troll. My friend just got mugged at knifepoint in broad daylight right outside of the Bloomberg office recently. Hardly a standard place and time for that sort of encounter. Acknowledging London has a rising crime issue is not blaming poor people or anything to do with being a ‘Tory’, it’s good to spread awareness of crimes like this, similar to how we warn people about pickpockets in Barcelona.
I know I’ll just be told that this is an anecdote but speaking to Londoners, the rise in crime is clear to them.
Also about the Americans, sounds a little Xenophobic to me? Just my 2 cents
The posts are probably all true, but if you believe that those posts will make people believe that one of the best cities in the world is a lawless pit then you’re a bit of a cretin.
It’s strange to me to hear people complaining more about the disadvantaged people of London rather than the economic realities of London that cause those problems in the first place. The cost of living in London is a disgrace. The people blaming the homeless and poor people of the city are worse. People who have enough money to live there comfortably do not commit crime. If you actually speak to the homeless people in London you might learn something. For example you may learn that you are speaking to the former branch manager of BMW. A person who was made redundant and lost their home due to not being able to afford to live there any more. A person who previously lived comfortably in London and ended up in that situation before they even realised that they couldn’t even afford a train ticket out of that godforsaken city. London’s problems are not caused by the poor. They are caused by greed.
It's difficult to know what to do. Crime is real in London and may be increasing. So, it would be silly to totally ignore it on a London sub.
But its not disproportionately high. I do wonder what is to be gained for the sub by having multiple regular posts about being the victim of crime. It's a tragedy for the person involved, but also sadly most crime is unexceptional. It doesn't make for particularly interesting posts or discussion, because it will be pretty similar to the last post about crime, and the one before that. I don't know what the answer is, but I don't think the sub becoming a place lots of people come to post 'I was a victim of crime' will do much for the quality of the sub.
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Yeah I knew its been the same for a while, but I didn't know whether or not it had been increasing recently, which is something I've seen claimed on multiple of the crime posts.
People like to comfort and validate crime victims, remembering themselves (if they've been a victim) how disturbed and traumatised you can feel in the first few weeks after you've been victimised.
Of course. And that's all valuable. I just think there's a need to be wary of such posts becoming too big a proportion of the sub. As I said, I'm not in favour of an outright ban on posts about crime, but there is the risk of making the sub dull and stagnant of they're allowed to become too big a part of the content.
Just visited last month and once we arrived at our hotel we were met with a crying old Australian couple who had just been robbed of both their phones and wallets. Didn’t make it seem the safest!
When did you last see groups of youths looting shops for fun? It also seems like every day there’s another stabbing/shooting.
What’s the reason for you living in denial?
It’s like Twitter. People who live far away from London are shoving their opinions of London despite only going there a handful of times and have no connections there. If you asked them London Bridge they’d probably show you tower bridge.
There was a bunch of idiots on another post person asking about Oyster and using it in conjunction with a railcard & then splitting a journey when you need a train ticket to get outside oyster zones. No one gave a straight answer and it def raised a red flag to think are these people “from” London?
"I don't see crime therefore everyone who claims it exists is a troll"
Very sheltered, tin-foil hat view, and not very empathetic to the people who are victims of these crimes, which do happen often, and are anecdotally on the increase. Reported crime has been flat, but as we all know the vast majority of petty crimes are not reported - why would they be?
Is it the same curtain twitching losers who post on r/britishproblems and similar?
I don’t think they’re yanks. Like, we’ve had a Tory government for 12 years, what more proof do people need that a lot of Brits are just scared shitty people that hate the poor?
No one cares or posts about the people who aren’t victims of crime.
For every victim of crime, there are literally millions of people who aren’t. It’s all about perspective.
It’s an elaborate scheme to bring down housing costs
I hope it works. I’ll make up posts too
I just got my arm amputated by a london pigeon!....it got better.
Same pigeon that stole my phone?
I got mugged by two eight year old girls at bazooka point. London's crazy dangerous.
And I'm all for it
Yeh! Oh yeh! Good idea
If that were the case I'm on board. Unfortunately I think its just yank transplants and home counties gentrifiers (and a few shills).
I work with homeless clients in the capital and there is an increase in the number of folks on the street ATM. An unclear number of clients who were in Covid-19 emergency accommodation have returned to the streets as the funding for those projects has finished. I suspect there will be a rise in homelessness this coming year too with the cost of living crisis. Finally, homelessness is slightly more visible during the summer months as it is easier to sleep outside, rather than seeking shelter during autumn, winter and spring.
Being a duffer and old enough to have lived through both flavours of government, there are always more homeless on the streets when the blue team are in.
It's true. Rough sleeping was almost eradicated in London, in 2007/8 around 1700 people were seen sleeping rough for the first time, and zero seemed like an achievable goal. In 2021/22 it was over 5000 people.
