Street Gangs And Its Effects On The Minds Of Today 's Youth

Initially gang activity could only be found in large metropolitan cities, but now gangs have invaded neighborhoods of all sizes across the country. Gangs introduce violence and fear to the communities they occupy, raise the level of drug activities, and destroy businesses and property which brings down the overall value of the whole area. Instead of going to school, many young people find themselves drawn in to the gang life which in most cases either leads to being locked up or death. There are various reasons why people would want to join a gang, but no matter what that reason might be one can only expect a life of violence and troubles.

Gang involvement and its associated violent crime have become a rapidly growing problem for the United States. Generally, gangs consist of young people of the same ethnic, racial, and economic background. Usually of a low socio-economic status, these gangs engage in illegal money making activities and intimidate their neighborhoods and rival gangs with violent crimes and victimization. Gang members exemplify a high value for group loyalty and sacrifice.

Gangs originated naturally during the adolescent years of a child. They started from small play groups that eventually found themselves in conflict with other small groups of youth. Due to the conflict between the two small groups of youth it became a part of a child’s mind set to come together as a gang and protect their rights and satisfy the needs that their environment and families couldn’t provide. There are about 24,500 gangs in the U.S and out of those gangs 40% of them are juveniles (Hess, Orthmann, Wright, 2013). There are numerous reason why a child would join a gang, and the

‘’Teen shot dead in gang wars’’, ‘’ two bystanders killed in gang shootout ‘’, these are familiar headlines at the front page of the local newspapers, aren’t they? Every day thousands of people are affected by gangs across the world. Women are left widowed, children are orphaned and parents are left childless. Let me put what most people are thinking ‘’ gangs are a threat to all of us no matter what sex, age or background we are from. They ruin the safety of a society as a whole, is a never-ending cycle which needs to be stopped and finally being a gang member most probably wrecks an individual’s life.

The number of gang members increased by 46% between 1996 and 1998 (Cox et al., 2014). Since 2001, It has been reported that there are at least 4,000 gangs in the United states with an approximate following of at least 200,000 Juveniles (Duffy and Gillig, 2004). A lot of these Juvenile gangs are broken up by race/ethnicity. In the 1920s, European Americans made up about 90 percent of the gangs in the United States (Duffy and Gillig, 2004). Among the earliest juvenile gangs were those of Irish background that had immigrated from Ireland to escape the life they had lead from there. From there, there were the Jewish gangs that had escaped the holocaust and the Italians that had fled from dictatorship of their home country (Cox et al., 2014) One of the more famous of the European gangs of this time would be the Death rabbits. The Death Rabbits were notorious for beating up other gangs with their spiked baseball bats with a dead rabbit’s head on the end (Kramer and Karr, 1953). On the other hand, African Americans made up about 7 percent of the total gangs in the United States (Duffy and Gillig, 2004). The longest running gang in United States history would have to be the Chicano gangs (Sheldon., Tracy and Brown, 1996). The Chicano gangs had been around for approximately 50 years and occupy most of southern California. (Sheldon., Tracy and Brown, 1996). Society has since become more open to the mixed races

Drug routes are associated and may have originated with U.S. gangs in an effort for drug cartels to amp up and focus on their production, leaving the logistics to the gangs. The drug cartels have chosen to align with U.S. gangs based on similar philosophies of honor, allegiance, and loyalty combined with similar business practices and levels of hierarchy. The largest U.S. gangs are structured similarly to giant corporations that succeed with levels of management teams with the ultimate goal of profit, U.S. gangs are no different as they often legitimize themselves as profitable business. Asian gangs are common in California and on the east coast but locating scholarly articles about their operations is a daunting task that required a personal interview with a former gang member.

