It was on the day of June 15th, 1975 that the world of eleven year old boy named Kody Scott would change completely. A month prior to this day, Kody was suspended from school for flashing a gang sign during the school’s panorama picture; from here it was evident where Kody was heading in life. Growing up in South Central Los Angeles, Kody was always surrounded by gangs and constantly witnessed the warfare created by rival gangs. Upon his return home from his sixth grade graduation Kody dashed out of the window in his room and ran to meet up with Tray Ball, a gang member of the Eight Tray Gangster Crips who had agreed to sponsor Kody into the gang. That night Kody was beaten senseless by the members of the set as a part of his initiation. Then, Tray Ball came and approached Kody with a pump shotgun that contained eight shells and said: “Kody, you got eight shots, you don’t come back to the car unless they are all gone.” The gang drove north into their enemy territory and eventually found and ambushed their target, a group of Bloods (the main enemy of the Crips). It was instant, gun shots rained from all directions, Kody shot six times before chasing an enemy blood who was then shot in the back by Kody. Kody’s future in the gang was set in stone. He was accepted by all members immediately, especially Tray Ball, who encouraged him to pursue barbaric acts that made Kody’s name soar in the streets. Two years later, at the age of thirteen, Kody was attempting robbery and proceeded to stomp on the man for about twenty minutes until the man was put into a coma at the hands of Kody. The police stated to bystanders that whoever did such an act was a monster, that name stuck to Kody and eventually became more prominent than his actual birth name. Needless to say, school was never Kody’s main focus. Over the course of the next two years, Kody made it his only ambition to fight for the gang and promote the superiority of the Eight Tray Gangsters. Kody’s end goal was to ultimately achieve the status of “Ghetto Star”, a title given to a individual who is known throughout gang because of the barbaric acts they have committed in the name of their own gang set.
1-The story tells, Real facts occurred in the 1940s, where it was a racist society. Gangs were scattered throughout the cities, and regions, and the streets. To live, you have full get away, or belonging to one of them. You should help the gang members that they were right or on falsehood. Also, it is a kind of bigotry, not much different from intolerance, national, ethnic, and sectarian That were prevalent in American society. in fact, it is the inevitable result of this society. When the corruption becomes prevails, injustice and lawless prevails too, and justice will disappear.
With no father figure in his life and a broken home, Kody turned to the streets in search of love and security. He became good friends with a guy by the name of “Tookie” Williams. Williams just so happened to be an early leader of the Crips, a notorious Los Angeles gang. The more Kody hung out with Tookie, the more respect he had for the gang’s power of authority and at the young age of 11 he was initiated into the 83 Gangster Crips (Kody, 2008). When someone is initiated into a gang they are “beat in” meaning they get beat up by 5 or 6 men for a certain length of time (usually around 30 seconds). Right after joining the gang he helped steal a car and shot and killed many rival gang members in a drive by shooting (Kody, 2008). When Kody was 13 years old, he robbed and beat a victim so bad that the police called it the “work of a monster,” which is where he got his nick name (Kody, 2008).
In this paper I intend to show how Kody's early child hood and teenage years, both proceeding and during his life as a Crip, fit quite well with several theories that were discussed in class over the quarter.
One of the theories that is associated with this school is the “Concentric Zone Theory”, which states that some of the highest crime rates will occur in the zone in transition (Lilly, 2012, p. 40). This is shown in the film when looking at the neighborhoods where much of the crime occurs. These neighborhoods are full of families that live in or close to poverty (Kotlowitz, 2012). The violence interrupters were taking a large step in trying to solve many of these problems, much like Shaw and McKay, with neighborhood organization (Lilly, 2012, p. 41). The group of people in the film would walk around and talk to citizens within the community and try and explain to them that violence was not the answer. They wanted the youth and the people on the streets to know that situations could be handled differently and one way to stop the violence that was occurring was by calling a ceasefire. The Chicago School of Criminology also explains that “juveniles were often drawn into crime through their association with older siblings or gang members” (Lilly, 2012, p. 41). Many of the youth that were involved in crimes in the film had history of crimes in their families. Some, like the people in the violence interrupters group, were able to escape the life of violence and continue to share their story and hopefully help people. Much of the crimes throughout the show were based on blood
Kody Scott was born into the gang life weither he liked it or not. Born on 1963 in South Central Los Angeles Kody?s life would be affected by the growing number of gangs inevitably. Kody knew he had a choice to be made, be a gang member or be a pedestrian. He viewed pedestrians as spineless nerds who were always victims of someone?s ridicule or physical violence, who never responded to an affront of any type. He himself had a taste of pedestrian life in grade school were he was picked on and had his lunch money taken from him. ?Early on I saw and felt both sides of the game being played where I lived. It was during my time in elementary school that I chose to never be a victim again, if I could help it?(Shakur 100). Being in a gang gave Kody a feeling of security in a city of violence. ?I felt very different, older, more attached than any of...
