Study says no single solution to 'gangster' children problem

Balbhadra Rana | Dec 15 2007= reposted from stolenchildhood.net 

A recent report by COAV [Children and youth in Organized Armed Violence] project says there is no one solution to the problem of city children taking to guns and joining gangs. The study was conducted in a number of countries around the world.

It finds marked similarities between child soldiers and city gangs? kids. In both the case they [the child] are guided into violence and misused by adults. As far as the city child gangsters are concerned they are controlled by criminals, often drug peddlers.

The question springs to mind: Why do children join such armed gangs and take to violence? The answer is simple- poverty. Youth take to gangs because they feel insecure in the present situations. Their families are poor.

According to the COAV study, policing alone will not make this problem go away. Harsh repressive measures might be effective and advisable against hardened criminals but such an approach will only push the gangster child deeper into the world of crime.

The emphasis should be instead on a number of productive actions. First of all policemen should cultivate good relations with the communities they are supposed to protect. If the local cop is looked up to, then the criminal elements will not be able to attract local kids. A corrupt and brutal policeman will make the youth feel that the local gangster is better.

Stress should also be on finding jobs in the areas, so that growing children are not forced to join gangs for survival.

In nine out the ten countries surveyed it was found that the drug trade was the chief recruiter for child ‘gangsters’. Drug policies will have to be reformed. Killing drug lords only increases the atmosphere of violence. Curbing the drug trade only pushes up drug prices attracting more child gangs.

Children of Gaza, playing war games with butchered innocence

In some countries children use guns for fun-shootings. If a few classmates die, one can even get famous. In other countries children wielding guns are so common that when Times Online reports that, hardly anyone cares to mention any names. If you are born in the wrong side of the globe then even if you shoot your whole city down, no one will bat an eyelid.

So clich鳠justify the violent games that kids are playing in the Gaza strip. Only these children do not need the television to learn guerrilla warfare. Everything is happening right in front of their eyes. And unlike the sociopaths in the West, who kill for pleasure, these kids may have to kill someday for necessity. They may have to defend their communities in the future against US and Zionist aggression.

They are playing ?raid-the-houses?, ?torture-the-prisoner? and ?curfew? games. The innocent world of the child has been stained by the dark stain of human blood. Palestinian kids are being forced to grow up before their time. Each child who is born brings us the message that God has not yet tired of humans. Children are the only hope for our blighted planet. But when these kids are being sucked into violence so soon in their lives, we are reminded of something Christ said. The Lord had said that if anyone misleads these tiny ones then it is better for that person to hang a grindstone around his neck and drown.

If the US?s President Bush is a Christian, then we know what he has to do. Christ is clear. The mess in the Middle East is a creation of the US. By now Israel and Palestine would have found peace if there was no meddling US there. The US is there in the guise of a peace-monger but all it wants is the oil.

And how so much we write, for Bush and his cronies only US kids matter, Palestinian children do not even deserve individual naming. Now, do we name insects, vermin? The Eastern and Asian people are so much vermin burdening the white world. That is what developed nations think of us.

Image Credit: Columbiatribune

Via: Times Online