Sad news from Southampton of a Canadian artist beaten to death by young thugs in a random act of street violence. 'Sad' of course does not do justice to the tragedy of a man's death, the grief of his family or the utter brutal horror of children - aged between 13 to 15 the police believe - who kill.

When I was in Southampton as a student I was set upon and beaten by young men acting out the Ultra Violence fantasy of Clockwork Orange. They were dressed as near as they could manage as 'Droogies' and they carried hefty sticks to hurt - though one, bless him, could only muster an umbrella as a weapon, which rather reduced the threatening aspect to the merely comical. ("Oi Mam, yer got a big stick I can borrow I wanna go out and hurt students?" "Sorry son your Da's taken my last big stick in the house, but you can have my brolly if you want and be sure you're back in time for tea and watch the roads won't you." "Thanks Mam, see yer later.")

They beat, they kicked and they thwacked - but their aim was not to kill, just to hurt and, above all, to humiliate. They could have carried on the assault to its fatal end had they chosen, but I suspect they would have been as aghast as I would have been truly mortified had I died from their blows.

And now it is my assailants' off-spring who attack. But these now are natural born killers and that scares me to my very soul that we have become such savage beasts in a single generation.