Strange news on Thursday

A story about a crime this week. As you may know, I work in Teddington. On May 18th, there was a fight between two gangs of youths, one from Teddington, and one from Twickenham. A young lad called John Roust was hit over the head with a wooden plank and of his injuries on June 9th.

To what can we attribute this? TV violence, the breakdown of the family, poor parenting, the decline of religion? I bet The Daily Mail would have an answer. But this happened on May 18th 1710. You can read all about the Teddington Maypole riot at the Twickenham Museum site. The three accused got off because there wasn't really any firm evidence. It's a reminder of the fact that human nature is essentially the same throughout history, and that society isn't really any more violent than it used to be.

Oh, and if you want modern nastiness, there's this story about a spider.