Better or Worse

Quondell Johnson

English 2

Ms. Mckoy

Bl. 1

September, 2, 2013

 

                                                           Better or Worse

 

                  Gang violence, a word often used, but never really educated about. When the word gang comes up in a conversation, no one thinks about the fact that the “Helping Gang Youth” website states “400,000 or more teenagers in gangs”. People also don't consider the fact that the website also states there are “approximately 15,500 gang related deaths that are known in the US”. People who are in gangs are often looked at as cool, bad, or even lame depending on the situation of which a person decides to be apart of a gang. Gang violence has been recognized by the US, but are the organizations that are working to prevent it actually working; if not should there be more strict precautions made to possibly decrease the number of gangs and gang members in America?

Mike was a kid that everybody knew to be the quiet kid. When I first met Mike, he was a lot different from other people which to me was a good thing. When I started to get to know him a little bit better I soon noticed that he didn't like the fact that people never really talked to him. I tried many times to convince him to be himself, and less trouble will come to him, then I said that if he decides to try to fit in that there’s a bigger risk of trouble. Over time my advice didn’t seem to have an effect on Mike, because he started acting a little different, plus I saw him talking to people that were always known to hang out in groups. Though I was still friends with Mike, he gradually started to change more and more over time. His mom had gotten him into some kind of program that was suppose to keep kids out of gang, and off the street. After that, his attitude towards things started to change, and the way people thought of him did as well. It wasn't until one Monday morning that I found out that Mark had been shot and killed while in a gang fight. My friend was gone, and I felt like I couldn’t do anything that would’ve helped him make the right decision. I thought to my self “did this program he was in help at all?”. I then searched to see what this program actually did to help the youth, and by looking at this I knew something was wrong.

My previous experience with gang violence has led me to see if the programs are actually decreasing gang and gang member activity. While researching using the “FBI 2011 gang surveys” website I found that “SC has at least 105 gangs compared to NC which has at least 106 gangs”. I also took note that there are only “two federal gang task forces in South Carolina, and only 3 in North Carolina”. Also throughout this website there were a few gangs that seemed to be stand out in South Carolina such as the Bloods, crips, MS-13, Folk nation, and the Vice Lords. Further research also led me to finding that some of these gangs have active members in certain branches in the military. According to the FBI 2011 gang surveys I also found out “Bloods have been known to be in army, army reserves, coast guard, marines, and navy while MS-13 members have been known to join the army, marines, and navy”. While exploring the “Helping gang youth” website and the “National gang center” website I noticed in the years “2000- 2007 that there was an average of 750,000 gang members in the U.S., while in 2011 there was approximately 30,000 more”. Even though, from the year “1996 to 2003 the number of gangs had decreased by nearly 10,000 which left the U.S. with about 20,100 gangs”. Then from the year “2003 to 2011 the gang population had increased by at least 9,000”.While researching gangs I found that “80% of gang members studied are male, and 75% of those males are teenagers under the age of eighteen”. This information could actually give the United States a wake up call to what they need to do to decrease these numbers of gangs and gang members while they are still increasing.

I feel that if the U.S. is actually more strict on their gang programs made for each state, that they can actually start to lower the number of gangs and prevent any future gang members. Information such as this could also give anyone a different out look towards gangs, and could even lead a member to a better decision. So if the issue of gangs get more educated on and more attended then we could possibly stop the increasing population of gangs and gang members.