Tag Archives: broken windows

Nick Clegg’s speech to Liberal Democrat members on the riots

Nick Clegg spoke to party members yesterday (Saturday) in Liverpool and Manchester, discussing last week’s riots and their aftermath.

His speech featured the announcement that the Government is commissioning independent research into the riots, (including research into gang culture) and cautions against “overnight policy” and “instant announcements”.

Nick’s speech in full:

This has been a traumatic week.

Traumatic for the nation; for police forces around the country; and above all for the innocent victims who have lost their homes, their livelihoods and even, in the most tragic cases, their lives.

The images of burning buses, looted shops and wrecked homes will not fade quickly. But

Posted in News and Speeches | Also tagged and | 18 Comments

Applying the broken windows theory to moderating comments

Interesting post at kottke.org about how the broken windows theory (i.e. low level crime and grot in turn encourages more serious crime) may apply to the quality of online debate:

Much of the tone of discourse online is governed by the level of moderation and to what extent people are encouraged to “own” their words. When forums, message boards, and blog comment threads with more than a handful of participants are unmoderated, bad behavior follows. The appearance of one troll encourages others. Undeleted hateful or ad hominem comments are an indication that that sort of thing is allowable behavior and encourages

Posted in Online politics | Also tagged | Leave a comment
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Recent Comments

  • Jonathan Brown
    @George - me too. I know that not everyone is happy about this, but it's perfectly reasonable policy and I think all care is being taken to try to reassure thos...
  • George Thomas
    It follows the position of what I believe is a majority of UK population of supporting Israel but being against these unlawful settlements. Maybe not brave in t...
  • David Le Grice
    I don't get your point. Starmer's problem was that he had no charisma or any broader understanding of how to be popular. Boris Johnson managed to deliver the ...
  • expats
    Dr Ruvi ZIEGLER 11th Sep '26 - 10:44am You ref..."These measures are a direct response to continuous shifts in policy in Israel over many years which have deep...
  • Jonathan Brown
    @Andy Daer - there is certainly a LOT I haven't addressed in my article, and am not going to address here, if only for lack of time and space. But a few points....