Youth Gangs Across the Globe

Most gangs are created to form a sense of power and control. All types of problems are presented to the youths of today growing up in major cities. Before being so eager to jump to conclusions, we must try to understand these problems, or we will never find a solution to them.

Gang members are out there trying to find a family that some never had. It may not seem like much to you - an abandoned house or a park - but it becomes a place to call their own. It’s easy to say “why don’t they ever leave the gang”, but many of those teenagers won’t leave until years to come, if ever. Gang life becomes the only thing they know. Everyone wants to feel needed, and in those blocks or areas, they feel needed.

The gang life in Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York are considered to be the most notorious. Why? Because their history is so violent, and a steady ongoing process. The African-American and Hispanic gangs are the prime target of the media network and the more publicity they receive, the more they develop.

I have been raised around gangs all my life. It’s not something I hated, but always understood what they were going through. As a young child, you learn and try to be accepted by your peers because you just want to fit in. If you’re raised with certain circumstances from life surrounding you, it becomes the only thing you know, unless taught otherwise. Without guidance from someone, they become a product of their environment.

When you go to school and start hanging out with a certain group of kids from your neighborhood, they become dependent on you, and you on them. Why? Because eventually trust will be gained among them. If they’re walking home from school and a group advances towards them, and out of the clear blue sky, one of the kids gets hit. Do you run like hell, or would you help your friend out? The decision could affect their feelings toward each other, and possibly cause insecurity about them. They may become known as a coward, scary cat, and so on... For simply making the choice to look out for their self, and for a kid it can affect the way they feel about themselves. When someone shows them attention at that point, they’re so easily influenced or drawn to other things.

To feel needed again is what they find in gangs, but gangs are not to be blamed from parent’s lack of interest in their child. Joining that gang will give them admira...

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...ng structure and organization to their criminal endeavors, some West Coast Vietnamese and Chinese “gangsters” are being recruited into the Crips and Bloods gangs. Their presence has been detected in the greater Midwest, notably in Minneapolis-St. Paul and central Wisconsin where Hmong youth have formed a dozen Crip gangs, and at least five “Blood” gangs.

The Hmong are an ethnic Chinese people who migrated from their native land in the 18th century to the mountainous regions of Laos, Thailand, Burma, and Vietnam. They poured into the West Coast in large numbers following the end of the Vietnam War and have filtered into the American heartland ever since that time. The Hmong people - a sizeable community resides in the Argyle Street neighborhood of Uptown - were often the victims of extortions and shakedowns by Asian gangs.

The West Coast is still the gateway to America’s riches for the Asian peoples of the world. Chicago remains the historic hub of Mid-America; a way station to the world and a destination point not only for the decent, law abiding immigrants from around the world escaping the yoke of poverty and political repression, but for the criminally inclined as well.