Personal Narrative Essay: The Cause Of Gang Violence

Also, from my observation of the author’s interaction with the gang members, he acted in a way, that was out of respect, and in no way condemning of the gang members or their culture. He befriended them and truly showed great interest in their personal lives. He also knew that he couldn’t’ approach these gang members in a hostile manner, as he learned this from a gang member, who stated that “You can’t just walk into the neighborhood and act like a tough guy, you get beat up.” Moreover, I also observed that the author seemed mild mannered, and certainly did not come across as this know it all, arrogant researcher. I can only imagine how scary this entire experience may have been for him, but nonetheless, he allowed himself to “hang around” the gang members as they drove him around their dangerous neighborhood.

Since the beginning of time there have always been clicks and groups that were made up of people who had the same goals in mind or same interests. However, nowadays gangs consist mostly of people who commit the same type of crimes together that involve drug charges or murders. Gangs noticeably started getting their “bad image” beginning with a man named Al Capone. The rebellion started with the prohibition era. Al Capone was the most powerful gangster in Chicago during this era.

Mona Ruiz was raised in the middle class neighborhoods of central Santa Ana in a household of two parents, and seven siblings. Although Ruiz had family members affiliated with gangs, her father despised gang members. Both of them would have talks about how proud he’d be if she furthered her education and became a police officer. He had said to her and her sisters, “gangs promise only shame and danger for a young girl.” (Ruiz 27).

Gangs in Prison Prison gangs have become a big problem in the correctional facilities today. The gang has started to control the prisons and making the work life for correctional officers very difficult. They are able to run their criminal empire on the outside from the inside of the jail and also try and traffic drugs into the prisons and among many other things. Prison gangs are criminal organizations that are formed with the inmates within the correctional facility. The gangs are made up of a select group of inmates who have an organized hierarchy and they are governed to follow a certain code of conduct.

Next, in paragraph 2, “I started in a low-level gangs, stealing, peddling goods, getting into fights, gambling and bullying other kids.” This quote explains that even in the lower level gangs there is still a lot of crime and bad bad stuff happening. After that, in paragraph 1, “I was just 8 years old when I got into the gang life. It was around the time I witnessed my first shooting…” This shows that the gang life is violent even when a member is young, death and other bad things still happen.

The memoir All Souls by Michael Patrick MacDonald is an important work because it is a testament of how one person transcends gang violence and racism. People read about gang violence and racism in the news, but they never think that it is happening close to them. All Souls reminds us how close and real violence can be through its captivating and horrific stories. It reminds us of how bad racial tensions can be. All Souls is based on true stories and commemorates those who died in Michael's Southie family and neighborhood.

There is a number of reasons that range from simple to complex, on why teenagers join gangs, and we can help by finding solutions to their specific problem before they choose to join one. To help someone get out of a gang, we as a society need to show there’s more out there in the world that they could do that will make a positive impact. Teenagers have different reasons to join gangs depending on their life situation. Everyone in the “Greasers” in The Outsiders had different reasons to be part of the gang. “We were used to seeing Johnny banged up-

did a study and concluded that poor math scores for males and a student’s weak attachment to his or her teacher are both strong indicators that he or she will join a gang (2003). Researchers also said that youths who feel unsafe at school are also more likely to join a gang—for protection (Curry, Decker, and Egley, 2002; Decker & Curry, 2000). Schools that have a high teacher to student ration or schools that have poor academic quality can also increase the likelihood of a youth joining a gang (Curry, Decker, and Egley, 2002; Decker & Curry,

Gang Definition and Classification Classifying gangs is no simple task and to begin you must thoroughly understand the definition and requirements of being classified as a such. There are multiple definitions of a gang, according to The Modern Gang Reader but the one I will focus on is “A street gang is any durable street-oriented youth group whose involvement in illegal activity is part of its group identity.” Now that the definition has been identified it needs to be broken down further to clearly differentiate why this definition is essential.

This paper draws on existing sociological research in identifying a number of theories used in explaining the formation of gangs. The theories discussed are social structure theories, social conflict theory, and social process theories all of which highlight elements of strain in different forms as they relates to gang formation. According to Merton, (as cited in Schneider & Tilly, 2004) structural theories significantly emphasize the role of social and economic structures as the causes of delinquent behavior and tend to treat criminal behavior as the result of the undesirable and dysfunctional structures (P. 3.).

Most gangs include mainly male people who can range up to the ages of 12 to 25 years old. Gangs are commonly found in large cities, which either include a white dominant race or a black dominant race. They follow a consistent pattern of either being truants and come from unsupportive families. They can also be people who are unemployed and struggling to make means and therefore they result to gang activities. They are seen to be associated with criminal activity and violent behavior as well as prostitution and drug laundering including many other criminal offenses.

The term gang can be attached to a legion of groups which would include outlaws from back in the nineteenth century in the west of America, a congregation of unruly prison inmates, members of the triads, the mafioso, and other organised criminal entities such as sons of anarchy a know motorcycle gang, and groups of socially displaced inner city youths. Despite its diverse definition, the term gang most of the times denotes the involvement to illegal or disreputable activities. The term gang were mostly facilitated by social scientists they use this term to describe a group of juveniles, this research can be dated back to 1927 with the involvement of Frederic Thrasher's literature titled The Gang: A study of 1313 gangs in Chicago.

Most gangs are made up of young males that are of a similar background and have a desire of acquiring

Gang effects on the community: Gangs has their own culture and characteristics that includes their dress codes, identifying symbols, language, graffiti, drugs use &trafficking, use of other narcotics, and involvement in other illegal activities. However the nature and characteristics of gangs differ from community to community. Gangs however are found to be more prevalent in high crime areas and are also responsible for the majority of crimes committed. However to understand the function of gangs within the community we have to delve once more into the definition which is characterized as an identifiable group of people who: are generally perceived as a distinct aggregation by others recognize themselves as an street identifiable group (almost invariably with a group name) have been involved in a sufficient number of delinquent incidents to call forth a consistent negative response from neighborhood residents and/or law enforcement agencies.

Young adults may want to join gangs because of the money that they might earn through illegal processes. Their grades could start to drop and they could potentially have a difficult time finding jobs. Young teens could begin joining gangs at as young as ages 13 and 15 ("Violence"). Gang rivalries could also happen at schools. This could be a major problem for school systems.