For my final paper I choose to sociologically analyze the book Gang Leader for a Day: A Rogue Sociologist Takes to the Streets by Sudhir Venkatesh. Newsweek describes Gang Leader for a Day as being “Compelling…dramatic…Venkatesh gives readers a window into a way of life that few Americans understand.” (Newsweek) Gang Leader for a Day tells the story of a young sociologist named Sudir Venkatesh and his search for answers to poverty problems in the urban projects. After being constantly warned of which areas not to visit, Venkatesh decided to ignore all the forewarnings and goes and walks into Lake Park Projects, to conduct surveys for his professor. On his trip into the projects Venkatesh ends up meeting a gang leader named J.T. After spending the night in the projects Venkatesh is allowed to leave after J.T. states “You shouldn’t go around asking them silly-a** questions —- With people like us, you should hang out, get to know what they do, how they do it. No one is going to answer questions like that .You need to understand how young people live on the streets.” (2008 : 21) From that day on Venkatesh would come to end up befriending J.T and spending almost all of his time in the projects. It isn’t until J.T gets relocated to the notorious Robert Taylor Housing that the real study begins. Over the next seven years Venkatesh would not only gather information from J.T but, also befriend everyone from the other neighborhood dealers, crackheads, squatters, prostitutes, pimps, activists, cops, organizers, and officials. Through his time spent with the residents and officials of the Robert Taylor Homes Venkatesh not only was able to gain insight on the day to day life of...
Young black men crowd the corners of Baltimore. They are all hard talk, hard jaws, and crisp white t-shirts as big as sails—strapped. One precocious boy witnesses a shootout near a drug lord’s stash house and takes up sticks to play guns ‘n’ robbers. His trajectory is as follows: he graduates from sticks and piss-balloons, to g-packs and real guns, to taunting cops with brown bags of excrement, to housecats and lighter fluid, to bold, cold-blooded murder. In the words of social reformer Charles Loring Brace, this boy is one of the dangerous class—an undisciplined, delinquent youth. A creation of David Simon’s for HBO’s crime drama, The Wire, the character of Kenard may be a fictionalization, but his presence adds to the much-praised realism of the series. There really are young boys like Kenard that exist on the streets of American cities—falling into the easy and familiar trap of the drug industry. The Wire makes a point to follow the tread of Baltimore’s youth throughout all of its five seasons, introducing the topic of juvenile delinquency to the considerable range of social issues the show discusses. The Wire almost flawlessly represents the factors which cause a young person to “defect”— from the failings of the city school district, a difficult home life, or the struggle of homelessness, to the surrounding environmental influences that arise from life in the city of Baltimore. However, while The Wire and its examination of causalities does many things for the discussion of Juvenile Delinquency on the whole—taking the conversation to levels no other scripted telev...
Sociologists see deviance as a collection of individuals, conditions, and actions that society disvalues, finds offensive or condemns. In part because gangs as deviant groups violate societies norms through crimes such as theft etc. Various explanations exist to explain the formation of gangs; Howard Becker, an American sociologist, claims that negative labels excaberate deviant behaviors by excluding individuals (Skatvedt & Schou, 2008). Further, individuals cannot distinguish between false needs such as watches, cars etc. and true needs (food, water, etc.) (Marcuse, 1964). Thus, the strain theory suggests that the inability to legitimately achieve socially desirable goals such as having
Gang Leader for a Day by Sudhir Venkatesh is an ethnographic study of a Black King Gang in the Robert Taylor community. Venkatesh accidentally stumbles upon the gang lead by J.T. and decided to study him and the gang. J.T. is familiar with sociology because he a taken a sociology class so he allows Venkatesh to shadow and document the gang which includes the way J.T. uses violence to maintain his power. Venkatesh also worked with Ms. Bailey, the community leader. She helps him learn how she solves problems, the impact of her power and affiliation with the gang, and how to extort money out of the community members. In his journey Venkatesh learns from the violence and illegal activity he witnesses that “in the projects it’s more important that
Dunn, Julia. “Los Angeles Crips and Bloods: Past and Present.” Edge. n.p. 26 Jul 1999. Web. 10 Feb
The book emphasizes the idea of how difficult it is to leave the gang lifestyle. There are frequent cases of relapse by individuals in the book, who were once out to again return to gangs. This case is brought by what gangs represent to this in the book and what leaving entails them to give up. The definition of gangs presented to the class was, three or more members, share name, color, or affiliation, or must exist in a geopolitical context. To members associated with gangs, this definition can include your family members, neighborhood, everyone that they associate with. Take for example Ronnie from Jumped in by Jorja Leap it states,” Ronny’s role models are gangbangers. His family is a hood. His mentors are older homies in county jail.”(102). Ronnie and other gang members like him do not
This book was about a street gang called the Mighty Vice Lords. They were the second largest gang in Chicago with about 30,000 members. The Vice Lords started in the Illinois Training center (Juvenile Correctional Facility) for boys in St. Charles Illinois during 1958 and was led by Edward “Pepalo” Perry and Alfonso Alfred. This group was known to be brutal and violent. It discussed how a violent gang can become a community organization and change the way things were done for the betterment of the community. This information is important because it showed that gangs can become a positive force.
The documentary Crips and Bloods: Made in America, can be analyzed through three works: “Modern Theories of Criminality” by C.B. de Quirόs, “Broken Windows” by James Q. Wilson and George L. Kelling and “Social Structure and Anomie” by Robert K. Merton.
When Kody Scott was 6 years old, the gang wars started in Los Angeles. It started out as a battle between the Crips and the Bloods, but by the late 70's and continuing today, the biggest killer of Crips is other Crips. The Crip Nation was divided into different divisions, which Monster compares to the U.S. Army. "For instance, one who is in the army may belong to the F...
“American Gangster” is based on the true story of Frank Lucas’ life. It is the story of how he cut out the middleman in the heroin business and the story of how Ritchie Roberts caught him. Throughout the film we see the parallel between a cop and a criminal as we inch forward to see their lives finally meet.