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Geoffrey Canada shares his story about growing up in an inner city neighborhood of the South Bronx in the 1950s and 1960s. Geoffrey Canada is one of four boys who live with his mother after their father left them. Geoffrey Canada talks about the struggles of growing up in the inner city and facing many challenges. As Geoffrey Canada grew up he witnessed a lot of violence which included young children getting their hands on firearms. The prevalence of firearms among children has changed the nature of violence in the United States. Violent acts have transformed from fists, sticks, and knifes to guns. Guns have undermined the street code of honor, the OGs back in the day were ruthless but not killers, this new generation has no developed courage and fighting skills but relied on guns for protection. Geoffrey Canada became aware of violence at only four years of age. Geoffrey had older brothers Daniel and John who …show more content…
According to a 1991 study by the Centers for Disease Control approximately one in twenty-five high school students carries a gun. Geoffrey points out that every street had its fair share of violence and hierarchy of alphas, but then it came down to schools like Public School 99, none of that mattered. Fights are inevitable and he later learned on that Union Avenue was much safer than going into other people’s streets, because that was like enemy territory. Reputation had to be earned at school, you had to win fights to stay up in the pecking order. Kids only cared if you had heart or not, having heart meant that you are unafraid, that you would fight even if you couldn’t beat the other boy. As far as middle school went fights stayed true to fists and occasional knife fights outside the block. The block had its own codes of conduct. One of them being, no man could let another man take his property just as quitting was never allowed, no one trusted someone who couldn’t take punishment, and no one trusted a
Geoffrey Canada gives his readers a rare opportunity to look inside the life of a ghetto kid and what they have to go through just to survive. He also provides answers to the many questions asked of why certain things happen the way they do in the Bronx. He used his childhood experiences and turned them into a unique tool when helping the youth of today. Now that he works as a youth councilor he sees that the problem in the slums has gotten dramatically worse with the emergence of guns. It used to be about pride and status, now any thug with a gun can be feared in the community. This, to Canada is a major problem because guns gives kids a sense of power, a strong feeling that is often abused and results in someone, even an innocent person dead.
When Butch was nine years old, his mother sent him away with a quarter and told him never to come back. He rode the subway for days, until he was picked up by the police and taken to court. This was in August 1950, he was sent to the Children’s Center. It would be the beginning of a lifetime of institutions for Butch. Butch had to learn at a young age to defend himself. To be the toughest kid in the institution. He had to strike first or he would get hurt. He was all he had. His mother did not want him. He learned early “that a willingness to fight was essential to survival.” (1) Butch became hard to handle at the Children’s Center. He was then sent to Wiltwyck, another institution for boys. “Wiltwick had become nationally renowned school, officiall...
Geoffrey Canada, the author of Fist, Stick, Knife, Gun; A Personal History of Violence, grew up and worked his entire life near or in the underclass society. Through his keen observation on behavior of children in these regions, he has noticed how with the introduction to guns, in particular to children created even more dangerous neighborhoods. Throughout his lifetime in New York, he tells us that violence has changed to be less organized and the social stability of the children is tested with (fire) power that they are too young to fully understand, it was an evolutionary decent. His observations on the violence that children can commit to each other parallels well with fictional story Lord of the Flies written by Nobel prize winning writer, William Golding. Golding, like Canada, looks what kind of environment is needed for violence to prevail in children. Although Golding’s 1954 book Lord of the Flies is fiction, it describes our current impoverished America’s epidemic on violence very well.
At the outset, during one cloudless afternoon in South Central, Los Angeles, a five-year-old juvenile by the forename of Anthony, cycles his training wheel down the pavement of the road while he unwearyingly waits for his mother Ronnie and her boyfriend Caine to finish transporting their properties to the van for their perpetual relocation to the metropolitan city of Atlanta, Georgia. As the adolescent voyages further on down the pathway, a green Pontiac LeMans Sedan comprised of four men with black masks obscuring their discrete identities, deliberately cruise alongside the curb contiguous to the last house on the street. As the four men approach the residence of Anthony and his mother Ronnie, one of the vehicle’s passengers bellows out the phrase, “Yo, what’s up now partner,” and immediately begins to discharge massive gunfire from his Beretta 92F (MIIS). An immense array of blasts erupted at the residence. Caine’s childhood friend Sharif, who was assisting them in the moving procedure, shot, and tumbled onto the lawn instantaneously.
The history of Canada was flooded with many influential and incredible events, particularly during World War 1 and World War 2. During the 20th century, Canada got more involved in worldwide events. It was a very important period for Canada; it was where they gained their independence and progressed as a country. After this century, Canada was considered an important and powerful country. The three main 20th century events in Canadian history are the battle of Vimy Ridge, the change of woman’s rights and the battle of Juno Beach.
In “Vulnerable Schools Need Protection: Guns, Training For Teachers may be the answer”, published in a 2008 edition of the Chicago Tribune, David McGrath argues that some teachers should be allowed to carry a concealed weapon for protection. First, McGrath states that if a random psychotic gunman were searching for someplace to attack, his classroom would make an easy target. He feels that if he was trained and armed, his class would not be trapped without a chance of survival because he would be able to defend against the gunman. Sec...
Geoffrey Canada’s characters in Fist Stick Knife Gun use violence to increase their status and honor, and to make themselves stand out from the rest of their group as being more powerful. Canada’s violence is necessary to his characters as it is their only way to distinguish different people’s power. Canada’s characters also use violence to save their lives, as the adults in their life cannot protect the children. Canada writes: “status was a major issue for boys on the block” (Canada 18), a very blunt yet compelling statement that describes the importance of “status” for the boys on the block. “On the block,” respect and power means everything, as social order is decided by these qualities. Canada argues that in the South Bronx this “status” and social order could only be decided ...
