Hipótesis especifica N°

As reflected above in the survey data (Table 39) a representative sample of young people drawn from the general population identified ‘acting and talking tough’ (23%), disputes where ‘neither side will back down’ (11%) and displays of physical aggression such as pushing or the display or use of weapons (9%) as the main triggers for how smaller, primarily verbal arguments transform into violent confrontations. Only 4% of young people in the representative survey saw ‘racism and discrimination’ as a key factor in why arguments might turn violent (Table 39), although 10% saw ‘discrimination and racism’ as the primary reason for why arguments between young people might occur in the first place (Table 38).

However, this picture changes significantly when we turn to focus group respondents, who placed strong primary emphasis on race and racial taunting as a key conflict escalator for both Sudanese and Pacific Islander young males. The most frequent causes for conflict escalation in public places cited by young people from both communities included retaliation for threats or insults and racism and racial taunting.

While both young Sudanese and young Pacific Islanders of both genders mentioned racism as a clear trigger for escalating conflict between young people, young Sudanese men related to this more specifically and in greater detail. As three different Sudanese male focus group participants put it,

When you talk to people and they say the bad word – that can lead you to fight. … If someone calls you the ‘n’ word you will get pretty upset about it.

If he calls you a nigger you do it [hit him] straight away – you don’t even need to talk about it.

If someone says a really strong word and you can’t control your anger, and then when you can’t control your anger and you hit that person… [Otherwise] they would just keep going and they would tell their friends to call you that.

Conflict escalation triggers for young Sudanese: loyalty, racism and reputation

A second significant trigger identified by young men in the focus group centred on the dynamics of peer support and loyalty. Both young Sudanese and Pacific Islander men felt strongly about the need or obligation to back up friends and/or family members, including extended family, involved in another dispute.

However, young Sudanese in particular may become involved in conflict escalation only reluctantly or ambivalently under such circumstances. For example, both young Sudanese men and women discussed not wanting to fight but feeling compelled to do so in order to avoid loss of respect and support from peers.

A number of young Sudanese men also commented on the importance of standing up against perceived racism and discrimination by social or emergency services, e.g. ambulance, police, Department of Human Services, and saw such discrimination as a trigger for escalating conflict. Finally, a few mentioned reputation-building as an element in escalating conflict, where a young person wants to enhance his social standing within a community based on cultural ideas about masculinity for young Sudanese:

Conflict escalation triggers for young Pacific Islanders: respect and retaliation

Many of the community-specific triggers for conflict escalation articulated by young Pacific Islanders revolved around social etiquette and socially acceptable/unacceptable behaviour according to their sense of cultural norms. These included swearing, which some young Pacific Islander men saw as aggression or an invitation to engage in conflict; dissing, which involves being the object of disrespectful comments about oneself, one’s family or a person’s cultural group; eyeballing or being stared at, particularly by members of other ethnic groups; and backstabbing, when a young person becomes subject of gossip and rumour in schools that is seen to damage or impact negatively on their reputation or social status.

Young Pacific Islander men in particular were also sensitive to what they perceived as implied social superiority displayed by others relative to Islanders, and they identified this as an incitement to further conflict. Disputes over young women were also cited by some Pacific Islander young men in the focus groups as perceived challenges to their social standing and masculinity.

For young Pacific Islander women, sexual taunting – what one young Pacific Islander woman termed ‘calling you things that you’re not’ – was the main conflict escalation trigger for female focus group participants.

Other conflict escalation triggers specific to Pacific Islander focus groups of both genders were alcohol– fighting over grog as well as being alcohol-affected – and ‘colours’ relating to perceived gang identity or membership. Attitudes to physical aggression

One of the key themes to emerge in this portion of the study relates to attitudes to violence and physical aggression across Sudanese and Pacific Islander young men. As indicated above, Sudanese young men in particular tended to see violent escalation as dictated by specific circumstances – in other words, as a circumstantially based reactive response to particular situations, particularly when race-based or retaliative:

There is a point where you can’t argue anymore and that is the point where you take action.

Pacific Islander young men, on the other hand, tended to see violent escalation more as a pre-emptive response designed to forestall further conflict either at the time or at some future date:

We’re mainly physical. Probably Australian people, they’re just verbal.

