elops between the gang and the child. Is then that the friendship and the feeling of belonging to the gang takes the place of the family. The child will spend less and less time at the home. The new antisocial structure of cities also effect the ease in which a boy or girl can join a gang. The formation of gangs in cities, and most recently in suburbs, is facilitated by the lack of community among parents. The parents don’t know what the children are doing for two reasons. The first is because much of the parent’s lives are outside the local community, while the children’s lives are lived almost within. Second, in a fully developed community, the parent gets a sense that the community will keep him informed of his child’s activities. Another great factor of joining a gang is for protection. Although from an objective point of view, we can see joining a gang brings more danger than it saves, this is not the way is seen by kids. In poor communities children will no doubt be beaten and robbed if they don’t join a gang. Of course they will get the same treatment from rivals when in a gang. The protection that the children don’t get from their parents, they think they get it by joining. ...