School shootings have altered American history greatly over the past two decades. From 1997 to 2007, there have been more than 40 school shootings, resulting in over 70 deaths and many more injuries. School shoot-outs have been increasing in number dramatically in the past 20 years. There are no boundaries as to how old the child would be, or how many people they may kill or injure. At Mount Morris Township, Michigan, on February 29th, 2000, there was a 6 year old boy who shot and killed another 6 year old girl at the Buell Elementary School with a .32 caliber pistol. And although many shootings have occurred at High Schools or Middle Schools, having more guns on those campuses would not be a good environment for children to grow up in. However, on a college campus, the pupils attending are not children anymore; the age range is from 17 to mid 20’s. Therefore they understand the consequences associated to the use of weapons and have gained more maturity. In April 16th, 2007, at Blacksburg, Virginia, there was a shooting rampage enacted by Sung-Hui Cho (23 years, from Centreville, VA) who fired over 170 rounds, killing 32 victims, before taking his own life at the Virginia Tech campus. Colleges and Universities would be a much safer place, for student and teacher, if guns were permitted on campus for self-defense purposes.
Robinson, Lori S, and Jimmie Briggs “Kids and Violence” Emerge November. 1993:44+ Seifert, Kathryn. A.
During a freedom march on May 29, 1964 in Canton, Mississippi a boy by the name of McKinley Hamilton was brutally beaten by police to the point of unconsciousness. One of the witnesses of this event, and the author of the autobiography which this paper is written in response to, was Anne (Essie Mae) Moody. This event was just one of a long line of violent experiences of Moody’s life; experiences that ranged from her own physical domestic abuse to emotional and psychological damage encountered daily in a racist, divided South. In her autobiography Moody not only discusses in detail the abuses in her life, but also her responses and actions to resist them. The reader can track her progression in these strategies throughout the various stages of her life; from innocent childhood, to adolescence at which time her views from a sheltered childhood began to unravel and finally in adulthood when she took it upon herself to fight back against racial prejudice.
School violence has become an increased peril, affecting not only those involved, but the society in itself. The underlying reason for this phenomenon is that it is derived from bullying and easy access of weapons. It can even happen by the hands of a person who does not attend the school where the act takes place. Bullying has become an epidemic in America amongst school children. Though there are rules enforced about weapons at school, the weapon is usually not detected until the incident takes place. I have witnessed violence in the form of fighting while in school, however, I have never imagined that it has become so aggressive and affects children at younger ages. We must take a bold stand to stop these incidents from occurring!
Too much watching of the video games normally trains people to kill and the fact that the parents are too busy to care leaves these children with little supervision as well as guidance. There is no understanding as well as respect for another individual’s life coupled with the unrealistic impression of entitlement that makes them solve their problems by use of guns as they see in the movies and video games (McLeigh, 201-202). The gang and drug related issues are the additional causes of the gun violence as the guns seek to protect their turfs from the invasion by another gang. The additional rise in the issues of drug fights among these gangs is additionally a major cause of the violence as the gang keeps on attacking one another followed by the retaliatory attacks with innocent people caught in the crossfire. The additional rise in the cases of the gun violence is as a result of the homicides caused by the use of guns in the common of a
As years passed, growing concern of violence, and crime in schools gave rise to the establishment of policies in order to combat the dangerous behavior among students. This led to schools having the necessity of adopting zero tolerance policies, such as the “Gun-Free Schools Act” passed in 1994. The cracking down on zero tolerance policies has been a major point of conflict, for the fact that schools have misinterpreted their limits when enforcing “zero tolerance”. A matter that is viewed improperly by schools, and one which is acted tough on is the term “weapon”. It is not harmful for a student to make a gun with their fingers, however; those are the type of acts that are now seen as major offenses in the eyes of the school system. While the use of zero tolerance policies intensified, it was also visible that the administrators started relying more heavily on actual police — in the form of School Resource Officers (SROs) stationed in schools. The presence of police officers in school and zero tolerance policies combined, have boosted the amounts of teens in juvenile detention, as a punishment for a minor offense. Now for students the fear of being arrested, and prosecuted while being in school is higher than it ever should be. The arrest can lead to suspension or expulsion, and here is where we see the real
As Hedges touches on, conflict is a part of human nature in how it takes little to convince people to commit such heinous acts (25). He discusses how people fall into a group mindset that is geared towards violence that is not socially allowed to be unleashed up until this point. This general embrace of conflict by everyday individuals makes one reflect on why we are not seemingly embracing this side of ourselves. Group mentality regardless of the goal remains a group mentality. It is the same group mentality that empowers conflict also empowers peace. So why is it that we here today in Canada choose to label ourselves a peaceful society?
School shootings are becoming common place in the news as school violence is on the rise. Statistics state that 31.2 percent of parents said the leading cause for choosing homeschool over public school is “concern about the environment of other schools” (Burke, 2014). According to the CDC fact sheet Understanding School Violence, 12 percent of youth in grades 9-12 report being in a physical fight on school property while 5.9 percent reported that they felt unsafe at school and did not attend. Seven percent of teachers also report that they have been threatened or injured by a student (School Violence, 2013). While only 1 percent of all youth homicides occur at schools, violence does not need to result in a fatality in order to be a concern.