New Orleans’ leadership has finally decided to take notice of its crime problem. They’re “drawing a line in the sand” and calling for help (NOLA.com):
In an extraordinary move usually reserved for the immediate crisis after natural disasters, a detachment of at least 100 Louisiana National Guard soldiers and 60 State Police troopers will be sent to New Orleans today in an effort to quell the steadily rising tide of bloodshed in the city, a wave of violence that culminated Saturday with the shocking murder of five youths in Central City.
Calling for help is a good thing, but it’s a stop-gap solution; a tourniquet. In some ways, it reminds me of the “build the wall at the border” facet of the illegal immigration debates: the problems don’t go away, they merely wait… and pressure builds.
Polimom cares, enormously, about New Orleans, and pretty much anyone who grew up there will understand my abiding connection to that broken city by the wide, muddy river. Like so many others, though, I left years ago, and the biggest reason I’ve never gone back is crime.
Gallons of ink (metaphorically) have been spent in the analysis of New Orleans’ social problems. Blogs, news reports, editorials, and entire books have been devoted to the subject, and the consensus is that poverty, driven by abysmal educational system and dead-end job prospects, combined with an inept criminal justice system to create a dangerous urban subculture fueled by drugs and gangs.
I agree with that, as it happens, but that doesn’t tell me — or anyone else — how National Guard troops and State Police will fix anything. I’m glad they’ve been called in, but assuming they can impact the problem… then what? Are they just going to stay until a generation of better schools and employment opportunities finally catches up with the community?
Of course not. They can’t.
How about some thought experiments:
What if drugs weren’t illegal? Would that eliminate the violence in the urban ghettos in New Orleans?
Since I’m thoroughly disgusted by this idiotic “War on Drugs”, I put some real thought into that one this morning… and sadly, I don’t think decriminalizing drugs would help the New Orleans gangster subculture. In fact, I think it might even make the problems worse.
The dangerous people gunning one another down are as concerned with materialism as they are with “respect” — and in gang-think, drugs are merely a vehicle, and an excuse, to prove themselves. Without that vehicle, the crime would spill out into the city and citizenry at large, as the ruffians (I’m getting tired of the term “youth”) start seeking other means to their materialistic ends. Street robberies and muggings, home invasions, car-jackings… they’d get their money from those who have it, if drugs were less lucrative.
Or let’s wave another magic wand and pretend that the Criminal Justice system in New Orleans was magically transformed, overnight, into a functional entity — one that had jail space and judges that kept them there, a fully-staffed and equipped, well-trained, and respected police department, and a prison that had locks without keys.
Yes, that might help… but we don’t have that wand.
Sigh… I see that I’ve written myself into a corner.
The problem in New Orleans is so endemic, so very entrenched, that they have to come completely “out of the box” to solve it. Even if all of the pre-Katrina ills were solved overnight, the city can’t wait a generation or two for education to take hold and a cultural shift to occur.
Polimom’s not going to leave you hanging in the dismal dark with thoughts of “it’s hopeless”, though. Instead, I’m going to throw a couple of ideas out here.
First some terminology and definitions:
Gangs, and the individuals within them, are not the same thing, and when someone acts individually and independently in this manner, we call them sociopaths.
Sociopaths are marked by their disconnection from societal norms and lack of empathy. They do not “relate” to the feelings of others.
Gangs are complex social organisms that offer belonging, inclusiveness, and in many cases, protection. In communities suffused with the gang subculture, it can be nearly impossible to survive outside them, or resist joining.
So here are a few thoughts:
- To connect these young people at an individual level, teens need to perform community service. It needs to be compensated, and it must last longer than a few weeks. (I’m thinking a year.) Nursing homes and children’s hospitals come to mind, but in New Orleans there’s also a big need for people to swing hammers and hold sheetrock.
Put the young people to work in their communities. Require it, and pay them for it. - It has been suggested by gang experts (sociologists and psychologists) that to withstand or resist the lure of gangs, young people (young males, specifically) need mentors and role models at an early age. Additionally, they require activities and a sense of belonging to a group.
Strategies that combine mentoring with organized youth activities are being tried in various cities. Get the “youth” off the streets and into organized, supervised activities early… like, by age 10. And by the way (as an aside to that New Orleans city council member advocating late-afternoon schools), this is NOT a teacher’s job.They’re supposed to be educating. Remember??? - Change the focus of the lens. Instead of looking at what causes the failures, examine the successes. Find the young people in the most dangerous of these neighborhoods and learn what makes them different. Find the positives instead of the negatives, and get a new model going. Raise the bar.
All of this takes money, time, and focus – three things which New Orleans does not possess but absolutely must find. The city, and perhaps the state, is going to have to ask for it, or else re-direct the federal funds already marked for rebuilding.
Eventually, one hopes that long-term social solutions like better education and a more diverse economy will take effect, but if New Orleans doesn’t put some serious effort on the near-term, tourism will dwindle and die, as will investment and rebuilding.
New Orleans has to get out of the box. The future depends upon it.