Since a young age I have always asked myself questions, these questions would always relate to groups that are formed by people mainly young people (gangs). Finding these things out has slighlty changed my perspective on Gangs. I have always thought of gangs as a waste of time, bunch of idiots , dangerous people who like to fight steal kill and take drugs and so forth. However after researching quite a few articles, I have found that it all has to do with their backgrounds. For example the gang member may have come from a violent family, or nieghborhood ect. It has taken me time to realise that it is not the fault of the actual indivuals themselves but of those of whom they may have grewn up with or may have been guardianed by. Personally I think everything should start in the home. And by saying this I meanParents should take responsability and teach their children from when they are young or even try to get involved with their child as much as possible. For instance help them with their homework, ask them who their friends are and get acquainted with them, basically paying attention to them giving them what they need. From a certain article:
Poverty: For many inner-city kids, gangs are one of the only available ways of making money. It's no coincidence that gangs surged in the 1980s as the number of decent jobs in the inner city declined.
Emotional Needs: A number of factors -- including overcrowding, single-parent (or even no-parent) families, and poverty -- make it hard for many young people to have normal ego needs met, including the need for status, excitement, and power. Gangs -- and gang rituals and camaraderie -- satisfy those needs, at least in part.
Protection: In many ways, gangs are the human equivalent of the "safety in numbers" herd-survival mechanism seen throughout nature. But gangs do more than just protect members; they drive up the ante so high that challenges to members are reduced.
Social Support: Gangs are social structures in places where there are few competitors. And even though they're based more on tribal values than family values, the feeling of belonging that gangs provide is one of the strongest ties binding members. Also, gangs are so entrenched in some areas that membership is now a family tradition. Kids join the set or posse or crew that their father or uncles or cousins joined before them.
Therefore examples should be set by our elders in society mostly by our parents.
What do you think ??? I would love to get your feedback !! THANKYOU
References List :
Herald.NZ.( April 27 2008) Melee outside party leads to teen's death art.Retreived april 29,2008,from http://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/story.cfm?c_id=124&objectid=10506470
Gangs.(n.d).Retrieved may 1, 2008, from http://www.gainesvillepd.org/gangs.htm
Herald.NZ.( May 6 2008) Gang sting 'good day for community'.Retreieved May 10, 2008,from http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/1/story.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10508177
Herald.NZ.(May 12 2008).Huge effort needed to combat gangs and drugs PM art.Retreived May 13, 2008, from http://www.nzherald.co.nz/category/story.cfm?c_id=30&objectid=10509542
Parker.J. (June 2007) Street Gangs: The view from the streets.Retreived May 9, 2008, from http://www.doitnow.org/pages/178.html
Samhsa.(n.d). Helping your kids street clear of gangs.Retreived May 13 2008, from http://www.necasaonline.org/images/customer-files/Violence/Helping-Your-Kids-Steer-Clear-of-Gangs-060105.pdf
Influence of gangs.(n.d). Retreived May 10, 2008, from http://www.term-papers.us/ts/hc/svn108.shtml
Mcshan.Jeff. (April 1 2008). Murder, pregnant women's stabbing linked toEast houston Gang art . Retreived May 5, 2008, from http://www.khou.com/news/local/crime/stories/khou080401_ac_gangactivity.1f39cea3.html
Youtube.(n.d). Ima gangsta. Retreived May 10 2008, from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeBhKkbkAWU
Q&A/Articles. (n.d). Alot of my Friends are in gangs . Retreieved May 5 2008, from http://www.teengrowth.com/index.cfm?action=info_advice&ID_Advice=2067
12 comments:
Hey Victoria!!
yay i finally found your blog hehehe.
I think you and Eileen both share similar opinions on this matter. That gangs are a big problem in society today and something should be done to stop the violence and crimes being committed by so many gang members in New Zealand today.
I definitely agree with you when you said parents should be taking more responsibility for what there children are doing everyday. Also that most kids commit such crimes or even consider joining gangs because they lack the attention and love that they rightly should be getting from their parents. I thought that was nicely said by you!