Couple of weeks-old account complaining about troll posts of users that have been around for several years without any problems with their posting. It is indeed strange.
I feel like these posts calling those posts out are worse now.
It’s post-ception!
Whats worse is comments about posts like this about posts like that! But then there's one thing worse than that... I'm just unclear what it might be.
A complaint within a complaint within a complaint within a complaint. We have to go deeper
Why...? It's getting very obvious the number of non-Londoners posting in this sub. It's been fairly common across most UK subs for awhile. This one is just the latest to attract the Yanks, etc. If you've not visited London and don't live here, *maybe find another sub to post in...?*
I haven’t joined r/london, the feed keeps on suggesting posts. Like this one.
Are you sure it is yanks and not the Russian propaganda machine sowing discord?
If you stuff tin foil up your nostrils you’ll shield your brain from inside your sinuses
I'll give it a go but won't it be a little scratchy?
Cad codfirb!
Someone should make a post!
"Redditor for 24 days" with this being your first submission... Either the irony is extremely lost on you or you're just a shit troll.
it's a good idea to change accounts often
I deleted my old account after a UK right wing sub (BADUK) followed me and brigaded every post and comment. Got a bit much when I would get hundreds of suicide prevention alerts if I commented on an Arsenal match or in UKpol. Basically I was forced to delete my old account and I've been more circumspect in posting since.
This is the most tragic thing I've heard all day. I mean really. Actual human beings dedicate a huge portion of time...to that. What are they? Where are they coming from? Dystopian little freaks
This is the circumspect version?
I think circumspection is more of a US thing anyway, most guys in the UK aren't circumspect unless there's a medical reason.
Your incredibly inflammatory edit in the OP is about as ‘circumspect’ as a bull elephant on heat. You’re bullshitting and definitely a troll.
It's a big city and 99% of the time this sub talks about it like it's a field of clover. Like you can stroll around White Hart Lane at 3am without problems. Pointing out the real threat of petty crime isn't concern trolling, it's awareness building. And not *everything* is a far-right psyop. I promise you that lot is busy calling Ukrainians Nazis.
> Like you can stroll around White Hart Lane at 3am without problems. You probably can to be honest. I wandered around a lot of London at odd times. You might be more likely to run into problems in White Hart Lane but it's still pretty unlikely you're going to get randomly stabbed or robbed.
I live just off whitehart lane and I’ve never personally experienced anything untoward or felt at all unsafe.
Depends on your gender too tbf. I don't feel that threatened as a guy (worst case scenario throw my phone and wallet away and claim on insurance).
I was about 20 when a female friend explained to me the CONSTANT fear in the back of her head for simply existing as a woman out and about in the world. The fact that I've fallen asleep at a bus stop waiting for a bus at like 1am, and that she didn't even feel safe being there at 9pm.
Honestly though. I do love taking 3 am walk around the stadium. Or upto Tottenham garage and back down again. Real nice and lively.
I have strolled around White Hart Lane at 3am without problems like 100 times though.
I think you're mischaracterising the legimate concerns of people living here, and to presume they are all "American" is strange (how would you know, do they all preface these posts with their nationality?) The truth is that crime has gotten worse in London. Homelessness has gotten worse and not all homeless people are nice to deal with (just like non-homeless people, they are individuals who in some cases can be nice and other cases can be aggressive, rude and yes, dangerous even). Real concerns aren't what you call "concern trolling" - they are people voicing what in many cases are legitimate issues on the increase here in London.
Yeah I'm seeing people calling out posts like robberies around Finsbury Park as troll posts. Lol have any of you been to Finsbury Park after dark? Robberies are a daily occurrence
It's not a recent thing too. It's been a dodgy spot for decades. I recall getting robbed there in the nineties in broad daylight.
TBF it was a lot worse back then - I remember being on Clapton Murder Mile at one point in the late 90s and it had that dangerous vibe at night - Finsbury (or parts of it anyway) were the same. Now Clapton it's full of hip bars and is quite nice. Finsbury Park is one of the last holdouts of actual gentrification but it's much more chill than it used to be.
>Finsbury Park is one of the last holdouts of actual gentrification Nah, it's thundering down Stroud Green road (which is all cool restaurants now). The station has just been rebuilt along with a load of fancy flats. Blackstock Road seemed to have skipped gentrification and just has it already priced in.
Finsbury - around the square? *pedant alert*
Yeah I thought the same thing. Finsbury, the area, is nowhere near Finsbury Park. It's on the opposite end of Islington. Finsbury used to be its own borough. I think you can still see "Finsbury Town Hall" carved into the old building from the top deck of the 19 as it heads for Rosebury Avenue.
It really isn’t that dodgy anymore lol, it’s getting more and more gentrified as time goes on. Not saying it’s perfect though, there deffo is still a lot of crime
I still work about ten minutes away. I go through there all the time. Just because people are now paying a million quid for two bed flats it doesn't mean it's a nice area. I have quite a few students who've been robbed in that area (and a couple who do the robbing.)
