A few years ago, the media warned parents that sinister drug pushers were selling or giving "transfer" tattoos with smiley faces and strawberries on them to young children. These transfers were impregnated with a large dose of LSD, so children who licked them were in danger of going insane from mind bending trips. Parents across Liverpool and elsewhere panicked and the police were besieged with phonecalls. It was later learned that the entire LSD tattoo story had been a hoax, but to this day no one knows who perpetrated it. Years before, in the early 1970s, Liverpool was gripped by what folklorists now call 'The Great Skinhead Scare'. In 1973 a terrifying report circulated the city which stated that a huge gang of skinheads wielding razors and knives were attacking schools and shops. The gangs originated from Huyton and Halewood, and were heading for the city centre. The gang had captured a schoolboy, and after one skinhead asked him if his mother could sew, he slashed the boy with a razor and said, 'Tell her to stitch that up.'
As the scary rumour snowballed, schools kept their pupils behind and police were asked to guard the playgrounds. The police were baffled, as they had not dealt with one skinhead attack. All the same, hundreds of people reported seeing the phantom skinhead gang, and several people were even treated for razor wounds. One woman said she was chased down Leathers Lane in Halewood by the shaven-headed yobs, and she even produced her slashed leather coat as proof. A retired policeman also told how skinheads had pulled him from his car in Northwood, Kirkby, and booted him around 'like a football.' Police immediately descended on Northwood, but found the streets quiet. Not one local resident had seen any rampaging gang of skinheads.
Occultists believe that if enough people concentrate on something happening, then it will. They claim that the combined psychic energy of the masses can collectively create solid-looking projections from their minds, and some think this is what some UFOs really are - mere creations made up from the subconscious desires of the population. That theory might throw some light on the origins of the skinhead mania, and the following peculiar incident. In 1973, an eccentric man, known locally as 'Mr Parky' used to patrol Newsham Park as a self-appointed park keeper. He often carried a small baton, and had been cautioned several times by the police for striking children with it. One evening a boy from nearby Molyneux Road was taunting Mr Parky, when suddenly, the bogus park keeper hit him on the legs with his baton and warned him he was about to receive a severe beating.
'Try us instead,' said a voice behind the oddball bully. Mr Parky turned around and saw two men, aged about twenty. They had shaven heads and wore matching denim jackets and jeans. They had literally appeared out of nowhere, and Mr Parky and the child he had assaulted noticed that the figures had a faint glow about them. The boy was so terrified, he ran off, but Mr Parky said the skinheads beat him up. Moments after the attack they were nowhere to be seen. The same menacing duo were seen in the park on three more occasions, and were thought to be the ghosts of two brothers who died in a car crash in the area several weeks before.

The LSD/transfer tattoo myth is a classic urban legend and has sprung up all over the world. The obvious fact is: why would anyone want to give away perfectly good drugs for free? I think the story is one of the anti drugs scaremongering jobs.
As for the skinhead stories, I dont get it.
Are you suggesting that there have never been skinheads? There were loads of skinheads around during the seventies, if you see any football crowd from that era it will show you.
There are still skinheads around today, I dont understand.

I've heard about the skinhead story before.

I think it is a classic case of mass hysteria; the story of a gang of skinheads attacking schools was never actually documented, but by simple word of mouth the rumour spreads and the more it is heard the greater the panic.

If you hear the same story from a number of different sources then it gains credability.

When you hear of people who were actually attacked (or claimed to be), they were either telling the truth and were attacked by real skinheads or making it up for some reason; these attacs (real or not) simply add to the hysteria.

I've heard of similar experiences in other parts of the world, with other perceived social menaces replacing the skinheads (it is usually whatever is topical at the time); nowadays in this country it would probably be illegal immigrants!!

I actually remember a lot of scare mongering about the drugs I think everybody in the UK does to some extent. Although there are skinheads floating about and always will be the storys were about organised gangs attacking schoolchildren and old people not the typical football hooligans who arranged to fight with rival supporters. There are also different types of skinheads, the thugs and the ones you mainly see today for whom the haircut is just a fashion. The point was just about how people can actually believe something exists without anything more than word of mouth. As opposed to visions where people can come away still doubting what there eyes have actually shown them.