Yeah, because the verbal stuff is going to get you nowhere. It all ends in this bullshit and that bullshit. Whereas physical stuff leaves it in that place and that time, and that’s it. … If they come back for a second time, let’s go round two. If you come for round three – it’s good exercise.

It puts them in their place. That’s how we resolve things. Violence comes first. Plus they don’t come back and verbal.

‘Come over, there’s a fight!’ From argument to brawl

Within the focus groups, the triggers and motivations for large-scale brawling were virtually identical across both the Sudanese and Pacific Islander cohorts. Peer pressure, backing up one’s mates and issues around group belonging and identity dominated discussion on this topic for both groups. Young people of both genders in these communities made the following representative comments about why smaller disputes can turn into full-scale violent brawls in public:

Peer pressure: There ended up being 100 people there [at Highpoint]. And she didn’t want to fight, like she wanted to talk it out but there were so many people around her and they were pushing her and she ended up on top of [another girl] and bashing her … and after everyone left she apologised.

Loyalty to peers, back-up: If everyone gathers round, no one’s going to turn down and back away because they’ve got their friends there.

Reinforcement of belonging to group: I’m not fighting ‘cause I need to, it’s because my friends are here and I don’t want to look bad.

Fear of loss of status within or exclusion from group: To back down from something while all your mates are around, is like being a wimp.

Strategic response to threat: If the person is bigger or stronger than you, you’re not going to fight them, you’re going to call someone else to fight for you.

6.6.2

‘Just those ones that are different from the rest’: why young

people become victims of violent crime

The survey questions on this topic were directed towards fear of violent assault, the experience of victims of previous violent assaults, and how young people felt they could avoid becoming the victims of violent assault. However, the issue of why some young people might be more likely than others to become the victims of violent assault was a question asked specifically within the focus groups. The slightly different emphasis in the focus groups was designed to elicit more insight into what young people themselves in the Sudanese and Pacific Islander communities felt were the main causes for why some young people are more likely to be victims of assault than others, based on anecdotal reports of higher than average levels of violent assault as both victims and perpetrators within each community in the 15-19 year old age group in Brimbank.

The question of how young people may come to be victims of crimes against the person created uneasiness for many participants in the focus groups. It was difficult for some participants to publicly identify with or as victims in the group setting of the focus group discussions. Nevertheless, some key issues and insights around why young people may become victims of violent assault by their peers emerged from participants from both communities. All revolved around one or more expressions of perceived cultural, behavioural or social difference from peer- group normsas these are understood by young people themselves.

They included differences based on racial/ethnic identity, with young people from specific cultural or ethnic groups being perceived as more likely to be victimised because of perceptions that they were hostile to other racial or ethnic groups, less likely to retaliate, had desirable and expensive gear, and/or were perceived to dislike and feel superior to young people from both Pacific Islander and Sudanese communities. School uniformswere also cited as highly visible ways of signalling difference and demarcation between groups of young people. Inter- school rivalry and conflicts were seen as major elements in making young people the targets of violence, particularly across territorial boundaries; removal of school shirt or jacket was cited frequently before entering certain areas.

In a more general vein, those who are perceived as ‘different’, ‘weak’, ‘unattractive’, ‘losers’, ‘freaky’, or relatively isolated and friendless within peer groups were seen as more likely to be targets of violent behaviour. Similarly, transgressing boundaries, which included violating or ignoring established (although often fluid) social and cultural norms – for example, asking out the ‘wrong’ girl, wearing the ‘wrong’ clothes – was cited as making some young people more vulnerable to violent assault.

Finally, some Pacific Islander young people cited ‘guilt by association’ as a perceived factor in making non- Islanders who hung around with Islander youth were more likely to be targeted for violence by others because of their friendships with this community, perhaps to build status (without physically taking on Islander youth themselves).

Overall, these responses suggest that conventional ideas about social conformity and the perception of shared values and identities that characterise how young people negotiate social relationships and status within mainstream communities apply for these two cohorts as well. Other than the motif of ‘guilt by association’ for some young Pacific Islanders and the perceptions of some ethnic groups as more ‘culturally’ vulnerable to assault, there is little to suggest that the factors leading to some young people being more likely to be victimised than others has any grounding in culture- or community-specific norms or understandings for either Sudanese or Pacific Islander young people.

6.7

Perceptions of and relationship with the police