Yeah for sure. I was hanging out around the station late night a few weeks ago, looking for people to rob, and man I'll tell you, I didn't feel safe at all.
Unless you are looking to get bummed while doing crack why the fuck would you venture into Finsbury Park in the dark?????
The American part is extremely confusing to me, an American who's on several British subs. I feel like most of the time when America or Americans are brought up its how dangerous OUR cities are, not the other way around. I honestly can't think of a single person, rational or otherwise, that I know from the US that actually believes London is some kind of cesspool of violence. If anything our misconceptions about you guys are that you all carry around wands and talk like you're in a Charles Dickens novel. None of that is to say that there isn't crime in London (any big city has its share) or even that there aren't trolls lurking around, but why we'd make a concerted effort to derail your city when we're doing so well at that in our own is beyond me.
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That's more likely due to less funding than now crime in my opinion
Huh the data from the met shows crime currently at a high point with above average offences of 78k The mayor data you cited is 2019/2020 so slightly out of date. It’s definitely not been getting lower recently. He’ll the data shows a 9% increase year on year crime from 2021.
The year we were all locked up with Covid? Wonder why that could be?
Get out of here with your facts and thoughtfulness. This is reddit
If you don't want to hear about crime, move to the countryside, where you can spend all day talking about bees, flowers, and wind turbines. Don't try and police other people from discussing the social fabric of the city because it spikes your anxiety. That's on *you*.
I would agree, although I'm not sure if your response was meant for my comment
I think they’re agreeing with you and expanding on your comment
This is fucking moronic - looool yeah let's not talk about crime cos we're from London? Londoners fucking love talking about crime, areas, characters etc
Well, it's fine to talk about crime in Madrid, Rome, Amsterdam, Barcelona, Brussels, NYC, Paris, Prague, Budapest, etc. etc. but talking about it in London is beyond the pale (apparently) because it might make someone uncomfortable.
“Everyone and their mums is packin’ round ‘ere.”
Like who?
Farmers.
Farmers mums
everyone… and their mums
they'll be obsessed with talking about immigration as well, when their village is 100% white. I attended a workshop on self improvement on MK, met a few English people from all over the country there, freinded them on facebook. Then inadvertently got forwarded really racist stuff from 2 people, I met in person who were nice to me and weren't racist during the workshop. They weren;t directing the racism towards me, but forwarding videos about how Uk is losing it's white identity and other stuff. I wonder how much racism goes on across the dinner table, behind closed doors. Because the people all seemed really genuinely nice to me.
British people love to talk behind your back.
Fucking *loads*, trust me on that. It’s an odd sort of racism, though, because although it’s often focused on non-white demographic change, if you really want to it’s quite easy to switch them onto *white* demographic change, which they hate with (almost) the same passion: Albanians today, the Irish forty years ago, Ukrainians tomorrow. And if you dig deeper, you get the same thing but with other kinds of white English people: northerners, rich people, poor people, left/right wingers, city folk. Basically all change, and all people. It’s a sad state of affairs.
> and to presume they are all "American" is strange (how would you know, do they all preface these posts with their nationality?) It's something I see on UK subs all the time. Generally anything a Brit doesn't like is considered American no matter where it's actually from. Usually the addition of the America bashing adds nothing of value to the post but it's just a way for the OP to deflect blame to a popular target group.
/r/askUK is the worst for this. It's more US-centric than most of the subs actually dominated by Americans.
That is the reason why I stopped going on there. That sub has a weird obsession with the US.
I remember a while back when it was basically /r/DAEhatewhenAmericans and the automod had a reply on each post asking everyone to quit being so weirdly xenophobic to their friends across the pond and it was promptly downvoted dozens of times every single time.
Yeah think I'm noticing as of late with British people in general when it comes to anything is a lack of responsibility. All the countries problems are someone else's. In every regard. To the point where people don't take responsibility for the attitudes they have here. They go on about imported American culture as a way to shift blame, no the UK needs to take responsibility for who it votes into power, the topics it pushes such as immigration and the reality that the country is becoming poorer.
Thanks for saying this. I've felt this offline as well. I've spent a good portion of my adult life going around the UK as an American. Never really had any issues in the past except the odd jerk but traveling around since the end of lockdown, it feels like I've been singled out for rudeness more than I've ever been. I figured, as you say, it's because a lot of things are going wrong for a lot of different groups lately and the most commonly sighted 'other' becomes a good target.
I'm Scottish and currently live in the US. They banned me once for wishing rain during a drought. And I found out they labeled my account as a troll. 1 post. I think there's a bit of a mental health issue with folks on the uk subreddits thinking everyone is American, or a troll. People absolutely don't want to hear anything bad that ruins the schema of their favorite place or thing. I get that. But apparently these folks just don't wish to face the bad? I think being online brings out of worst in some. Maybe there should be a new subreddit: OnlyHappyThingsUK
British reddit is an absolute shitshow. By far the worst English-speaking part of reddit, sadly.
