THE ALLURE OF GANGS

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THE ALLURE OF GANGS
By: Joel E. Gordon

 “You prevent kids from joining gangs by offering after-school programs, sports, mentoring, and positive engagement with adults. You intervene with gang members by offering alternatives and employment to help redirect their lives. You deal with areas of high gang crime activity with real community policing. We know what works.” – Father Greg Boyle, founder of Homeboy Industries - the largest gang-intervention, rehabilitation, and re-entry program in the world.

“You got to understand that every block is controlled by a gang. If you try to set up a tent, they’re gonna come to you and say, ‘Hey if you want to be here, guess what, you got to put in the work.’ Many of these individuals owe drug debts. So they’re more than willing to cooperate with the gang members, either out of fear or to work off their drug debt and support their habit and that's why things are getting worse and worse and worse.” – Officer Deon Joseph on gangs and skid row.

For each and every one of us a need for love, affection and belonging results from the fact that human beings are sociable and need relationships with others. People deprived of these interactions due to dysfunctional cultural or family factors seem bored and joyless, even when doing well at their chosen tasks and frequently experience feelings of loneliness, pain, sadness, separation and unworthiness. Psychologist Abraham Maslow states: "The person will hunger for affectionate relationships with people in general for a place in the group if not family, religion, town or class." Hence a gang will often fill this void in a young person through gang affiliation.

Many youth are introduced to the gang culture at a very young age. Membership and loyalty to the neighborhood gang becomes a matter of family and honor.

Risk factors leading to gang involvement:

·      Unstable/broken home

·      Economic instability

·      Low education attainment and expectations

·      Family members in a gang

·      Neglect by one or both parents

·      Violence in the home or in the community, directed at the child

·      Alcoholism and or drug abuse by one or both of the parents

The Los Angeles California Police Department offers this explanation as to why young people join gangs on its official LAPD website:

Gang members join a gang by either committing a crime or undergoing an initiation procedure wherein they are beaten by fellow gang members to test their courage and fighting ability. Their motivations for joining the gang are varied, but usually fall within one of the following:

·       Identity or Recognition - Being part of a gang allows the gang member to achieve a level of status he/she feels impossible outside the gang culture.

·       Protection - many members join because they live in the gang area and are, therefore, subject to violence by rival gangs. Joining guarantees support in case of attack and retaliation for transgressions.

·       Fellowship and Brotherhood - To the majority of gang members, the gang functions as an extension of the family and may provide companionship lacking in the gang member’s home environment. Many older brothers and relatives belong, or have belonged to the gang.

·       Intimidation - Some members are forced to join if their membership will contribute to the gang’s criminal activity. Some join to intimidate others in the community not involved in gang activity.

·       Criminal Activity - Some join a gang to engage in narcotics activity and benefit from the group’s profits and protection.

Unfortunately, few youths realize the hazards associated with gang involvement. In many cases, parents are unaware of their children’s gang activity and are unable to intervene until it’s too late.  As life gets more complex in our modern world even more risk factors emerge. Interestingly, in the 1940s the Department of Education asked teachers to list the discipline problems in public schools:

  • Chewing gum

  • Getting out of the line

  •  Improper clothing

  •  Making noise

  •   Not putting paper in the waste basket

  •  Running in the halls

  •  Talking

The same survey taken in the 1990s:

  •   Abortion

  •  Absenteeism

  •  Aids/HIV

  •   Assault

  •  Bombing

  •  Drug / alcohol abuse

  •   Extortion

  •  Gang violence

  •   Murder

  •   Rape

  •  Robbery

  •   School shootings

  •  Suicide

  •  Teen pregnancy

  •   Vandalism

While much work remains to be done on many fronts, as time moves on the more mentoring that we can do while providing alternative support and programs to our youth the better chance we will have in combating the allure of gang life for future generations to come.