Day: November 21, 2014

There have been 157 deaths in London between the years 2005-2013. It is shocking to believe that 105 people have been stabbed; 30 have been shot; 13 have been beaten ; 2 have been burnt; 3 have been strangled and 4 have fallen into the others category. In this essay I am going to be writing about why teenagers/young adults carry knives, the effect of this and the reasons behind this.

Teenagers tend to carry knives around for many different reasons such as: self-protection (if they feel they are likely to get approached by someone they’re afraid of), gang activity and in some cases, simply because they are easy to access. People wonder why the statistics of knife crime is so high. It is egregious to believe why so many teenager/young adults carry knives. Maybe it is because they are forced to or have no choice but to use these dangerous weapons.

However using knives is clearly not the only solution to problems. If police catch anybody in possession of a knife, they can be put into prison for  up to 6 months! It doesn’t matter whether they use the knife or not, just being in your possession can put people in a lot of trouble.

Have you ever been threatened? Have you ever witnessed somebody being stabbed? Have you ever been stabbed? Or have you received a death note? If yes then you are more likely to carry a harmful weapon. This is because you’ve had an unpleasant feeling. You have experienced terror and you’re most likely to be scared and want to protect yourself. The first thing teenagers and young adults think to do is protect themselves. Carry a knife. Risk their lives. They do not think of the consequences of their actions They do not stop and think, what if I get caught or what if I get into big trouble, what will happen then? Teenagers/young adults tend to keep their problems to themselves and act anti-social. The best thing to do is ask for advice, just sit down and speak to a mature adult. Try to get the problem sorted out.

On the 7th of December 2013 a photographer named Adam Patterson began photographing London gang leader, “Vipoh”. This was shown in the newspaper “The Guardian”. The figure of knife crime in London was 14,192 in 2007-8 but significantly decreased to 11,376 in 2012-13. Whilst being interviewed, Adam Patterson asked why he carries knives and other weapons. Vipoh replied “ To make me look intimidating, so others will be afraid of me”. When he was young and was new to this way of life he chose the name ‘Vipoh’, his close friends told him that somebody was after him because his “tag” (the name he goes by) was similar. Vipoh was horrified and didn’t know what to do. He went down the wrong path. When the boy and a couple of his friends approached Vipoh, he brought out his knife and the bunch of boys were afraid so they left Vipoh alone. That was probably the most significant decision that he was forced to make. The clear impact to this is that he lived a life of a teenage boy committing crimes and getting involved in gang violence. This is an example of why teenagers/young adults carry knives.

Male teenagers/young adults are much more antisocial than females are. This is because boys dislike expressing their emotions and feelings.They tend to take matters into their own hands rather than speaking  to somebody about their problems or worries. One solution for a knife crime is to think before you act (be careful of the decision you’re making); think of the consequences of your actions. The second solution is to speak to a person or a specialist about your problems. Also we should enforce more severe laws on the possession and utilisation of knives. People will be too worried to have them in the first place let alone use them. Prevent is better than cure. We should all put down the knives of death.

Everybody was in panic. Immediately the doors and windows were tightly shut and were blocked off by massive bags of rice. Nobody could leave or enter the overcrowded shop. Furthermore there was an absence of light; the mist caused a murky darkness. The sun was concealed by the mist. The mist inhaled the light provideth by the glowing spark of the sun. Condensation slid down the window as though it had just finished raining. Suddenly there was a silent pause amongst the shoppers. The thought of not living to see daylight flew across the minds of  frightened ones. A women then screams “ We’re all gonna die” as though she wanted everyone to panic in depression. All that could be heard was the screaming of petrified shoppers. Tears fell from the faces of the young whilst parents brokedown in distress beside them. Not a living soul could begin to comprehend the immensity of the dangerous situation. Responsibly the shop owner went around trying to reassure people that everything would be alright. You could see in his eyes that he was just as afraid as everybody else, the only difference was he tried to stop people from panicking and crying. In one corner of the shop people were being attracted by a woman preaching. She was persuading ill-hearted sinners to repent since she believed judgement day was swiftly approaching. In another corner of the shop, couples were kissing and caressing; making sure they spend  what would seem to be their final moments together.

Four brave men were willing to sacrifice themselves in order to observe the phenomenon in the outside world. Amongst the four men stood a soldier as tall as the Eiffel Tower. He had a muscular physique. His fists were tightly clenched and you could see the blue veins popping ferociously out of his large hands. The second person was the owner of the shop. He was a very large man. Overweight. He was the most terrified of them all. He wanted to leave the shop and get back home to his family but they all refused saying that there’s something out there destroying mankind. The third man was an ordinary person trying to figure out what was happening. He was a middle aged man (30-40) with an authorized gun in his back pocket. He’s an experienced shooter and he was the only person with a gun. The last person was one of the shop workers. He looked very young as though he just came out of university. He was lanky and skinny with ginger hair and freckles. He had a big personality. He wasn’t worried about anything. You could tell that he was very childish and stubborn because he said he could take down the monster with one hand tied behind his back and his eyes closed. The fate of the shell shocked shoppers were entrusted in their hands.These four men tread past the shoppers; into the basement without attracting attention.

Their plan was to open the garage door. See what was lurking around causing the mist. Difficult decisions were forced upon them. How would they do this? Who would go into the world of the unknown?. Eager to make himself look like a hero, the ginger haired fellow volunteered without hesitation. Fearful of what may happen, the soldier did not want to allow the young man to leave. However, everybody else concurred to his decision of leaving because he showed no fear, in fact was overjoyed to be the leaving the isolated store.

They opened the garage door slightly but gradually to prevent anything from entering the shop. The mist entered the shop slowly; the mist smelt like some sort of gas; the mist felt numbing and cutting.The young man had rope tied to him so if anything happened he could be pulled back into the shop. He walked around and kept on looking back to check if he could still see the garage door.

He then shouted “ We’re safe there’s nothing out here”. A feeling of ease was blessed upon him. Overjoyed. Delighted. The thought of being safe made him feel tranquil.

Suddenly he could hear the voices of three men echoing in the distance, “come back you’re going to die…look behind you”. At that very instant the young man had a numinous feeling. He started running back as fast as he could. An octopus like tentacle grabbed him by the bottom of his legs. As soon as the tentacle made contact with his legs, there was a puddle of blood surrounding him. The tentacle was draining the young man’s blood.

The soldier and the middle aged man then ran out in desperation to try and save the young man. The soldier grabbed onto the young mans hand and from there, was a battle of tug-of-war. Would the young man survive?. The tentacle latched onto the young man and you could hear steam burning through his skin. Blood was gushing out of his body. You could tell by the expression on the young mans face that he did not want to die. Tears dropped from his face. Ear bursting screaming revealed the amount of pain he was in.

The shop manager shouted “Leave him, there is no hope for survival” , the two men fled in order to save their own lives. The boys hand reached out crying “ save me…please”.

They closed the garage door where they would remain stuck, hidden in the mist.