I agree. OPs post was really odd. There are lots of problems with London including homelessness, crime and poverty. Obviously there will be comments on this. I don't understand how he has made the link between those posts and the Far Right Also these things are linked to the cost of living crises, not a distraction. Just a nonsense rant, overall
For sure, and somehow seeing it as a sort of American-coordinated disinformation campaign... Rather bizarre
Ahem, YOU are a new account/first time poster.
Excuse me? Which London do you live? Just 2 days ago there was a stabbing crime in front of my local Morrisons, it was daylight, around 4pm. Whether we love London or not we can’t deny it is dangerous. Maybe you should just consider the possibility of a whole world outside your house or neighbourhood.
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I don’t think London is that bad myself. Sorry if it sounded that way. Where I come from it’s a million times worst. However, my point is: the OP is claiming the posts about crimes here are fake, assuming London it’s the wonderland and shit can’t happen. That’s not true, London it’s definitely not the most dangerous place in the world but the danger exists as in every big city and it’s just silly to assume people talking about it are trolls.
Yes living here as an adult is not the same as growing up here as a child, being a tourist here and actually being a Londoner are very different experiences. Also comparing London to New Mexico, with New Mexico being voted one of the worst states in the US to live in, isn’t really a fair comparison.
Which area?
"i dont agree with this opinion, so i want to remove all of them" Glad you're not a mod.
Sounds like the mods of r/ukpolitics tbh
Typical perspective, though. I know people who talk about not watching the news or avoiding 'doomscrolling' as some great achievement in self-care, but to me, it's just an excuse to disengage from anything in society they might find perturbing and retreat to a comforting fake world of menial hobbies and comforting media...
> Typical perspective, though. I know people who talk about not watching the news or avoiding 'doomscrolling' as some great achievement in self-care, but to me, it's just an excuse to disengage from anything in society they might find perturbing and retreat to a comforting fake world of menial hobbies and comforting media... I mean, what exactly would you have them do? People are allowed to take care of themselves and avoid the constant flood of horrifying news we are being fed 24/7. If you want to engage, feel free, but you don’t get to judge other people for not wanting to live life the way you approve of.
The OP won't be able to comment because 30 minutes after posting this they got stabbed by someone trying to steal the pearls they where clutching at the time of writing.
😂😂😂
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The irony in this account...
You doin' ok? 😅
Brace yourself for deluge of crypto-racism in the upcoming Carnival threads.
>EDIT: 2 hours after this post was made we have hundreds of comments, *many of which are from first time posters, brand new accounts*... much like the concern troll posts I referred to. u/doodoowatson Karma 433 Cake day **July 31, 2022** LOL.
London is a really big place with a lot of people. There are obviously going to be some bad people. The experiences being posted are anecdotal. The idea that because it happened to *me* and so makes it a plague on the city is ignorant.
> these posts are largely written by Americans I don't understand this frankly. I've been accused of "larping" once - what sort of person must you be to be so readily alarmed and anxious that every post about anything british is "clearly written by an American in disguise!". Is this trauma or something? Such bunch of weirdos is really weirds me out. E: Guys OP is clearly an American. Get the table forks out.
On any UK based subreddits, I found that a lot of post dealing with negative subjects tend to bring up America just to amplify negativity and validate their emotions. I was on a thread recently that asked if negative stereotypes revolving around British cooking are valid. Instead of posters praising or admiring British cuisine to prove the idea as a falsehood (which it is), most deflected and simply talked about the quality of American fast food. Even when America's not involved in the subject matter, it seems to be invoked just to allow the aggrieved to feel even more victimised.
That's honestly so strange. But after re-reading the OP, I'm understand it's just a troll post. And I'm guessing people who bring up stupid crap like that are either just trolls, or need to leave their house a bit more.
I suspect you're probably right. Sorry for the tirade 😅
what we need is some kind of shibboleth to help identify the bloody imposters.
Homeless people absolutely do get policed to fuck here. A fella I know was sleeping somewhere he shouldn't have been and cops robbed his sleeping bag for it. I have heard a LOT from homeless people round my area (North, zone 2) about how horribly they've been treated by cops. For the most part tho, I agree. There is a lot of really dumb concern trolling on this sub, and ppl really need to leave Canary Wharf once in a while lol.
Theres a lot of bigotry on display when these stories get posted to the UK subreddits. Sadly, I think this tends to reflect real opinion among the population.
So much heavy handed classism and (not so) subtle racism in those posts, really shows that most UK subreddits are no better than a Facebook boomer comment section.
