Seems your Brits' government is pretty hell-bent on imitating every dystopian and totalitarian book possible.

http://reason.com/archives/2010/02/24/weoponizing-mozart

Really now? Cameras on every street corner, torturing your younger citizens (*cough* sorry, royal subjects) with classical music? "1984" and "Clockwork Orange" seem to be synthesizing together. 0_o
What's next haha? May you all need a reminder of the 5th of November soon...?

(btw no offense to any British on here, I just found this funny...and mildly scary)

Well, I note that in the article there is an air of complaint about police using an unmanned flying drone with cameras to catch a car thief.

What would the writer have preferred? The car thief to have gotten away in the name of human rights?

The fact is, when you have a nation as unruly and loutish as this one certain measures will be employed.

I should point out however that blasting teenage louts with classical music is nothing new. I first recall it being used in my home city of Birmingham in the mid-eighties - by McDonalds. They used it after about 6pm at night to disperse gangs of youths who loitered around their doorways.

Ive heard of a lot of this stuff before so it doesn't really surprise me as to the level it is being taken to in the UK.

One interesting fact you may find amusing in relation to this;

>>A few years ago some local authorities introduced the Mosquito, a gadget that emits a noise that sounds like a faint buzz to people over the age of 20 but which is so high-pitched, so piercing, and so unbearable to the delicate ear drums of anyone under 20 that they cannot remain in earshot. It’s designed to drive away unruly youth from public spaces, yet is so brutally indiscriminate that it also drives away good kids, terrifies toddlers, and wakes sleeping babes.<<


Recently some high school students in Australia have been banned from bringing their mobile phones to school because they were using ringtones and message alerts in that high frequency which was inaudible to the teachers (those over the age of 20) to communicate with each other during classes.
The ringtone is freely available here for anyone interested:

http://www.freemosquitoringtones.org/



The

Where can I buy one of these oh, so wonderful devices?

I keep reading about how we are the most watched nation on earth but I can't say that it bothers me. On the other hand I do realise that the "if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear" argument could just as easily be used to justify putting CCTV INSIDE people's homes, 1984 style.

Rather than all these fancy gadgets I think putting more (armed) policemen out on the beat would help solve a lot of the problems of anti-social behaviour.
It all comes down to cost though. The main reason there aren't as many officers out on the beat as there should be is because they have to spend a good deal of their shifts filling out forms and typing up their reports. Up until a few years ago every police station had admin staff (Civil Servants) to do that, but most of them were made redundant in cost-cutting measures that started in the late 80s.

"The dangerous message being sent to young people is clear: 1) you are scum; 2) classical music is not a wonder of the human world, it’s a repellent against mildly anti-social behavior." The fact that using classical music as a yob-repellant seems to be working would say to me that a lot of young people ARE scum, who can't appreciate decent music. Notice there's no mention of using Heavy Metal as scum-repellant

Maybe I'll move to Britain.

I can be perfectly happy sitting at train stations all day listening to classical music while police robots protect my car. I couldn't care less if every square inch of public space is covered in surveillance cameras, the worst they can get is footage of me picking my nose.

Here in America they seem to be determined to keep me away from my favorite places (like bookstores and coffee shops) by playing the most "ethnic" music they can find, which usually consists on weird sounding aborigine chants or Cubans hitting cans with sticks. I would love to be “punished” with some Mozart for a change.

I do not follow you.

What's dystopian or totalitarian, about using of music to help shape troubled youngsters, be it Classical or otherwise?

The method according to the article, seems to be producing positive results.

What other method would you suggest be used to the means, less "dystopian and totalitarian" ?

As far as CCTV is concerned, one in every street corner is the least security there could be, in a place where people are free to walk around streets doing protests such as this:

I was being a little bit melodramatic intentionally here; I just think it's funny how the Mozart thing is like A Clockwork Orange, and the cameras like 1984.

Of course the cam-bot catching the car criminal (YES alliteration) is pretty cool and I'm not complaining about that usage of it. It could also be very useful for stopping possible terrorist attacks in major cities like London.
I just do still find it a little unnevering...same with the surveillance cameras; I mean they're in public places where cops could be walking around anyway.

No I think the article was right that Mozart is not a good punishment for kids...I mean, I think it's true most teenagers are too uncultured or whatevs to like it, and I sure as hell don't mind good classical, but ASSUMING that ALL kids don't like it and playing it as punishment? I mean that really is a self-fulfilling prophecy; "they hate Mozart so we'll punish em with Mozart, then laugh when they cringe hearing it 10 years later!"
Blah.

And SINClair, yeah the Muslims like that in European countries piss me off to no end. The scumbags move to a Western country, take advantage of it's wealth, social services and toleration of diversity, then kill cops and expect the country to adapt to THEIR culture. I'd deport em back to their huts sooooo fast...

I think I'm actually starting to hate Muslims more than Christians... and that's a LOT of hatred!

>> I just do still find it a little unnevering...same with the surveillance cameras; I mean they're in public places where cops could be walking around anyway. <<


Britain is absolutely cash strapped. In debt for multi-billions. Taxes that are so high that the populace is being bled dry and they still can't recoup the cost of their squanderings.

They can't afford to police the streets adequately.

I would join you in that suffering.

You can actually get them as a ringtone.Youth started using that against the adults in schools because they could hear when they would receive a text message, and the teachers couldn't.

There is also a ringtone that someone developed in Asia(?) that has a subliminal message that will cause a woman's breast to grow slightly. Thanks technology!

It is not assuming that all kids do not like it, it is knowing that most troubled kids do not.