Ashley Stevens's List: West Side Story/Gangs

• transitional services
• marginal
• lurch
• unrehabilitated
• volatile
• simmering
• Bloods and Crips
• latitude
• ''But society has to decide the balance between safety and civil rights. How  much of one are you willing to sacrifice for the other?''

  • Text to text: Much of the problem with gangs vs. the police is safety, stereotypes, and boundries. Gangs are a violent problem and the police officer's safety has to be put first. Many officers revert to previous experiences and stereotype individuals based on those exerpiences. Sometimes they are justified in their thinking and other times they are not. This is where the problem with police brutality comes into mind. In the movie "Crash" a police officer in L.A. works with another officer who is extremely racist. The first officer refuses to stay partners with the racist officer, but cannot shake the events they had encountered together. In the end the first officer shoots an afican american man that he gives a ride to based on a stereotype. He thinks the man is reaching for a gun in his pocket and the afican american man is just pulling out a trinket that is like the one the officer has on the dashboard. Does this suggest that even when we try to see past stereotypes, we just end up reverting back them in cases on fear? Are we able to get past stereotypes? Many stereotypes are in place for a reason, so when should we believe them and when should we ignore them? Do gangs fall into a certian stereotype?
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• disarray

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• megalopolis
• sprawling
• Rolling 60's
• Crips gang
• precipitated
• homicide
• precinct
• narcotics
• The reason, the authorities say, is the re-emergence of   

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  gang  warfare .
• gang warfare

  • Text to self: This occurence of gang warfare is high out West and looks as though it is far from our doorsteps, but in reality it is not. Mang gangs are migrating East. My freshman year at Wilkes University a man was shot in Wilkes-barre just by answering his door to a stranger. In order to join one of these gangs, the incoming member has to kill some one and it has to become public. The unfortunate predicament that this man found himself in is that it was his house that this gang chose.
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• beleaguered citizenry
• innovative
• precipitous
• demoralized
• demoralized
• stewardship
• demoralized
• demoralized
• demoralized
• demoralized
• inverse
• The economy is busting, not booming

  • Text to World: Many U.S. citizens have lost their jobs due to the decline in the economy and the recession. Desperation grabs hold of many of these people which makes them turn to violence in order to support their families. The influx of parolees is also alarming, but our system has been dried out financially. Therefore, we find more and more unrehibilitated criminals on the streets. An even more increasing problem is that persons with criminal records already have a large problem finding employment after release and in this economy it becomes almost impossible. Subsequently, people turn to violence and illegal activities.
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• parolees
• disbanded
• corruption
• chronic

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