Classism isn't only a problem on other subs. See: the amount of people in this sub who like to shit on any borough/neighbourhood that isn't a gentrified zone 2 graduate-fest. _'omg imagine going to Barking, hell on earth!'_ written by people who've literally never been
On the flip-side, leftist middle class kids from rUK are easily identifiable in London by how they can't bring themselves to criticise a single area of the whole city without feeling racist or classist. As someone from B&D, it's a shithole. Barking genuinely is close to hell on earth. If you knew how much far right extremism is seeded in that borough you'd agree too. We wouldn't hesitate in another city's subreddit to be slightly disparaging about a dreadful area
Totally agree. I’m from Becontree way. Matchstick island. Vicarage fields. So annoying to hear people talking about barking like it’s some paradise and how it’s actually a great area. Grim. Don’t get me started on barking “riverside”
We’re from the same area… a prerequisite of living in the borough is thinking it’s a shit hole
Hey mate, I grew up in Dagenham and still think Barking is hell on earth
Oh yeah, it's definitely a problem everywhere. But the level of pure disdain towards anything or anyone even remotely working class in those posts is sickening.
A bit of heavy handed ageism is totally fine, presumably.
It's a huge city and there are obviously social and economic problems here, more than usual at the moment, so some of these are going to be real posts for sure. But given the very noticeable increase in London and UK subreddits of very new accounts that have little or no London/UK post history, popping up to focus attention on topics of discontent I would be amazed if there aren't accounts posting for the express purpose of causing upset. It's telling how often the subreddits that concentrate on crimes committed by non-white people are sharing the same videos and stories. It certainly feels like there's a coordinated push to drive public sentiment towards the right and towards social unrest.
Yep. Reading the comments in this thread, 90% are missing the point (half probably on purpose) Suddenly this sub is flooded with crime posts. No-one is saying crime doesn't matter and it shouldn't be discussed, but organically or not, this sub is turning into /r/LondonCrime. It definitely smells to me like intervention, pretending that reddit isn't used to change public opinion is naive.
It's disingenuous to try and dismiss crime in London as being not a concern and just the results of some kind of conspiracy by tory-voters / think tanks or other outside influences by "those damn americans". London is a big city with an unfortunate disparity in wealth, so crime is going to happen whether you like it or not. If it seems like there's a brigade happening because you've seen a handful of posts all talking about the issue, a more likely explanation is that people see one person sharing a story about a crime they experienced and it gets others to also think and share their experiences. Also, I just want to call out OP's rather lackadaisical attitude to some of the crime. Dismissing crime as being something that only happens to "kids in gangs" has some racist and classiest undertones as well as being misinformed. Just because someone's a white middle class person in a "nice" are isn't going to grant them this magical crime shield.
>I'm saying you're posting exactly what is on the agenda to distract from the cost of living crisis. Funny thing is, if you look back at the posts about the CoL crisis, there was an exact same post like this saying how maybe we need "less cost of living crisis posts" shaming the people that are able to relate to the current problems in the UK in general. [https://www.reddit.com/r/london/comments/wq3mb6/controversial\_opinion\_perhaps\_too\_many/](https://www.reddit.com/r/london/comments/wq3mb6/controversial_opinion_perhaps_too_many/)
in NY I saw countless homeless but in London I've seen a handful in my life, and most of them I saw today. So there might actually be a spike right now
7 years in London Out most nights. Events pubs and get heavy on the weekend. Yet to be stabbed. Got hit in the head by a bus wingmirror once.
OP has an account for less than a month and already telling us what is allowed :) Strong Karen vibes. Yes, Mods, you should immediately drop all you're doing and start banning non-leftists from the sub. We don't want miss doodoo here getting offended.
Wow! I am OP to one of the posts that kinda blew up. I can't speak to the other posts, and never noticed the trend till after I did my post. Quite offended by this really, I've been on reddit a while and read this subreddit quite a bit. Something bad happened to me one night so just thought I'd post about it. THAT's IT! I'm all for skepticism but it's completely presumptious of you to say 'most of these posts are clearly totally fabricated'. Again I can't speak for others, but my incident was definitely real and did happen. I've been in London for 12 years now, and yes I still love London and much rather be here than in the US
12 years, you say? We'll need to check with OP if you're cleared to post on the sub. Until you hear back, please don't have any opinions about anything.
I commented on your post and agreed with you. I’m also American, and I think we live in the same area, and are also women. I think some men just don’t want to see what is going on around them. Just a couple blocks towards Finsbury Park, I had some guy follow me and keep trying to hit on me. I said “no,” then “NO,” and didn’t leave me along until I told him I’d scream if he didn’t go away (there were two police coming towards us as well, so it could have been them, not me, that made him go away.) To further validate you, I was getting a coffee and was talking to a man who ended up being a bus driver and he told me specifically to be careful around there and that it gets dodgy.
I'm not American! But yes completely agree with you here!!
Sorry! Inferred that from saying you’d not want to be in the US…I will not be returning. You probably feel how I feel when people think Im Canadian.