People often get into to gangs by offending members of the gang through a disagreement, debt, or for protection. Every day accidents happen new to the area or not, we may not always know our way. In some way shape or form, anyone can disrespect a gang member by simply bumping into them without purpose, angering the specific member causing more conflict between the gang member and the person that bumped into him leading the person into to the gang. Gang members try to help people that are in debt by getting them into to selling things illegally or stealing things. Researchers have found that “Teens also join gangs because of the mistaken belief that membership will protect them. But gang members are more likely to be victims of crimes than people not in gangs” (Klein, 2009) the realization of that person is soon realized when they or the gang comes to an end. Even though most gang members either ends up in jail, injured, or dead. People still see a safety in gangs leading to further conflict.

The Life course of Youth Gang Members paper presented us with results of a study that observed the life histories of gang associated youth in the Ottawa area. The paper analyzes the institutional supports that gang-involved youth required as they grew up. Furthermore it contemplates what might have aided to keep them from becoming gang involved. The Life Course of Youth Gang Members presents three general types of organized groups; first one being “youth gangs”, then “street gangs” and “organized crime groups”. The two types of gangs are of interest: youth gangs and street gangs. Street gangs typically consist of young adults (18 – 30). Street gangs are predominantly systematized to engage in criminal activity. In distinction, youth gangs consist

“According to statistics from the National Youth Gang Center, more than 24,500 gangs, consisting of more than 770,000 members, exist in about 3,300 cities in the U.S.” (Rank 1). Although it is not illegal to be a member of a gang, it should be noted many gangs participate in illegal activity for funding and will use the money as a way to entice new membership. The “money begins flowing, and with that comes all of the things associated with material wealth that is usually beyond the reach of these adolescents without the criminal activity of being involved in a gang” (Nawojczyk 3).

In order to become a member of a gang, most gangs typically have new members “put on” by being beaten up by a large number of older members of the gang. After this, the new member must commit a crime and earn his stripes, either by robbing someone, beating someone up, or in other cases, shooting and killing someone. All members must prove themselves (Howell, 1998). To an outsider, it might seem crazy that a kid would want to join a gang, but to a poor inner-city kid who has very little, gangs provide a family like relationship for kids who feel they are all alone. They provide protection and respect that allows a young person to walk through his or her neighborhood and stay unharmed (Howell, 1998).

In most cases, adolescents join gangs because of close relationships with family members or friends who are already in gangs. Some adolescents are born into gangs as a result of either their parents’ gang history or neighborhood affiliation (The Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency and Prevention: Why Do Youth Join Gangs?, 1998). Protection is also extremely important when it comes to gangs, violence is an everyday occurrence in many gang related environments, and as a result, many adolescents seek out gang involvement for protection from opposing gangs (Taylor &

Street gangs in this country can probably be traced back to the first wave of Europeans who migrated to the colonies for a better life for themselves and their families. Many of the first gangs were formed as a means of self protection, with the thinking that there is simply strength in numbers. The missions of gangs in today’s society have grown and emerged to include many violent criminal avenues, including drug trafficking, prostitution, money laundering, and extortion but the original thinking that there is strength in numbers remains true. Criminology experts believe that the number of teens involved in gangs or gang activity may be as high as 1 in every 5 people in most urban areas. Those number jump to 1 in every 3 people in

When we think of the word "gangs" we usually don’t see an image of youth in our heads, we automatically tend to see an image of male adults with tattoos, guns, drugs, etc. However, this is not always the case; some gang members are also juveniles. A data from Denver 's self-reported youth survey alone, found that 47 percent of gang members were ages 12 to 14, 31 percent were ages 15 to 16, and 22 percent were ages 17 to 18. (Robert, Herbert, & Scott, 2016) When looking at the number of active youth gangs nationally,

Abstract: This review studies in depth research done on street gangs. Social issues have social scientists turning away from including this in their research around this time. Sociological views have been changed dramatically in the past 40 years due to gender and racial studies. Also, women have started to join gangs since America has been changed with woman equality laws passing.

A multitude of social conditions prompts young adults to join gangs and participate in the illegal crime that makes a city unsafe. People join gangs because of “economic issues, weapon availability, drug market access” and street protection needs (Block). Gangs are