Innocent Children, Violent Gangs Essay -- Exploratory Essays Research

Innocent Children, Violent Gangs      Ã‚   18, 059 violent felonies, 690 deaths, and 13,000 hard-core killers. What is the horrible cause of these striking statistics? Gangs. Gangs are a problem in nearly every state and 83 percent of the largest cities in the United States. The problem of gangs and their negative impact on the communities they exist in continues to grow and nothing seems to be able to stop this powerful growth. Gangs not only exist in just inner cities anymore, but in towns and suburban communities as well. Gangs are affecting more and more children everyday, and this problem needs to be stopped.    No one knows exactly how many children and youth nationwide are gang members or join a gang in an average day, but the numbers are astonishing and increasing. What is it about gangs that is so appealing to children? Gangs offer identity which a child may not have felt he or she had before. Gangs also offer belonging, protection, money, sex, and status. The majority of the children who become involved in such groups as gangs usually don't have a sense family or belonging to anyone, are lonely, and are looking for friends. Some may think that gangs are actually a good thing in that they offer so many positive things to a child's life. That is where some go wrong, and make the biggest mistake of their lives.    Gangs are responsible for ten to twenty percent of the criminal activity in the United States, which estimates to an approximate thirty to sixty billion dollars of taxpayers' money a year. Gangs are often associated with the use of drugs, including heroine and marijuana. Gangs also are connected to the illegal use of many weapons and as a result, many bloody murders. So, it is... ...f Violence: A Study of Violence on the Street, Journal of Research in Crime and Delinquency, Vol. 30 NO. 1, February 1993, pg 88-112. Kotlowitz, Alex, There Are No Children Here, Anchor Books Doubleday, 1991. Krivo, Peterson, Disadvantaged Neighborhoods and Urban Crime, Social Forces, Vol. 75 No. 2 December 1996, pg. 619-645. Lo, Chun-Nui, A Social Model of Gang Related Violence, Free Inquiry In Creative Sociology, Vol 19 no. 1, May 1991, pg. 36-43. Sambar, Chuck. http://www.sambar.com/sambar/chuck/aregangs.htm Omega Boys Club. http://www.street-soldiers.org/omega/omega1.html Alanzo, Felipe and Zavala, Eric. http://www.cwrl.utexas.edu/%7Edliss/student_projects/final_project/felipe2/index.htm http://home.navisoft.com/requiredreading/Page6.html Cantrell, Mary Lynn. http://www.bluemarble.net/%7Enes/hot/htopicgang.html