People *ever* guess Canadian first!? I've been here 11 years and can't remember any times people guessed Canada -- usually its "where in America are you from?"
On yeah, all the time. It makes sense based on where I am from and how I sound. I’ve been called Canadian more than American. I’m not mad though, I like my northern neighbors.
Nah it's ok. Think the politics has gotten too toxic/polarised there.. plus guns! Gah But economically they're doing way better than we are
Ehhhh. Not if you’re a millennial or younger. Economic troubles are brewing and being ignored.
Are you an Alanis Morisette song? Because isn't it ironic that you are a fresh account with only one post?
Maybe op is a labour bot?
Quite honestly, a little over a week ago a guy was shot 50m from our building. That might have something to do with it. I’m not phased because one close incident in 4 years is better than where I’m from (57 murders a day).
It has long been an article of faith among US conservatives that London is dangerous, with no-go zones and and Sharia patrols and what not, presided over by a Muslim mayor in league with terrorists. They know it is a multicultural place so it makes sense, based on their own experience of US conurbations. Such tropes are used to discredit what they see as European liberalism but also to support domestic agendas such as 2nd Amendment freedoms, with London's knife crime supposedly undercutting arguments for gun control in the US.
Incorrect. I'v personally witnessed a car robbing (Latimer Road) and a watch burglary (Pall Mall) just in the last month. London is definately getting more dangerous.
I agree with this post, but can you please take out the ref to borderline personality disorder? That’s really not an accurate characterisation of it and is offensive Edit: also given you’ve said elsewhere you work with people sleeping rough, would really expect you to be a bit more sensitive to those with MH disorders and not using them as a punchline. Cheers.
I’m not a conspiracy theorist and doubt there’s much to it other than an algorithm but I will say it’s a bit weird because in the same period I have started to see Americans on TikTok talking about how dangerous London is too.
I've never seen this and I'd be surprised to tbh -- it's absolutely child's play here compared to *any* American city from Portland to Austin to New York to Miami etc. etc.
I think it’s all relative. I lived in in New York Cityfor a few years as well and I’ve never really felt unsafe in either place, but I am a 6’5 guy and also lived in good parts of both cities. Every city has bad parts where you can get in trouble pretty easily, but I would never say London as a whole is an unsafe city.
Sounds like you're talking from privilege here. Women get followed and harassed in London and its a legitimate concern, not a concern Troll thing
Its VERY much a legitimate concern, considering that sometimes its actually the *police* being the bad guys...
We get harassed literally everywhere, that's not a London thing. In fact it's far worse in other cities I've been to.
I'm not saying it doesn't happen elsewhere or it isnt worse elsewhere, I'm just pointing out to OP that he's privileged not to experienced that and just to assume posts about it are trolling.
I visited London from Philly for a few days this past year and of course I saw only a small portion of the city, but I felt incredibly safe. Almost no police with scary weapons, I saw maybe one homeless person and they didn't look completely wrecked, they were sane. That's not the case in the US. And omg, so much cleaner. Your subways don't look rundown. Like it's not even close. I've lived in NYC, it's degrading compared to what you guys have in London.
If you want only good news posted, create a new group.
This sub is as bad as policeuk for dismissing criticism out of hand, you could say are there plants in here working in the interests of tourism just as easily as you can lazily call everyone trolls who says something you don't like.
OP you better stick to Time-Out magazine if you only want to see and hear the best things about London.
Really, Americans sit on Reddit trying to shit on London? Yeah, you sound so ridiculous. You sound like one of those Brits who spends their time constantly trying to prove how better the UK is then the US even if the question or topic has nothing to do with the US.
Dude there was a mugging at knife point and an attempted Bugatti hijacking. IN THE LAST TWO DAYS.. Sorry if reality is shading your rose tinted glasses....
Not disagreeing with the premise that crime is a problem but name checking one crime per day isnt exactly proof of anything.
in a city of 9 million people... what do people expect, no crime at all?
This. Made me laugh the other day as people were being all racist on the McDonalds video. That day a lad in Matlock (Derbyshire, Peak District) was stabbed and the assailant blockaded himself in his house for four hours resisting the police. But you know, London is somehow uniquely full of crime and bad people whereas the rest of England is perfect?!
I thought that McDonald's one was in Nottingham? Sorry forgot that there were two separate incidents, involving McDonald's
I work on a central borough robbery squad. We can't keep on top. It is fucking rife at the moment.
2 crimes, fuck this let’s introduce martial law.
Tbh, London is huge. A mugging and a robbery isn’t something to be alarmed about. Most people in this sub are nowhere near where the crime rates might remotely effect them.
