I agree, but you cant blame the economy on ignorance like this. Whats the purpose? You win a fight because someone was on your street? Thats the most asinine thing ever. I know gangs have existed since the beginning of this country, but honor students getting killed for walking down the street, really saddens me.
I'm not, it's inexcusable. I'm blaming the economy for the lack of jobs that put too many angry young men on the street instead of in the paycheck line. Individual responsibility is always paramount. But the big picture still reveals a systemic problem. The honor students who are doing all the right things are getting caught up in gang violence because they can't escape the bad neighborhood.
I guess being broke, without the job prospects, would make almost anyone angry. Id just probably move to Maylasia or Australia and surf, fish, and sleep for the rest of my life. And sell the fish for money!
its gotta be tough to do when your entire life youve been surrounded by friends and family with no education, no ambition, no prospects. it takes the exceptional person to get out of that situation. the US needs to spend a lot of $ to get these kids in bootcamp schools early and organize real apprenticeship programs. a lot better than spending more money on their incarceration 10 years later.
Father's getting jobs and staying home to provide discipline and stability will go a loooooooong way towards fixing this. These seemingly addressable problems underlie all the troubles in impoverished communities: 1. absentee fathers 2. school dropouts 3. teenage pregnancy 4. apathy Fixing #1 would go a long way to curing #2-4.
its not just the poverty cycle, its the parenting/attitude cycle. i used to work for a program that place low income kids in summer jobs. (yes, a govt run program.) it was part time jobs at non-profit organizations. anything from animal shelters, to churches, to schools. they worked with the adults at those places who supervised them and tried to help them learn good employment habits. at the same time, the kids had to be enrolled in and attending part time summer school or ged programs for older youth drop outs. these kids were handed jobs to help them learn skills and good work habits yet i cant tell you how many had pathetic attitudes and seemed to bitch because the adults made them actually *gasp* work. and i saw the same pathetic attitudes from parents who brought them in to enroll in the program. i had to kick a few out due to their not fullfilling the education compoment of the program. the ones that were the worst were the ones that the parents seemed to not give a sh*t either. dont get me wrong. the majority of the kids were grateful for the chance, a small income, and something to start building a resume with. i saw it more so in the older youth that had dropped out and were in a ged program as part of the requirement. i actually enjoyed my job when i worked with the kids that wanted to change and make something of themselves. but some of these kids were gang kids that had no desire to change and seemed to think work was beneath them but wanted the $. and when i had the cajones to kick them out of the program for not living up to the educations component, they werent happy. i didnt like my job when i received threatening phone calls, and had a few mysterious /suspicious drive-bys at my house.
the odd thing is that other ethic groups seem to be able to progress. poor chinese kids dont form gangs and beat each other. they use the only money they have to buy calculus textbooks and then get scholarships to MIT.
Oversimplification. You know good and well that there are Puerto Rican gangs in Queens. Probably Irish and Italian, too. There are damn sure Mexican gangs in Texas and guess what? California has a serious problem with Asian street gangs. Google Chinese street gangs. Pick your poor ethnicity in any sufficient concentration and there will be a street gang. Poor neighborhoods in lily-white Wyoming have skinhead street gangs.
