IStock Photo 3005092 © Galina Barskaya

We usually blame young people when things get violent. After all, street crime is the province of young men, isn’t it?—along with, recently, some notorious young women. Sensationalized schoolgirl assaults crank up those “mean girls” stereotypes, too. All the news about bullying, like the alleged harassment of Massachusetts teen Phoebe Prince, who committed suicide, seems to depict our schools and streets as teeming with uncontrollable young thugs of both sexes.

But the FBI’s actual crime figures tell a surprisingly different story. Violent crime among young people has dropped. Instead, it’s people in their middle years who are getting more hotheaded—especially middle-aged women.

From 1981 to 2008, arrests of women age 35 - 54 for felony assault shot up from 7,100 to 28,800, an increase of 405%. Among men in that age group, arrests increased by a far smaller proportion (though they still more than doubled, to 100,500).

Drugs and alcohol may have something to do with all this violent misbehaving. Of course, you can find kids hanging around outside the 7-Eleven, furtively smoking a joint and hoping someone of age will buy them beer, but these mini-delinquents have nothing on their elders. Drug and alcohol abuse peak in middle age.

Arrests of Americans over 40 for drug offenses exploded from 22,000 in 1980 to 360,000 in 2006. The odds an adult 45 - 49 years of age has engaged in heavy alcohol use in the past month are 1 in 12.82; for those aged 60-64, the odds plummet to 1 in 34.48.

Are drugs really to blame for this upsurge in ugly behavior among the no-longer-young? Some experts think so. David Murray of the Office of National Drug Control Policy points out that drug use among young people peaked in the 1970s; those boomers, Murray says, “brought it with them like baggage when they hit 50 and 60.” The odds a person 50-54 has used any illicit drug in the past month are 1 in 16.81, compared to just 1 in 57.37 for those aged 60 - 64. Also, age can magnify the effects: Older bodies have less water content to dilute alcohol and slower metabolisms to process drugs out of their systems.

“What’s the matter with kids today?” asks the old Bye Bye Birdie song, echoing every generation’s complaint about their prodigal progeny. In place of that question, boomers should remember something they might have heard from their own parents. Every time you point your finger at someone, you’ve got three more fingers pointing back at you.