The Effects of Gangs Culture and Violence on Society
It might not be obvious to you but Gang culture and or gang violence has been a growing problem in our society in many different ways. In this paper, I will be covering the three big ways Gang culture/gang violence has entered our society. The three ways that Gang culture/gang violence has impacted in today's society is through the communities, through the media, and it's even affecting our youth.
We will start on how Gang violence is impacting the communities and first, off we have to learn how many members there usually are in a gang. The number of members varies in the size of the population in the area like cities, towns, and rural counties with populations of less than 50,000 gangs tend to be much smaller with very few members, and usually, the gang problem may go away as quickly as it develops. Unlike small populations, large populations like 250,000 and above there are 30 or more gangs with 1,000 or more members in each gang. The worse problem with the gangs in the bigger population is how long they stay a thing like most gangs in larger cities were made in the 1990s and are still going strong today.
Another problem with these large gangs is the large trail of violence that follows these gangs into communities like in Rochester gang members that self-reported committing 68% of all the violent offenses. Next in Seattle, gang members self-reported committing 85% of all the robberies. Finally in Denver, gang members self-reported committing 79% of all the serious violent offenses. To stress the point even more the Rochester gang members were responsible for, on average, four times as many offenses as their share of the total population would suggest. Also, gang life has a long-lasting effect on a person. In the three towns said before, Seattle, Rochester, and Denver show that gang members commit many more serious and violent acts while they are gang members than they do after they leave the gang. Well, gang members’ offense rates dropped after they left the gang in all three sites, but their crime rates remained fairly high because the rates of drug use and drug trafficking remained almost as high after the person that left the gangs as when they were a part of the gang.
Violent gangs are also responsible for a very uneven number of murders. In Los Angeles and Chicago, The most gang-populated cities in the United State, over half of the combined nearly 1,000 murders were reported to have been done by and to gangs. In the remaining 171 cities, almost one-fourth of all the murders were considered to be gang-related. More than 80% of violent gangs in both smaller cities and rural counties usually recorded zero gang-related murders. Across the United States, the number of gang murders has been reported by cities with populations of 100,000 or higher.
Murder hasn’t been the only thing gangs do when they are organized in the cities. Drug addiction is also a major part of gangs in the inner cities of the United States. In Milwaukee, it's reported that 97% of all gang members have and or smoke weed and they started when they became a member of the gang in question. Most of the gang members that smoked weed have also done cocaine but less than 10% have ever injected drugs into their system.
Gangs also aren't limited to one city there are gangs which go across the country, These gangs are called OMG, outlaw motorcycle gangs,. OMGs began becoming a thing shortly after World War II when disgruntled former Armed Forces established groups based on common philosophies and a mutual passion for motorcycles. The FBI has named almost 800 different OMGs in the United States and all of them ranging in size from a single loose-knit group to an organization the size of the Hells Angels, which by the way has currently fields 63 chapters in 13 countries. Why it looks like these gangs look like they are completely different from your typical neighborhood gangs they have several common characteristics. All gangs can be put into these categories: by race, national origin, culture, or territory, and people who associate with the gang for the sole purpose of committing criminal acts. In this definition, the territory can refer either to geographic location or to the scope of a particular criminal enterprise.
No matter where the gang is, who makes up the gang, or even how they get around they all cause the government a lot of money. The total price of crime is estimated to cost the United States $655 billion each year and gangs are responsible for a huge part of this. A Los Angeles hospital found that the cost of 272 gang-related gunshot victims ended up being almost $5 million. For the record that's $5,550 per person a day and that's just the one hospital. The average cost for Los Angeles hospitals a year is 1 billion dollars and across the United States average cost of gun violence shows a value of almost $1 million per assault-related gunshot injury. The suppression of gangs also costs a lot of money and isn't effective at all. Here's a quote from the Los Angeles city council “After a quarter-century of a multi-billion dollar war on gangs, there are six times as many gangs and at least double the number of gang members in the region. Suppression alone—and untargeted suppression in particular—can not solve this problem. Law enforcement officials now agree that they cannot arrest their way out of the gang violence crisis and that their crime suppression efforts must be linked to competent prevention, intervention, and community-stabilizing investment strategies.”
If you can't tell gangs are a huge problem for society by them killing people, costing the American taxpayer around between $1.7 and $2.3 million per year, or just plain out selling and or doing drugs. These aren't the only problems that gangs make our society deal with. Gangs also recruit kids at a young age and cause them to miss out on good opportunities and or make them miss school/dropping out.
