Avneet Sidhu
A Warriors Religion
Is it really shocking that gangs are still prevalent in today’s society? When I looked into it, I realized that gangs are still a big part of today’s society. The main reason gangs still exist is because there is constant recruitment from the youth. The gangs recruit because they need someone to fill they’re shoes once they’re dead, incognito, in jail, or in the hospital. However when you look at it from the youths’ perspective some of the reasons they decide to join are deep-rooted. Adolecendents join gangs for a number of the following reasons:
Attention
Low self-esteem
Desire for friendship and a sense of belonging
Love
Peer pressure
Respect
Fear
Need for protection
Sense of power
Victim of poverty or inequality
Family tradition
Excitement
Access to drugs, guns, sex, and money
A belief that gang life will make them superior
Family problems/lack of positive communication
None or little adult supervision - no role model
Glamorization of gangster life by media (movie, TV, music industries)
Parental neglect-or parents looking the other way because they want to believe that they’re kids are still the innocent little children they were.
In accordance to the Ministry of Public Safety of Canada, the statistics of 2013 show that in Canada alone, we have about 434 youth gangs with roughly 7000 members nationally. Ontario has the highest number of youth gangs and members, with a startling number of 216 gangs, and 3320 members. Saskatchewan coming second in this ominous list with a lower number of 28 gangs with 1315,
British Columbia a close second with more gangs spread out, but lower numbers, of 1027.
When you take a closer glance at the country as a whole you’ll notice that 94% of the adolescent gang members are male. Almost half (48%) of the youth gang members are