Peers And Delinquency: Juvenile Gangs And Groups

Compare and contrast the anthropological,  the sociocultural, anomie/alienation, the psychological, and the  rational choice views of gang formation. Which of these views, which do  you think is most relevant today? Identify two ways to assist kids from  gang affiliation. What can you suggest to reduce the participation in  the gangs?

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Please  answer the question(s) above fully with no less than 300 word response  (80%). You must also reply to at least one student with a minimum of 150  word response (20%). Make sure to use proper grammer and cite any  resources utilized. You will not be able to see your classmates posts  until your post your original response.

Remember  that your post must be at least 300 words and you are required to  respond to two classmates with at least a 150 word response.

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• Write a short essay or paragraph of at least 300 words.
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• As part of the assignment, you must also reply to TWO of your classmates with at least 150 words. You will have to POST FIRST to  see your classmates’ postings. Make sure your replies are a thoughtful  and relevant to what your classmate has posted. Try to build the  discussion and keep it going.Elvia response:

   

  Some believed that gangs serve as an outlet for disturbed youths who suffer a multitude of personal problems and deficits. The comparison among the anthropological, the sociocultural, anomie/ alienation, the psychological, and the rational choice views of gangs formation is that most of the youth make a decision to join a gang for their own reasons and purposes. However, each view of gang formation has a distinctive case. For instance, the anthropological view is that gangs appeal to adolescents longing for the tribal process that sustains hand signs. Sociocultural is a gang form because of destructive sociocultural forces in disorganized inner-city areas. Anomie/alienation are alienated kids who join gangs. The psychological are kids with personality problems, form gangs and become leaders. Finally, the rational choice view is for the sole purpose that kids join gangs for protection, fun, and survival. I believe that the most relevant view of gang formation today is the rational choice view because members of the underclass turn to gangs as a way of obtaining desired goods and services, either directly through theft and extortion or indirectly the drug dealing and weapons sales. Most gang members join for personal safety, fun, and support. Youths who are new to a community may believe they will be harassed or attacked if they remain unaffiliated. Also, the youth enjoy hanging out with others like themselves and want to get involved in exciting experiences. Some experts suggest that youth join gangs in an effort to obtain a family-like atmosphere. Kids may join gangs, then, to compensate for the lack of a family life they have experienced at home. Two ways to assist kids from gang affiliation involve targeting by criminal justice agencies, and the other involves social services efforts. I can suggest reducing the participation in gangs is to involve schools in gang control program.

   

   

  Johana response:

  There are various reasons why gangs come up or why youths join gangs and these form the various theories of gang formation. Anthropological theory of gang formation deals with the matter of tribe or ethnicity where youths form gangs as a way of identifying with a specific tribe or ethnic community such as the black Americans would form a gang as a means of having a sense of community and as a safety net for the community. Anthropological argument is almost similar to the sociocultural argument for the formation of gangs except for the fact that as anthropological looks at the tribe or ethnicity, sociocultural looks at the destructive sociocultural forces that occur in the disorganized areas especially in the urban poor suburbs where there are no specific cultural approaches for the youths to follow. In sociocultural approach the focus is on the wrong norms that are advanced in the disorganized areas rather than on the tribe as a whole (Bates & Swan, 2014). The focus thus lies on issues such as the praise for ill-gotten wealth and love for delinquent behaviors such as rampant drug abuse which are treated as normal despite them being wrong in the sociocultural context.

  Anomie/alienation refers to the fact that when one is alienated from the social context say when one is excluded from the school set up or from the family set up the person develops delinquent behaviors as a coping mechanism as the individual seeks acceptance in the various social circles (Siegel & Welsh, 2017). The anomie theory is more or less similar to the anthropological and sociocultural because there is the need to belong. The only difference is that while the two are subject to abnormality being treated as normal in the society, anomie arises from one being excluded and so it is the individual who practices that which is abnormal in the society. These social conditions of exclusion in a way encourage youths to join gangs to try fight the status quo and have a sense of belonging even if it means through a gang. In essence, no one wants to be alienated from the community.

  There are also those youths who do not have the social personality traits that would see them integrate well in the society. These youths tend to find pleasure in engaging in deviant activities like violence, drug abuse and many others as a way of compensating for their antisocial behavior defects. These youths thus join gangs due to the psychological view. Theirs is quite different from the rest because it has nothing to do with belonging but rather behavior and personality. Rational choice on the other hand deals with ‘reason’ for joining where a youth outlines the benefits that come with joining the gang or forming one (Shoemaker, 2009). These could range from the desire to have easy access to drugs, the need to have some sort of safety or even just for fun and to have a support system from like-minded individuals.

  In my view, the most common views today are anomie and psychological views. This I suggest because when the society alienates young people they end up lacking role models or even the people to walk with them in their struggles and so they end up engaging in delinquent activities not because they want to but because they are struggling to fit within a system of gangs. Psychological also comes in because most of the families nowadays are not stable when it comes to behavior nurturing among the children thus most children grow up discovering for themselves what is wrong and what is right and miss the necessary training and teaching on how to develop personalities that would allow them fit in the society save for what they watch on both mass and social media.

  Two ways to assist kids from gang affiliation would be through coming up with some youth programs where there are role models who help them come out of the gangs by offering alternative means of livelihood and reconnecting them with their families. The other thing would be to have some recreational facilities where these kids can be engaged in to help them develop new attitudes and mindsets through the process of recreation thus they would be salvaged from crime and drugs. To have a reduced participation in gangs, one of the best ways would be to an outreach for the gangs at the community level where social workers who live in the community reach out to the gang members and talk them out of the gang while laying bare the consequences of gang activities. The social workers can also reach out to the kids in the community and make them see the need to have proper lifestyle with no gang affiliation.