Ambientalización Curricular

The figure below shows the percentages of young people within the same gender who chose reasons why people joined gangs (e.g. 61% of males thought people joined gangs for a sense of belonging, which means that 39% of the males did not choose that option). Note that respondents could choose more than one option.

Figure 13: Perceptions of why young people join gangs

A total of 373 young people offered ‘further comments’ after completing the quantitative drop down boxes in this section. Most of these comments were quite brief. The three main themes emerging from those comments were: self-defence and feeling safe; to belong; and power and reputation. A number of responses also centered on young people wanting to be, or look, ‘cool’ as the primary reason for young people joining gangs.

Table 31: Other reasons given for why young people join gangs OTHER REASONS GIVEN FOR WHY YOUNG PEOPLE JOIN GANGS

Self-defence and feeling safe They are unsafe so they try hide behind other people. To feel like a big person joining a ‘gang’.

To feel tough because they know they’re weak.

To feel safe and to hang out with people they are comfortable around.

To belong To be around other people because of their stories in life…or because they have known

each other for quite a long time.

When they are lonely and want to be a part of something. Friends get sucked into it, so therefore they get sucked in.

Power and reputation I think they enjoy feeling powerful, it’s like a sense of security. Some people do it for

protection just for backup when it comes to a fight whereas some people just do it to try and act tough, scare people, and try to have power over others.

Reputation. Respect. … Some start off by wanting to show off. In the end they have to hold that rep so you do more. Peer pressure.

People join gangs to look and act tough. They feel that if in a gang their behaviour would be free and if in trouble, as a gang they have backup.

In relation to the central themes of this study, a number of further comments focused on young people joining gangs to feel safe, protected or ‘tough’ when they are in reality feeling unsafe, vulnerable or insecure.

0 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100 To belong Criminal activity Same ethnic background

Self defence Other

Per cent ages Male Female Total

Overlapping with these responses are themes of friendship, support, loyalty, feeling understood and/or belonging. Some respondents also felt that the influence of family and friends was a primary factor in whether young people joined gangs:

Most of them…have grown up watching friends and family doing the same things which they think are alright, they really don’t care and think it’s a cool and fun thing to be in.

A few comments emphasised the sense of power that being in a gang can bring. However, others emphasised the constant pressure to keep up a ‘reputation’ once a young person uses gang membership to bolster social status, which in turn can lead to ever more risky and anti-social forms of behaviour. Still others identified the motivation to join gangs as a way of being free of consequences for their actions:

I believe people join gangs to feel as if they can do whatever they desire without any consequences involved … People in the gangs will think whenever they need their friends’ help they will have their backs.

Despite a little more than half (54%) of young people in the survey who thought that ethnic background was relevant to why young people join gangs, only two of the comments in the qualitative data related to ethnicity, either implied or directly.

Finally, some respondents saw the desire to join gangs as connected a form of sanctuary from or solution to problems linked with home, family or other emotional and social difficulties. The focus on gangs as providing an alternative ‘home’ or ‘family’ for young people who have troubled home lives is well supported in the literature (Maxson, Whitlock and Klein, 1998.) Comments included:

To try to get away from a bad situation or problems that [are] causing them to feel in that way so they might decide to join a gang.

Parents give a lack of commitment to bring up their kids in [the] right manner, so they go to a gang they can call home and their other family.

Overall, the more thoughtful and extended comments in this section of the survey illuminate the 68% of young people who identify a range of social, emotional and relationship-based reasons that young people may join gangs, beyond the desire to ‘look cool’ or to combat boredom or lack of direction. In addition, they emphasise the important perception of 42% of respondents that joining gangs is one route to feeling safer or more secure if a young person feels at risk of being vulnerable or unprotected in the community, particularly in relation to peers. Finally, they are candid about the desire for power and perceived ‘superiority’, or feeling better than others, that underlines the motives for joining gangs for some young people, although this does not appear as statistically significant in the quantitative data analysis. The qualitative responses did not focus or elaborate on criminal activity as a reason for joining gangs, despite 57% of young people saying this was an important motive for joining gangs in the quantitative section of the survey, and they did not focus on shared ethnic background, despite 54% of participants choosing this as a reason why young people join gangs (see Figure 13 above).