Kylie Lang: Brisbane Airbnb party chaos is parents’ fault

It doesn’t matter whether the teens who destroyed a Brisbane Airbnb were from an “elite” school, writes Kylie Lang. Many teens from all backgrounds have a twisted notion of amusement, but it’s more an issue of parenting.

My father grew up on Geelong Street, East Brisbane, and remembers being a bit wild back in the day.

But nothing comes remotely close to the havoc more than 500 teenagers wreaked on that lovely leafy street over the weekend.

Dad would tear up and down Geelong Street on his motorcycle but he – and the young bucks of his generation – would never have considered trashing somebody’s home or climbing onto police cars to stop officers getting out.

My grandfather would have thrashed the living daylights out of him, for one thing, and those police officers would already be inside at the kitchen table as my grandmother poured tea and begged them to teach her boy a lesson.

How things have changed since the 1950s.

Nan and Pop lived in that house, built by my great grandfather as their wedding present in 1934, until they died. It’s a good thing they’re not here today to see society going down the gurgler.

Last Saturday night, a party run by students from Brisbane Boys’ College turned toxic.

The Airbnb home they’d rented – claiming to be five adults and one infant – was wilfully damaged and expensive appliances and a lawnmower were thrown into the pool.

An out-of-control house party organised by elite private school students left doors smashed, plumbing wrecked and expensive appliances in the pool at an Airbnb property in East Brisbane. Photo: Supplied.

Appliances and a lawnmower were thrown into the pool. Photo: TikTok.

Neighbours’ yards were also targeted in these kids’ twisted notion of amusement.

When police arrived, teens were seen scrambling onto their cars and preventing officers from getting out.

Neighbours told The Courier-Mail they were terrified.

“All the young ones were running up and down, screaming and yelling and all of sudden you hear all these smashed bottles … why would you want to do so much damage?” one observer said.

A Fijian tourist staying in a nearby unit remarked: “Stuff like this doesn’t happen in my country … it was wild … I thought, is it a normal thing in Australia?”

I sincerely hope not, but you have to wonder what on earth has happened for kids to behave so dreadfully, with such little respect for other people and their property.

Because they attend BBC – a prestigious school in Toowong where annual fees exceed $30,000 – they’ve been labelled entitled little rich kids.

Maybe they are, but it’s not only children from private schools who have been known to carry on like reprobates.

I’ve written previously about teenagers throwing rocks and bottles at officers and damaging three police cars after a mass party in the Logan suburb of Eagleby.

There was a riotous gathering in the outer southwestern Brisbane suburb of Acacia Ridge which saw one officer hospitalised with fractures in his eye socket and cheek bone.

Were those kids – some of them probably parents by now, god help us – private school students?

A Brisbane home trashed in a wild youth party after the home was initially booked for a party of five. Picture: Sunrise

Probably not, and it doesn’t matter anyway.

This is less an issue of schooling and more an issue of parenting.

Teaching your kids right from wrong is not dependent on how much money you have, or whether you choose a private or public education.

It comes down to how present you are in your children’s lives and the behaviour you model yourself.

It involves disciplining them when they stuff up and establishing clear boundaries and enforcing limits so they are in no doubt of what is expected of them.

And it means guiding them to stand up for what is right instead of weakening under peer pressure.

Too many kids are being raised to rile against authority figures, be they police or teachers, because parents think their little darlings are being persecuted and can do no wrong.

Queensland’s youth crime crisis was allowed to fester under nine years of woke Labor.

But it originated in homes where consequences for actions were absent or meaningless.

And yes, it was cemented in schools where poor behaviour was ignored or inadequately dealt with.

The buck stops with parents.

If they can’t do their jobs properly, their kids should be rehomed.

I don’t like the chances of that, even with Premier David Crisafulli’s hard stance on youth crime, but it is clear that society needs a reset.

While we can’t return to the 1950s of my father’s youth or waste time being nostalgic about our own, we can – and we must – reinstate values of respect and responsibility to give all kids a fighting chance.

They deserve it, and so do we.

Kylie Lang is Associate Editor of The Courier-Mail
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Originally published as Kylie Lang: Brisbane Airbnb party chaos is parents’ fault