Gangs in Canada - Youth Crime and Gangs

Youth Crime and Gangs

Youth crime

Youth crime is crime committed by people aged 13–18. However, the word youth can be as broad as ages 12–24 depending on the context of the topic.

Problem that Canada faces today in regards to youth crime

The mass media regularly depicts youth gang activity as a “growing and violent menace”. As a result, such reporting by the mass media can cause moral panic, which in turn, portrays youth gangs as a threat to societal values and interests. And it is typical for the mass media to present youth gangs in a stereotypical fashion. The fact of the matter is that most of the time such reporting by the mass media can lead to people basing their knowledge on what they perceive to be as “reality” when regarding gang activity

Researchers paying attention to youth and crime

There are a number of reasons to why youth and crime has become so important to some people. One of the reasons is the rising number of homeless youth. In Toronto, there can be up to 2000 homeless youth sleeping on the streets. The other reason is the media bringing attention to homeless youth and the illegal activities they may take part in. Many homeless youth come from poor families, broken homes, and abusive backgrounds. There are, however, some youth from middle-class families who are attracted to the gang lifestyle.

Youth and gang related crime; Gangs in this context

There are various types of gangs in Canada and a gang is broadly considered any group of individuals who have identifiable leadership, an identifiable or claimed control over territory, and engagement either individually or collectively in violent or other forms of illegal behavior.

Causes of youth joining gangs

Power and Respect: Many times youth feel that joining a gang is the only way to obtain status and success. Status in this sense means that others are fearful of them. Gang members often have tattoos, which help a gang member gain respect within their group, and mark them as members for life.

Money: For some youth, working an honest and legal job may not be an option as entry-level employment often does not pay enough money to buy what they want. Perceived wealth is an important aspect of status in a gang. Some youth feel they have to join a gang in order to support their families. Some gang members believe working for relatively low pay is slavery.

Social Support and Protection: Gangs stick together like families and are often fiercely protective of their members and their gang territory.

Three main sources developed in U.S to address the prevalence of gangs

In regards to gang prevalence, there are three main sources that have been developed in the United States to address trends as to whether the very existence of gangs is changing over time. The first is the National Youth Gang Center, which collects data from a large sample of police forces on gang activity; it’s basically a survey which is regarded as the official count of gang activity in the United States. This information provided by the police is sometimes used in Canada, especially by the mass media, but is not collected on a regular basis. Second, surveys-which are normally school and community bases-are used to ask youth about their own gang-related activities. But national information such as this is not available in Canada. Third, gang behaviour can also be measured by through case studies and observational research. This is where researchers study small groups of youth who have been pre-identified as gangs.

Manitoba anti-gang ads sell prevention

It was a $250,000 advertising campaign created to prevent gang violence. It was created by surveying youth in the community who wanted to avoid being part of gangs. Swan concluded that youth are “lured” by artificial freedom and forget to look at the dangers that they call upon themselves. After he became the justice minister, he outlawed armoured vehicles, used civil courts to revocate the license of gang-fronted businesses, and started creating a list of “criminal organizations.”

Law-And-Order and youth gangs/crime prevention

It is hard to tell whether Law-And-Order is successful in preventing youth gangs/crime because there are not very many studies done on these topics. However, criminologists and the Criminal Justice System (CJS) are looking into restorative justice in order to deal with many youth related crimes.

Youth, social exclusion, and gangs

One of the main reasons is that the concept of social exclusion is multi-dimensional. There are various causes to social exclusions. One of the main causes is poverty, but not everyone who is socially excluded is poor.

Social exclusion is a multidimensional process of progressive social rupture, detaching groups and individuals from social relations and institutions and preventing them from full participation in the normal activities of the society in which they live. For most social scientists, socially excluded people are those who are poor. Youth and elderly are considered to be socially excluded.