I write in utter disgust and dismay at hearing of another shooting and stabbing in Edmonton on Saturday, July 12. We hardly have to dream up a fantasy image of a Bronx-type ghettoised existence where people are afraid to walk the streets. For it is already occurring on the streets of Edmonton today. It never use to be that way. Increased shootings seem to be a sign of the times in a world where guns and knives are tolerated.

Just when will these senseless and brutal crimes stop? I know this could and does happen in the leafiest and quietest of places (only last week was my friend’s son senselessly mugged for his mobile phone at knifepoint in another area of north London). But the fact that this is happening in Edmonton, which is known to have one of the highest murder rates, points to the issues of gangs yet again.

A lack of respect for fellow human beings and any sense of social responsibility seem to be the root cause and is a disease of modern society.

In senior schools there needs to be more initiatives to connect with gang members or would-be gang members and to show them that there is a different route available to them.

Senseless violence is glamourised by computer games and films cast as entertainment. This further fuels the lack of moral fibre in society and will lead to a breakdown in the social system.

The barriers in society between class systems need to be broken down, starting with a shake-up in the education system. A new more equal structure needs to be put in place where youths have more than senseless muggings on their CVs, one in which they will want to contribute to society in a positive way rather than destroy it and their victim’s lives in the process.

We have but one world, and although we don’t live in an ideal society by any means, given the chance, with increased interception of gangland activities by police and clamping down, our world in north London could be so much better.

Andy Theodorou

Winchmore Hill Road, Winchmore Hill