Why do kids become gang members in the first place? There are plenty of reasons they do like they have poor school performance, low educational aspirations, especially among young girls, Negative labeling by teachers, high levels of anti-social behavior, Few teacher role models, Educational frustration, Low attachment to school, and or Learning difficulties. Well, whatever a kid’s problem in the long term effects of being in a gang will negatively influence the youth's life to the limited attachment to the community,over-reliance on antisocial peers, poor parental supervision, alcohol and drug abuse, poor educational or employment potential, and a need for recognition and belonging. Speaking of schools, if a gang member stays they cause a whole boatload of serious problems within the school. The first major thing is there is a strong connection between gang presence in schools and the availability of drugs and guns at the school. After that, there is a higher percentage of students who have reported knowing a student who brought a gun to school when students report gang presence is 25% compared to when gangs were not present which is only 8%. Twelve percent of students reported having seen a student with a gun in school when gangs are present versus 3% when gangs are not present. Boys between the ages of 13-17 more likely to have weapons on them. Next, 35% of students who report that any drugs like marijuana, cocaine, crack, or uppers/downers are readily available at school are much more likely to report gangs at their school than those who say that no drugs are available which is only 14%. Finally, the presence of gangs more than doubles the chance of violent actions at school.
The presence of street gangs at school also can be very disruptive to the school environment because they may not only scare students into not feeling safe or not wanting to come to school but also increase the level of violence in schools. In the School Crime Supplement to the 2003 National Crime Victimization Survey, students between the ages of 12−18, were asked if street gangs and or gang members were present and active at their schools during the previous six months. Only 21% of the students reported that there were gangs at their schools. However, no difference was detected between 2001 and 2003 in percentages of students who reported the presence of street gangs and gang members at their school. Out of all the students surveyed, 35% of students in urban or inner-city schools were more likely to report the presence of street gangs and gang members at their school. Another problem that the youth has to deal with is recruitment from family and friends. Most kids joining a gang already have problems with drugs and obeying the law but joining a gang makes her problem worse in every way, but 80% of gang recruitment comes through the family or close friends and the other 20% is usually done by intimidation by the actual gang members that have been in the ruff for awhile. They also grew up with that culture around them like in some areas, gang membership has become a family tradition. Hispanic gang members in East Los Angeles usually reveal in interviews that cousins, brothers, or other family members also actively participate in gangs. Gang culture in communities have become so deeply entrenched in the social fabric of communities and recruiting becomes less of a process of selection and more of a ritualized gang recruitment that thrives in a bad neighborhood. Gangs use this connection to cause family disorganization, including broken homes with parental drug and or alcohol abuse, family violence, neglect, and drug addiction, family members in a gang, lack of an adult and parental role models, parental criminality, parents with violent attitudes, siblings with anti-social behaviors, and Extreme economic deprivation. Some other risks that come when joining a gang as part of the youth: prior delinquency, legal gun ownership, drug trafficking, desire for group rewards such as status, identity, self-esteem, companionship and protection, anti-social attitude, aggression, Alcohol, and drug use, and early or precocious sexual activity, violent victimization. Most kids that join a gang when they are in school don’t graduate. The director of a Hispanic youth services organization in Florida guessed that between 50 and 60 percent of the gang members in an antigang program operated by the organization had dropped out of school.
How do you stop the kids from becoming a gang member? Well, start building positive relationships, starting having patterns of interaction with mentors and pro-social peers creating positive social environments through the community, family, and service organization, and promoting social, economic policies that support positive youth development.
Gangs have always been a part of American history and have always been all over the US from New York to California, but recently more than ever the media has been justifying gang culture. Music and The Media is everywhere in the world and is the biggest influencer on earth. Being one of the major influencer music can make people think a certain way and if music is justifying gang culture and making it sounds like it's the ideal life then our youth will grow up trying to live that life. It doesn't stop at music either gangs will use, have used, and currently use the internet to reach people they otherwise wouldn't or arrange illegal activities. When acting like a gang member the police call it “cyber banging,' and cyber banging they will usually openly brag about affiliations, skipping school, getting high, and battling rival gangs. The worst part about it is there is no way of telling actually gang members from people who fake it because it's “cool”. Most cyberbangers are teenagers and they make their social media pages look like they are part of a gang by flashing in-your-face images of gang flags, hand signs, marijuana, women, stacks of cash, and while actual gang members scroll by thinking this is legitimate. Some show pictures of themselves with guns and bandannas covering their faces below the eyes, casting menacing glances. The part is when a gang member finds out that these cyberbangers are fake and do not even live that life. Gang members hate it when you act like a gang member online and will try to find you and try to kill you if you are close to them.
In conclusion, we went over how Gang culture/gang violence has entered in our society and impacted it. From the murder rates that gangs have caused in cities, or how gang members arent limited to one part of a town in fact they can range from mobile cities and can be on the road. We also learned that the youth has and is continued to be affected by gang culture and Gang members use the internet to arrange illegal activities. I hope this shows you how bad gangs are for society and or cities in general.
