Tolerance of Gang Violence and Social Problems

Most people can agree that gang violence is definitely a problem for communities when it comes to safety and well-being. However the tolerance of gang violence in communities can be just as bad because it perpetuates the problem and leads to the problem growing. The tolerance of gang violence stems from various social forces that lead to no alternative other than accepting the violence as part of life. This post aims to explore these forces and how they affect the tolerance of gang violence within communities as well as explain why this tolerance is such a big problem. The first thing that should be looked at when it comes to the tolerance of gang violence is how it affects the community as whole and how it becomes a problem. 

Gang violence and tolerance of it can be a problem for obvious reasons most of which are due to the fact that violence is generally seen as deviant behavior that hurts communities. The violence that gangs bring to a community not only affects gang members but the community as whole and these effects are not limited to just people being injured or killed in the cross fire. Tolerating it leads to the problem of gang violence not being solved and left to grow. The tolerance of gang violence is something that most people would find appalling and wouldn’t be able to understand but for those that live in communities that see gang violence such acts, although disturbing, are in some cases tolerated and seen as necessary. This leads not only to more problems than just violence but also the proliferation of the violence in these communities. 

The problems that are caused by this violence can be seen in Sudhir Venkatesh’s book Gang Leader for a Day in which he focuses on the activities of a gang in one of the Chicago projects. In Gang Leader for a Day Venkatesh talks about the problems that people face due to the gang violence in the area. These problems range from a lack of police to a lack of maintenance and repair services to members of the community. This leads to a lapse in safety and well-being for members of the community. In one instance Venkatesh talks about having to have a gang member bring someone in need of medical care to the hospital because the ambulance would not come to the neighborhood. This was also the case with the police in the area who were unwilling to patrol such a dangerous neighborhood. The problems that a lack of services to a community creates lead the community to look to others for these services and create an alternative economy of sorts. Most of the time it ends up being the gang who caused the problems in the first place picking up the slack left behind.  Most of the time the services they provide come with some sort of fee much like in Gang in Leader for a Day when the gang collected taxes for protection.

It is easy to see how something like this can lead to the tolerance of the gang and the violence that comes with it. When people have nowhere else to turn the gang is their best option as illustrated in the example above. This dependence comes from a lack of outside support of the community and this lack of support is assumed to be non-existent to those from outside the community that have access to these services. The lack of understanding of the outside community helps to propagate this problem because the community facing it doesn’t have many options but to tolerate gang violence in order to get help from the gang when needed because there are no other options. This however is not the only reason that communities come to accept gang violence in their communities.

Another reason for gang violence to be tolerated within a community comes from the idea that there is no alternative and that violence has become the norm to that community and those surrounding it. For most people if you asked them where they would expect to see gang violence their answer would be in a city and if you asked them why their answer would more than likely be because of unemployment or because it is a bad neighborhood. These answers although very simple are not wrong and be backed by the graphs below. One of the graphs shows the prevalence of gang violence by area type and was provided by the National Gang Center and the other shows the unemployment rate by county in 2013 provided by the Bureau of Labor Statistics. In the first graph you can see that there is a much higher rate of gang violence in large cities compared to any other area type and in the second graph you can see the average unemployment rate by county in the US with urban areas having the highest rates. By comparing the two graphs you can see that the counties that are more urban see higher unemployment rates and has some impact on the amount of gang violence. Due to the fact that there is more gang violence in these areas people come to view this type of behavior as the norm and begin to tolerate it.

 

As gang violence and presence become the norm in some places outside observers might wonder why it continues to be perpetuated and also why anyone would want to live in such a place. The perpetuation of gang violence and the acceptance of it can also be caused by the idea of a lack of capital both socially and economically which is a product of social class. This idea was talked about in the article Community Tolerance of Gang Violence by Ruth Horowitz where the tolerance of gang violence was looked at in poor neighborhoods.  After reading the article it was clear that part of the reason for the tolerance of such actions comes from an inability to get out. Many people in these neighborhoods are poor and cannot afford to move out and because of this come to accept the violence as normal. This inability to get out comes from a lack capital socially and economically.

What is meant by capital is that there is a lack of opportunities afforded to many people in these communities both socially and economically and this leads to people looking for a way to gain this capital which is where gangs come in. The problem of a lack of capital can be fixed for some by working with gangs because gangs have the ability to provide this capital. For those that receive this help it is a huge advantage not afforded to them regularly due to the fact cultural and economic capital is something that comes with social standing. As was talked about in Horowitz’ article social standing or class in these neighborhoods is usually working class to the very poor. Most times the capital gangs provide is just economic but it can sometimes be cultural and even this slight help is useful. This leads to the acceptance of gang actions like violence because in some ways the gang benefits the community. Examples of this can be seen in Venkatesh’s book when the gang in the book is seen trying to help the community by paying rent for some or sending younger members to a community meeting to learn.

The reasons for the tolerance of gang violence are all socially created and a solution to this problem needs to be found. One potential solution to this problem is assistance to these areas in way of social and economic opportunities. These opportunities are part of the reason that gang violence is tolerated in the first place so if this is eliminated maybe some of the tolerance can be as well. Potential ways to provide these opportunities could be through community programs in those areas affected by gangs.

In the end the tolerance of gang violence comes from various social constructs that cause people to have few alternatives other than accepting violence. This leads to various problems in the community that lead to a perpetuation of the problem. However one way that this can be solved by working with others outside the community to provide opportunities to members of the community. This will eventually lead to the problem being solved but the only way that this can happen is if some initiative is taken to solve this problem and realize how much it hurts and affects a community. 

Sources: 

Federal Bureau of Investigation. http://www.fbi.gov/.

Horowitz, Ruth. "Community Tolerance of Gang Violence." Social Problems 34, no. 5. Jstor. http://www.jstor.org/stable/800540.

Venkatesh, Sudhir. Gang Leader for a Day. New York: Penguin Group, 2008. 

US Department of Justice. www.nationalgangcenter.gov/.

US Department of Labor. http://www.bls.gov/home.htm.