Gangs are a violent reality that people have to deal with in today’s cities. They are a direct result of human beings personal wants and peer pressure. Kids are the main targets because they feel that being in a gang is both an acceptable and prestigious way to live, because of the bad miscommunication of society. By looking at the way humans are influenced in society, there is good evidence to point the blame at several institutions. These institutions include the forces of the media, the government, theatre, drugs and our economic system.
Peer pressure and greed cause gangs. Many teens in gangs will pressure peers into becoming part of a gang by making it sound all glamorous. Teens get fooled into believing that joining a gang will help them achieve a better life. Money is also a crucial factor. A gang member tells a kid that he will make money by doing small part time gang jobs. Although these are important factors they are not strong enough to make kids do things that are strongly against their morals.
TV and Movies are crucial in bending kids morals, by making gang violence acceptable. The average child spends more time at the TV than he spends in a classroom. Since nobody can completely turn off their minds, kids must be learning something while watching TV. Know in days very few hours of television watched by children are educational, so other ideas are being absorbed during this period of time. Many TV shows and movies today are extremely violent and are shown often from a gang’s perspective.
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In poor families with many children or upper-middle class families where parents are always working, the children will often be deprived of love and go looking for it somewhere else. Parents can often feel that putting food on the table is enough love. Children of these families may often go to gang activities out of boredom and to belong somewhere. As time goes on, a form of love or friendship develops between the gang and the child. Is then that the friendship and the feeling of belonging to the gang takes the place of the family. The child will spend less and less time at the home.
The new antisocial structure of cities also effect the ease in which a boy or girl can join a gang. The formation of gangs in cities, and most recently in suburbs, is facilitated by the lack of community among parents. The parents don’t know what the children are doing for two reasons. The first is because much of the parent’s lives are outside the local community, while the children’s lives are lived almost within. Second, in a fully developed community, the parent gets a sense that the community will keep him informed of his child’s activities.
Another great factor of joining a gang is for protection. Although from an objective point of view, we can see joining a gang brings more danger than it saves, this is not the way is seen by kids. In poor communities children will no doubt be beaten and robbed if they don’t join a gang. Of course they will get the same treatment from rivals when in a gang. The protection that the children don’t get from their parents, they think they get it by joining.