So maybe if we take into consideration the factors that make children, in this 21st century, join gangs. Such factors as for the care and sense of belonging in a "family" that they recieve when they are in a gang. Then the government might just understand how to help improve this problem and even one day find a solution.
This quote by Snoop Dogg about gangs -"It's so easy for a kid to join a gang, to do drugs... we should make it that easy to be involved in football and academics." ...definitely something to consider!?!
Hello~!
Thanks for commenting on my blog.
I haven't really got into this yet but I also think that for some people they have nothing else, no family and no friends so they kinda feel that joining a gang is the only way they could feel any sense of belonging. Thus the gang becomes like their family. When this happens at a young age it is virtually impossible to get out of. I don't know if you've seen the movie "The Departed" but its such a good example of this.It follows a young boy who becomes involved with Irish gang members because they were kind to him and helped him out ('you scratch my back I scratch yours' kinda thing). By the time he's an adult he has no way of getting out and is still doing favours for them. He becomes a cop and obviously is corrupt. It's a really really good movie you should watch it coz my description really doesn't do it any justice!
Hey claire !!
haha yes I know and thats cool now we can give eachother feed back now !!
lols anyways thankyou soo much for your helpful feedback and I love that quote from snoop dog I think I might just use that somewhere in my blog !! thankyou your comment means alot !!
Hey Eileen !!
hehe your welcome !! yay you commented !thankyou soo much for your feed back and I think I would like to maybe search for that movie and consider watching it because it sounds really good and it also sounds like something I can add to my blog. Anyhow your description of the movie is just fine!! haha but maybe i think it would be somewhat of a benefit to actually watch it because that way I can get a sneak peek of what gang life is all about and why people actually consider joining one. So once again I thankyou and hopefully i will get to add some more stuff to my blog to keep you and other viewers interested !!
Hey Victiora,
Watching "The Departed would be good for you to see how gangs and society co-exist if you are more interested in wacthing something else i reccomend watching "The Don". Its more about the Sicilian gang family and how they go about their business. i think it would be good for you. let me know if you have any other questions
Hey Vic
Love the blog and thought the picture was very appropriate indeed. Since Gangs is a very vast issue to talk about and we always seem to miss the bigger picture here, how and where does all the nonsense behavior come from? I’ve always fear gangs, and who wouldn’t but the thing is, the picture is already painted in our minds that a gangster speaks nothing but verbal language,has no patient at all, voilent towards others, drink nothing but alcohol, and sleeps in his mothers back yard. Not much people are aware the fact that the abuse and violent influences comes from home some dont even bother to take notice. How can people make change in the community when the big chance should start from inside our homes. Thanks Vic, for painting a new picture for me to gaze upon.
Vic
Don't forget that your iWrite blog is a filterblog and your text should include links to the online articles (remember my first lecture on the Apu blog).
Hey dyls yeah i might watch those pretty good thanks.
Hey ericah!!
Your most welcome I think it is time people took into consideration that gangs are violent but they have their reasons and that it is for us as a community to do our part and help them, since some of their own families cant. And also the governement could do something about it like they could create more organisations that would help those helpless teenagers or people that are in those particular situations.Thankyou for your comment it is much appreciated.
yes thanks for the reminder darryl !!
“Parents should take responsability and teach their children from when they are young”, this is exactly what I would like to say! A lot of parents blame teachers for the outcome of their children, but parents really are the only best role models for their own children, and they are either extremely bad or extremely good role models. How can parents expect their children to grow up normally, if they spend all their children’s childhood times drinking and taking drugs or fight between each other everyday?
Parents of children in bad neighbourhoods need to tend to their kids better, reason for most delinquents / gang people are that their parents are gangsters or they just dont care what their kids do. my opinion is that gangs dont do things because they want to cause trouble but because they actually want attention aye? and there are very few organizations out there that help kids that need help, because their parents dont care, i think the government should invest in these institutes's more instead of paying bums for nothing. what do you think?
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