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Where to begin David?
"Nobody was forced..." Let us not confuse arm-twisting with sweet words from a figure 'in the know' and the gentle urging of peers and an innate quality that we each possess to progress in life. Advertising does not work, you imply; it is for amusement only? The spider casts it's web at random, without any notion of insect-traffic? The poacher's snare is likewise laid? Is the insect or the rabbit then culpable?
"...to borrow money"... Might 20:20 vision only be available to hindsight? Is it not ever the way of the 'agent' to point-up the benefits? Who but the professional knows how simple a matter it is to profit all the way up the property ladder, who does not see "the home", but only the means to a greater end? [A house in the eyes of the seller is not made of brick but profit.] Since the seventies the property market has not been one of borrowing money, but making money. There would never be the 'bust' if there were not first the 'bubble'.
"irresponsible borrowers"...Who would buy a pair of boots that had no intention of going places? Who would undertake a mortgage of 100%+ if they were not sure of a no-lose situation?
Let us imagine that all are now older and more wise. Where is the person on average or low wage to rent when there are yet so many on the cusp of disaster with their own past borrowings, (i.e. The buy to let brigade.)? Then there is the property rich, who on listening to the sage/weasel words of those that predict an influx of the wealthy of other nations soon to enter into/onto the UK property market, should they falter now or stick it out for more profit?
Fewer houses being built to rent, council housing for sale (discounted), rents ever on the rise, house prices 'set' to rise (is that not always the rhetoric?)...fewer jobs, fewer well paid jobs, less stable employment.
No David the borrowers are not to blame...any more than the flower is to be 'condemned' for following the course of the Sun.