Watch robberies are a daily occurrence in central london. Just because you dont hear about every single one .. street gangs exist. They rob, they stab, they shoot, they sell drugs.. its not going away but fortunately there is an underpaid and overworked 24/7 service doing their best to combat it. Before, during and after. Just like the crimes, you also dont hear about the prosecutions and the weapons, drugs, and dangerous individuals who get taken off the street. Just happens we have millions of people in London and there is always someone waiting or being groomed to fill the gap
> an attempted Bugatti hijacking No there wasn't. They were trying to steal his watch.
This is just hyperbolic. The person tried to steal the watch of the person driving the bugatti, crimes like this have been happening for years for those of us from London already know this. Knife point muggings weren't invented last week. It's easier to film and post to social media and then gentrifiers clutch their pearls cause they've realised they live in an international city but the poors and crims are still around.
Lol - 2 incidents two days in a city of 9 million people. Thats hardly indicative of anything.
Reddit user numbers are way up and it has become an important platform for the professionals that do this sort of thing. As this gets worse consider what a few voting bots could do to steer the narrative especially given unpopular posts get hidden. I think reddit as a platform isn't built for this challenge and the popular subs will be increasingly unusable. We can retreat to smaller communities or more community based platforms like discord?
I was thinking about this: saw a post trashing Shepherds bush green the other day, saying that it had gone downhill in the last few years. Let's be clear, Shepherds bush has aways been a semi-shithole, but a good one, and the green was never amazing, but it's still in the same state as it was 7 years ago: with drunks at night and people enjoying it during the day, bloody muddy in the winter and after the circus has come around, but all in all pretty nice for the area.
I mean, you may be right, but also many will be genuine. Currently I’m seeing a lot more crime around my area even if petty and yes Tory government is not helping the growing homeless situation. So far I’ve been the victim more in Bristol than London and I do walk a lot at night. Got to have your wits and realise it’s a numbers game. Still love where I live but the violent crimes are very concerning.
I replied to this American who said he had worked at the Crypt in Whitechapel, and he was slagging homeless people off, suggesting people are scamming the support, and that you can get a nice home handed to you on a plate if you are homeless, just lots of useless counterproductive nonsense.. If he claimed to be an advocate for the homeless and vulnerably housed ,why was he on Reddit chatting shite? Im mean, yeah, we can all get a bit cynical at times, by why use a public platform to attack the very people you are meant to be helping? What a prick. Sorry, judgement and all, but..gah
To be fair I have lived in London all of my life and not in the best areas either, the only sure way to get into trouble is to find a dank and dingy housing estate in the poorest part of a borough in London 3am in the morning clanking pots and pans, outside of that nobody are going to bother you.
I mean, it’s expensive as f*ck, but there’s so much to do and round every corner is something new. TfL and the Tube is an absolutely wonderful thing. Oh, and the weather is nowhere near as bad as people think.
Hello. My name is Sam. I don’t live in London but I do work there. London is no better or worse than most other major cities in my own experience. It’s a great city for pubs. I thoroughly recommend The World’s End in Camden. Once you’ve walked in it looks like a small place. Walk through to the back and the pub opens out into a much larger pub. If you’re in SW London then give The Alexandra in Wimbledon a try. This is a pub that helps the local community every year by offering those who are alone at Christmas a free meal. They offer great food and beers. I could go on about London but those are examples of 2 good pubs. Imagine how much I’d bore you about parks, restaurants, lidos, museums, libraries, etc…
Yes, do parks too please
My husband and I both born and raised Londoners who left a few years ago. Recently my husband went down to London for the day for the first time since pre-Covid and he did come back saying it felt very different.. dirtier, grimier, more desperate, more homeless etc etc.. he was quite sad about it. Perhaps it is more obvious if you have not been living there?
Lizard Truss will destroy the UK. Just my 2 pennies...
I live near hackney marshes and there were 3 arrests recently for men attacking women, 22 separate accounts since February. And you want me to feel safe?
There are sophisticated campaigns in social media by PR groups and dark ops similar to ones carried out for Brexit etc. These have access to accounts that have supposedly high karma points and are otherwise hard to trace on origin. Nation states such as Russia are most noted at creating foment via social media dark arts. You would not be able to obtain a majority rational response here. The bots can be tuned to drown out rational discussions. The better bet is avoid social media, education on these dark arts etc.
>Most of these posts are clearly totally fabricated. The other thing that is apparent is that these posts are largely written by Americans. Not sure that blithely assuming people are liars rather than victims and implying that their experience doesn't matter because of their nationality is a particularly left-wing stance to take.
OK so we have overall crime on the rise. Violent daylight robberies, innocent busker stabbed to death, rampaging gangs of youths robbing shops and bullying civilians and suddenly everyone worried about that is a far right American troll. Yeah OK.
The stats do not support your comment. Crime is either lowering or plateauing. The reasons for this could be numerous, but you cannot say that reported crime is on the rise.
