In the '60s and '70s, people didn't pay a lot of attention to gangs. I think gangs still existed, but gangs had fallen out of criminological favor. Meda Chesney-Lind More Quotes by Meda Chesney-Lind More Quotes From Meda Chesney-Lind Girls often feel very powerless in their lives and their families, and they kind of mimic the male violence as a way to try and get some of that male power that they see lacking in their own lives. Meda Chesney-Lind malesgirltrying When some of the gangs got involved with the drug trade, particularlythe crack cocaine trade, and the lethal violence started to flare up in the '80s, then there was a great deal of public attention on gangs and a great deal of concern about what was going on in these social groups. Meda Chesney-Lind flare-upgroupsdrug The most dangerous kind of girl involvement with gangs is one where the girls are just sort of hanging around the gang boys or even being part of the male gang. Meda Chesney-Lind malesgirlboys Violence among boys is so valorized and so encouraged that you have to do things different in violence prevention with boys than with girls. Meda Chesney-Lind girldifferentboys Girls begin to have second thoughts about the violence. Studies show they feel a considerable amount of guilt about it. They feel bad later and want to apologize. Meda Chesney-Lind girlguiltwant If you socialize people to care about each other and care about relationships, they tend to be much less violent and tend to think about the consequences of their actions more. Meda Chesney-Lind carepeoplethinking If we socialized boys like girls, we would have a much lower crime rate in America. Meda Chesney-Lind girlboysamerica One of the differences between boy gangs and girl gangs is for girls it's much more relational and much less violent. Meda Chesney-Lind differencesgirlboys The gang may be a safer place than home, but it's not without its problems. In some instances, especially in the Latino community, the boys have very traditional views of femininity even though they are gang members. The girls can be [seen] as sexually available, but not the good girl that you want to take home to your family, even by young men in the gangs. Meda Chesney-Lind girlhomeboys The girls go to the gang in order to get protection from victimization that's occurring in their lives. And also it's a place to be, because they're often rejected from and rejecting their families. Meda Chesney-Lind protectiongirlorder Girls come to the gang for very different reasons than boys. For boys in marginalized communities, they have a gender problem, and they solve it often through gang membership. They find an ability to do masculinity in a way that reasserts their importance in a society that mostly ignores them. For girls, they're coming out of more damaged backgrounds. Their families are often the reason they get propelled into gang membership. Meda Chesney-Lind communitygirlboys There's only one thing worse than not paying attention to girls in gangs - it's paying attention to girls in gangs. The public reaction to girls and women who engage in nontraditional behavior - the hysteria that often surrounds girls in these groups - is almost as interesting as the behavior itself. Meda Chesney-Lind hysteriagirlinteresting
