Watching the documentary, Crips and Bloods: Made in America, I learned that white people never gave black people in America the chance to succeed because they were constantly targeting them. I learned that people who grow up in south California really have no choice but to join a gang and result to violence because if they don’t they will not survive. Kids who are born in this part of LA are born into drug dealing families, broken homes, or to parents who are working multiple jobs just to make ends meet. These children have no guidance and no one to show them the right way of life. They join gangs so they can feel protected and like they belong somewhere in this world. The most important thing I took from this film is that its not these peoples
A FBI report stated, “An estimated 1.4 million people are active in more than 33,000 street, prison and outlaw motorcycle gangs across the country.” In book, “If I Grow Up” written by Todd Strasser discusses that life in the projects is not easy. DeShawn, a young boy who lived in the projects with his gramma and his sister Nia, wanted to get out of the projects, but he thought there was no way out. So after DeShawn started to see that there was no hope for him he decided that there was no hope and made a decision that would forever affect his life, he decided to join the gang. For then on he made poor decisions that caused him to be put in jail.
Most of the gang members come from a poor and unstable upbringing. Many of the youth who are a part of the Crips have dropped out of high school and are
The array of neighborhoods in the center southern California holds nest to the notorious Crips and the Bloods. The documentary Crips and Bloods: Made in America starts with the generation before the blue and red covered the streets. Thorsten Sellin’s pioneering on conflict theory best describes the development of the gangs. There were two waves of cultural conflict that led up to the Bloods and Crips. The primary culture conflict derived in the 1950s, segregation defined norms that strictly separated blacks and whites.
In the film Crips and Bloods Made In America by Stacy Peralta, the history of the two south L.A. gangs is discussed in depth. The current disadvantages these modern gangs are faced with can be traced back to the oppressive and segregative history of America towards people of color. In the 60’s the black community was extremely strong and had a plethora of leaders who united and led their fight against inequality. Even in the face of white flight and segregation (Schneider, Escape From L.A.) the community had thriving social programs, cultural hubs, and vocational opportunities that was beneficial to its members (Film: Crips and Bloods).
Greg Boyle once said “You can’t reason with gang violence: you can’t talk to it, sit it at a table, and negotiate with it.” A big problem with the US educational system is that they don’t do anything to stop gangs in school. The gangs inside the school and outside the school are constantly influencing the students making them more violent and aggressive against each other and teachers. In the memoir, Holler If You Can Hear Me By Gregory Michie, Michie and his students face gang problems inside and outside the school.
As gangs increased, so did the fear in the neighborhood, giving way to deadly consequences. Unfortunately, the majority of these consequences were taken out on the African American community and young black men were given an unnecessary sentence over a struggle with the world of illegal drugs. In an article examining the structure of an African American house hold during the Crack Era, Eloise Dunlap determines a line between the struggling family and drugs. She states there were “…increasing concentrations of poverty during the 70’s and 80’s, particularly among African Americans...” with “Poverty and joblessness associated with…drug and alcohol abuse…” Not only is the use of drugs affecting their safety, but it is now ruining their home life and economic stability as well.
In America, a teenager can be easily drawn into witnessing a family member being stabbed to death, trafficked into drug/gang cults, or receive severe damages to his/her physical body. Commonly, these kinds of circumstances call the responsible leaders in our community to action, but in the forgotten part of America, they continue uninterrupted. During the late 1980’s, the United States ranked as a developed nation with a competitive capitalist economy and better living standards for the higher social class. Their promises to defend critical human rights remained unrivaled around the globe; yet the United States still possessed areas with lower class people compressed into high rise projects and who struggled to overcome poverty, violence, and prejudice. The lower class people were often given very little to no resources or the
How well Wes Moore describes the culture of the streets, and particularly disenfranchised adolescents that resort to violence, is extraordinary considering the unbiased perspective Moore gives. Amid Moore’s book one primary theme is street culture. Particularly Moore describes the street culture in two cities, which are Baltimore and the Bronx. In Baltimore city the climate and atmosphere, of high dropout rates, high unemployment and poor public infrastructure creates a perfect trifecta for gang violence to occur. Due to what was stated above, lower income adolescent residents in Baltimore are forced to resort to crime and drugs as a scapegoat of their missed opportunities.
A gang is an interstitial group, originally formed spontaneously, and then integrated through conflict. Crips are a famous street gang founded in Los Angeles California in 1969. They are known to be one of the most violent and unlawful gangs within Los Angeles. Crips main activities included theft and assault. The founders of the Crips gang are Raymond Washington and Stanley Tookie Williams III.
In American education, being in a gang and stereotypes plays a major role in the way people view education. Through loyalty to their gang, poverty, and corrupt legal systems, educational systems don 't know how to handle these types of people going through these problems. In many instances, people from rival gangs are in the same class or school. There will be no learning for them because it is engraved in their head that “I need to ‘pop’ this guy because his gang killed someone in my gang.”
Gang activities have been increasing over the years from crimes ranging from robberies to homicides. In California, estimates were made by the Justice Department that approximately 175000 to 200000 persons were members of gangs. In the county of Los Angeles gang activities for over a period of five years accounted for over 23000 of the crimes that occurred.(Friedrichs. M. 1999). Gangs have become not only a problem for those communities where the gang's ar located but has become a problem for everyone.
In the United States, every year there are around 2,000 gang-related homicides and in the realistic fiction novel, The Outsiders, by S.E Hinton, it explores the issues of gang violence, and teenagers in gangs. Around 40% of all members in gangs are teenagers, who are getting involved in some dangerous things very early in life. In the novel The Outsiders, the “Greasers” which is a gang of all teenagers, fight other gangs and commit serious crimes such as murder. We as a society need to pinpoint why teenagers join gangs and stop them beforehand. We also need to help people get out of gangs if they are already in one.
In Chicago, and all over the nation, the effects of gang activity have been displayed, specifically in low income and poverty torn communities. Poverty is measured depending on a family’s annual income and determining if the amount falls below the poverty threshold for the family’s size. If the annual income does fall below the threshold, then the family and every individual in it is considered to be in poverty. Gang activity is more visible in the areas specifically in major cities similar to Chicago where poverty is a commonality in communities. although gangs might add structure in order where the government fails to do so in the projects and and similar low income communities the negative effects such as the distribution of drugs, violence,
Gang violence is a growing problem in this world. No parent would like to imagine their kids dealing with weapons or being threatened by them. These violence’s affects each child individually and their families as well. These gangs recruit multiple different individuals for many reasons such as bribery, family traditions, or even threatening. Although, many kids feel like they have to be a part of it but there are many resources out in this world to prevent them from believing so.
Members of gangs live off of the power they feel they have on their communities and continue to intimidate society through their violent