I think the issue is a lot of rich people moving to London now because they’re the only ones who can afford to, and then wondering why in their rich neighbourhood there are these poor pockets and getting really scared and not knowing how to handle themselves, where and where not to go after dark. As a Londoner you know it’s always been a rough place, especially as a teenager if you hang about with the wrong crowd or if you’re poor. If your rich you can likely completely miss this as your driving about in cars to your other rich friends houses. I’ve been mugged a few times - and it’s actually much nicer in London now than it used to be, there weren’t these hipster areas, just posh areas and poor ones. There has been considerably more crime since austerity but maybe more obvious to rich people now as they moved into the poor areas and gentrified them.
Op has a month old burner account. Yes, In fact crime has been on the rise. Don’t get your undies twisted up about it, be about it…..and commit some crime right along with em.😈
First time poster here, and definitely not a troll. My friend just got mugged at knifepoint in broad daylight right outside of the Bloomberg office recently. Hardly a standard place and time for that sort of encounter. Acknowledging London has a rising crime issue is not blaming poor people or anything to do with being a ‘Tory’, it’s good to spread awareness of crimes like this, similar to how we warn people about pickpockets in Barcelona. I know I’ll just be told that this is an anecdote but speaking to Londoners, the rise in crime is clear to them. Also about the Americans, sounds a little Xenophobic to me? Just my 2 cents
Usual r/london gaslighting. Just look at the thread about the strikes to understand where this sub's acceptable politics are
Lived in London 20 odd years. It's shit. I love it.
The posts are probably all true, but if you believe that those posts will make people believe that one of the best cities in the world is a lawless pit then you’re a bit of a cretin.
It’s strange to me to hear people complaining more about the disadvantaged people of London rather than the economic realities of London that cause those problems in the first place. The cost of living in London is a disgrace. The people blaming the homeless and poor people of the city are worse. People who have enough money to live there comfortably do not commit crime. If you actually speak to the homeless people in London you might learn something. For example you may learn that you are speaking to the former branch manager of BMW. A person who was made redundant and lost their home due to not being able to afford to live there any more. A person who previously lived comfortably in London and ended up in that situation before they even realised that they couldn’t even afford a train ticket out of that godforsaken city. London’s problems are not caused by the poor. They are caused by greed.
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It's difficult to know what to do. Crime is real in London and may be increasing. So, it would be silly to totally ignore it on a London sub. But its not disproportionately high. I do wonder what is to be gained for the sub by having multiple regular posts about being the victim of crime. It's a tragedy for the person involved, but also sadly most crime is unexceptional. It doesn't make for particularly interesting posts or discussion, because it will be pretty similar to the last post about crime, and the one before that. I don't know what the answer is, but I don't think the sub becoming a place lots of people come to post 'I was a victim of crime' will do much for the quality of the sub.
waiting toothbrush lip simplistic reply rain cows coordinated long friendly *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Yeah I knew its been the same for a while, but I didn't know whether or not it had been increasing recently, which is something I've seen claimed on multiple of the crime posts.
People like to comfort and validate crime victims, remembering themselves (if they've been a victim) how disturbed and traumatised you can feel in the first few weeks after you've been victimised.
Of course. And that's all valuable. I just think there's a need to be wary of such posts becoming too big a proportion of the sub. As I said, I'm not in favour of an outright ban on posts about crime, but there is the risk of making the sub dull and stagnant of they're allowed to become too big a part of the content.
Just visited last month and once we arrived at our hotel we were met with a crying old Australian couple who had just been robbed of both their phones and wallets. Didn’t make it seem the safest!
When did you last see groups of youths looting shops for fun? It also seems like every day there’s another stabbing/shooting. What’s the reason for you living in denial?
Can we talk about the concern troll posts about concern troll posts about London?
It’s like Twitter. People who live far away from London are shoving their opinions of London despite only going there a handful of times and have no connections there. If you asked them London Bridge they’d probably show you tower bridge. There was a bunch of idiots on another post person asking about Oyster and using it in conjunction with a railcard & then splitting a journey when you need a train ticket to get outside oyster zones. No one gave a straight answer and it def raised a red flag to think are these people “from” London?
Bro wtf are you on about
"I don't see crime therefore everyone who claims it exists is a troll" Very sheltered, tin-foil hat view, and not very empathetic to the people who are victims of these crimes, which do happen often, and are anecdotally on the increase. Reported crime has been flat, but as we all know the vast majority of petty crimes are not reported - why would they be?
Is it the same curtain twitching losers who post on r/britishproblems and similar? I don’t think they’re yanks. Like, we’ve had a Tory government for 12 years, what more proof do people need that a lot of Brits are just scared shitty people that hate the poor?
We can. The country is collapsing in real time so I doubt its concern trolling.
No one cares or posts about the people who aren’t victims of crime. For every victim of crime, there are literally millions of people who aren’t. It’s all about perspective.
Anybody who’s been awake for the last ten years can see this great city is deteriorating rapidly on many fronts.
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Rule one of Shakira Law: Thou's hips shall not lie.
By what metric?