Assignment: Persuasive Final Draft

Persuasive Final Draft

Charity Holmes
October 22, 2013

Community Violence:
A Piece of the Devil's Pie If an automobile company had cars that would cause an accident one out of every eight times, would you buy from that company? Of course you wouldn’t. No one would accept that many innocent mishaps. That’s about the same number of innocent people that is being violated on a weekly basis in the small community of Itta Bena, Mississippi as in the case of the hypothetical auto producer. The fact is that many innocent lives have been altered due to the influx of gang activity and community violence (Margolin & Gordis, 2000). Aggressors of community violence should undergo counseling and training to improve self-esteem and alleviate depression, which would help the aggressor avoid violent situations in the future. The city of Itta Bena is no different when it comes to community violence. Every town across the nation experiences the same problems, it’s everywhere and you can’t escape it. Everywhere you look there is a crime occurring people by juveniles under the age because they make preposterous decisions. Community violence can ruin a tight knit society. Clearly, minors are making the wrong decisions by taking part in this cycle. The community system that Itta Bena currently employs is actually flawed with mistakes. Many kids end up in gangs because they can’t find an outlet such as recreation and education. And due to budget cuts and economics, the town just can't afford it at this moment. Research indicates that 68 percent of Itta Bena's youth is in a gang and the imposed curfew that was signed into effect in 2005 has had little impact to curtail the violence in the small town. The factor may be attributed to the lack of intervention of law enforcement as opposed to the rule itself. The town of Itta Bena has a budget for eight police officers, but presently employs only four. Another reason is that Itta Bena has had no city judge for the last year due to city council conflict which gives criminals a free reign of crime without fear of retribution. It must be noted that police presence deters people from committing violent crimes. Evidence indicates that since the assistance of the local Sheriff's Department, violent crimes has reduced by thirty percent during the past two months. Former Itta Bena Mayor Thelma Collins, “It is my own experience that those arrested in Itta Bena were deterred by the existence of police officers.” As stated earlier in the paper, without the presence of police and a judge to ensure that these thugs will be prosecuted, these gang members can just do what they want and Itta Bena and its citizens are at their mercy. But with the odds of being arrested, it’s likely that it would discourage them from being so blatant (T. Collins, personal communication, June 2, 2013). John Hagan states in his article, “Youth violence and the end of adolescence, "American youth experiences high levels of violence and increasingly the public policy response is to punish youth perpetrators of violence through waivers and transfers from juvenile to adult courts. He goes on to declare that adolescence is a time of expanding vulnerability and exposures to violence that can be self-destructive as well as destructive of others (Hagan, 2007). The article supports the claim of the essay by reiterating that the implementation of recreation and educational activities would offset the crime wave by providing these kids with positive situations. There are abundant amounts of reasons on how we can stop community violence from occurring. Parents need to talk to their kids about youth violence. The majority of teenagers in gangs rarely talk to their parents. If they did, we probably wouldn’t have so many teens in gangs. In addition, the environment that teenagers live in also results in their actions. For example, if you live in a