The Impacts of Gang Violence to The Young Population

Gang violence has caused countless deaths of the young population. Although gang violence began in the early times, it did not reach an outstanding amount of crime until the 1950s when gun violence began.

Gangs have been active for many years. Gang violence dates back to end of the American Revolution, most gangs at the time were white European immigrants. Around 1820, serious gangs began in New York with the first well-organized gang formed in 1826 called the Forty Thieves. The first attempt by the police to stop gang activity in New York was not made until 1915-1916, before that time many police officers were beaten while attempting to guard polling places. In 1916, “Police beat and arrested gang members and criminal courts imprisoned more than 200 of the most important gang leaders (Howell, 6).” By the 1930s, gang activity in New York had moved to East Harlem, the Bronx, and Brooklyn.

Most, if not all of these gangs wars were fought between different ethnic groups. For example, the Bourgois gang was made because of clashes between Irish and Italians. More fighting gangs were formed after the Latinos settled in New York, mainly in East Harlem, the South Bronx, and Brooklyn. Ethnicity was also a factor in three-way race riots. These involved the Italian Americans, Puerto Ricans, and African Americans in Harlem. Even today, gangs consist of one or more ethnic groups, but they do not have the same power that they did towards the beginning of gang violence.

One of the most well known gangs in the United States today is the Crips. The Crips gang started in 1969 by two 16 year olds named Stanley Williams and Raymond Washington. The word Crip is an acronym for “Community Revolution In Progress.” Like many other gangs, the Crips are involved in drug dealing, murdering innocent citizens as well as other gang members in cold blood, and committing robberies. Crips are known to use the phrase “Crips don’t die, we multiply”, this meaning that the gang will never die because they will always be recruiting new members in new places. The Crips are also known for being violent and fighting within the gang, their color blue, and being extremely hostile towards Hispanic street gangs and their rivals the Bloods.

The Crips are divided into sets based on location, each set having different a color or colors with the gang color blue to identify where they are from. A couple examples of this are The Grape Street Crips, who wear purple with blue and The Shotgun Crips in Gardena, who wear green with blue. Some people believe that the Crips began wearing the color blue because that is the color of the high school where the gang originated; other people think it is a tribute to “Buddha” because he always wore blue shirts and bandanas on his left pocket. This is also why Crips “flag left”, or wear their bandanas on the left side.

The Bloods, being mostly associated with the color red and their rivalry towards the Crips, began in 1972 in Los Angeles and slowly began taking over streets previously occupied by other gang members. Unlike the Crips, the Bloods “flag right”, this meaning they wear their bandanas on the right side; it also stands for “Your bloods should always be on your RIGHT side, and never LEFT behind (Blood Gang Knowledge).” The word “Bloods” came from elder people calling the gang members “Young Blood.” Blood is an acronym for “Blood Love Overrides Oppression & Destruction.” They make money by selling drugs and guns, taxing drug dealers, prostitution, loan sharking, and providing security services to clients. The Bloods became fearless and as a result, members from other gangs began joining.

The organization of the Bloods for criminal activity and recruitment has slight differences from that of the Crips. Members are grouped into sets, called Banners: some Banners are responsible for recruiting, using whatever tactic or task they see fit for the person(s) to accomplish before becoming a member of the gang, ranging from stealing to murder; others send threats to people, forcing them to join the gang. Some Blood Banners include Priu, Brim, United Blood Nation (UBN), Family Swan Nation, and many more. Like the Crips, these groups also wear certain colors that symbolize their hometown. For example, the Prius and Brims use burgundy with red, and UBN uses black and green with red.

Every set or Banner uses hand signs to greet one another. If Bloods from different sets meet up they will greet each other with the “B” hand sign and then flash their Banner hand sign. Blood gangs only go to war over turf (territory); they will often murder a member of another gang on the spot if they are in Blood territory. They cannot attack anyone who is not in a gang, and/or does not pose a threat to them; doing so will cause them to be “blooded out” or killed.

Gangs have been around for hundreds of years. The Crips and Bloods are just two of the many gangs today, that cause death and crime rates to rise in certain areas.