Why Are There So Many Murders in Chicago?

[danikerhino]

​

It would be nice if cops walked around the neighborhood and get to know the people that are in it. At least the people that are willing to talk to them. That won't solve the problem completely but, it may help things out at least marginally. They do that at some parts of San Francisco and it seems to have disrupted the violence.

 

[powerballin]

The solution is powerful wealthy people and the government choosing to care about poor Americans (the majority of that group is minorities).  I wouldn't get my hopes up on that one.

Not gonna say its hopeless but they got us right where they want us.  Why would they change things if the problem doesn't effect them?

 

[utvol23]

The solution is powerful wealthy people and the government choosing to care about poor Americans (the majority of that group is minorities).  I wouldn't get my hopes up on that one.

Not gonna say its hopeless but they got us right where they want us.  Why would they change things if the problem doesn't effect them?

What is that wealthy people need to do in order to show that they care about poor Americans?

 

[thegoldenchild]

What is that wealthy people need to do in order to show that they care about poor Americans?

why should wealthy people care about poor americans? why cant poor americans care about themselves enough to either work harder, go to school or just anything to try to improve their own situation? if you're gonna wait for a hand out or for other people to save you, well good luck with that..

 

[DCAllAfrican]

We all know why....we all know the solution...the real problem is that certain Americans in power don't really care. 

What is the solution. I don't know

 

[th3kid]

I don't think the point is that people in impoverished areas are looking for a hand out, it's just that they're so far gone (mentally, physically, socially) that they don't know how to improve their quality of life. They see people on TV TALKING about improvement, not SHOWING it. People in hood areas need something they can hold onto, something real. Not welfare, not someone who makes it from that hood then never comes back. They need active participation in their daily lives for improvement (among other things) in order to WANT to be greater.

If someone is abused as a child and it goes untreated by a professional, what usually happens? They abuse their child or someone else's or they become overly aggressive or a combination of them all. The hood was abused, they need a professional to come treat them. Whether our government is fit to do that without exploiting the areas/people is up for debate but assistance is needed.

 

[-Red-]

What is that wealthy people need to do in order to show that they care about poor Americans?

why should wealthy people care about poor americans? why cant poor americans care about themselves enough to either work harder, go to school or just anything to try to improve their own situation? if you're gonna wait for a hand out or for other people to save you, well good luck with that..

Do you not understand that our system as currently constituted is designed for people in the hood to fail? How can they improve their situation within our current system? Work harder where? Where are the jobs? Go to school to do what? There are millions of people that are unemployed that have college degrees...

We all know why....we all know the solution...the real problem is that certain Americans in power don't really care. 

What is the solution. I don't know

The solution is ultimately a reorganizing of the capitalist system in this country which has been historically based upon the exploitation of the labor of the masses (particularly the Black masses) and has, at this point, advanced to the point that the labor of the masses has become obsolete. Historically, survival for the masses was predicated on their ability to be productive workers for a capitalist system that exploited them as much as possible but ultimately relied on their labor. Now the labor of the masses is not needed. Their jobs have been outsourced or a computer is now doing them. Therefore, at this time more than any other in the history of the world, it makes absolutely no sense for people's ability to live to be predicated on work.

That is ultimately what we have to come to terms with...

 

[kaygee6]

JChambers: I totally understand what your saying but that is everywhere in America. There are SOME officers who constantly violate citizens civil rights on a daily basis and those are the ones that give the good ones a bad rap.I for one am a community police officer, I love helping the community out when needed but sometimes you throw the community a bone and they want a steak. In chicago there is no death penalty and I really do not believe in it, I say tighten the gun and drug laws so that they somewhat mirror the federal system. When prisons get overcrowded start utilizing the federal system prisons to ship the inmates plain and simple. We are too lenient when it comes to laws in this country. Also I say prosecute individuals to the highest level that you can so that these "thugs" can take notice and maybe drive them out somewhere else. To end Chicago police is very short on man power and that is why they can not go into combat with the gangs because they are outnumbered.

 

[memo]

 It starts with family, but doesn't stop there. It's easy to lose your self to a certain mentality when it's all around you especially when your young.

 

[jchambers]

JChambers: I totally understand what your saying but that is everywhere in America. There are SOME officers who constantly violate citizens civil rights on a daily basis and those are the ones that give the good ones a bad rap.I for one am a community police officer, I love helping the community out when needed but sometimes you throw the community a bone and they want a steak. In chicago there is no death penalty and I really do not believe in it, I say tighten the gun and drug laws so that they somewhat mirror the federal system. When prisons get overcrowded start utilizing the federal system prisons to ship the inmates plain and simple. We are too lenient when it comes to laws in this country. Also I say prosecute individuals to the highest level that you can so that these "thugs" can take notice and maybe drive them out somewhere else. To end Chicago police is very short on man power and that is why they can not go into combat with the gangs because they are outnumbered.

You are right, there are some officers who do it, and the other officers cover it up for them, or are demoted or fired.What country do you live in? In the country I live in, The United States of America, a first time drug offender can get life in prison and the system can lock you up without a warrant or charges. Your views don't coincide with reality.You act like these guys are killing people and getting released. As a law enforcement officer you know that is not the case. If you even get caught with a gun in Chicago, you are going to prison. The laws are already extremely strict, especially on gun crime in Illinois. Federal regulations are fully applicable in Chicago, Illinois, and I know that they are used on a daily basis against violators of federal law. How could laws possibly be considered "lenient" in this country? You can get a life sentence for growing a God given plant. The police can search your vehicle if a dog barks at it and hold you without a warrant or allowance of trial or due process. Federal agents can also seize any property you own and refuse to return it under civil forfeiture law, which requires no probable cause. The president just signed paperwork allowing the assassination of American citizens. It is funny when police talk about being outnumbered. Law enforcement in this country is militarized with fully automatic weapons and millions of dollars worth of tactical equipment. There is a complete nationwide infrastructure in place ensuring safety and convenience for law enforcement. When was the last time you heard of an armed group going up against the police? Most of the time, it requires at least 3-10 fully armed officers to take down 1 suspect. The laws are too strict as it is, and most of the time they aren't followed by police officers or other members of the system either. What needs to happen in Chicago, as I previously stated, is that the people there need to wake up and see what they are doing to their own community. Sending a bunch of armed thugs at other armed thugs isn't going to cause anything but a bloodbath. Maybe if the government and so called protectors of the people would follow the rules, the citizens would follow suit. I also find it interesting that the states with the harshest gun laws always have the highest violent gun crimes. That needs to be addressed as well, I feel sorry for the law abiding citizens of Chicago who can't even defend themselves from violent encounters without fear of incarceration.


"Of all tyrannies a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good
of its victim may be the most oppressive. It may be better to live
under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies.
The robber baron's cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may
at some point be satiated, but those who torment us for our own good
will torment us without end for they do so with the approval
of their own conscience."

-C.S. Lewis

 

[stringer bell 32]

As long as the murders stay in the brown communities things aren't changing anytime soon

 

[jchambers]

As long as the murders stay in the brown communities things aren't changing anytime soon

Your statement says just as much about the brown community, as it does about the system. Why does the black community need an external influence to change their ways?

 

[powerballin]

We all know why....we all know the solution...the real problem is that certain Americans in power don't really care. 

What is the solution. I don't know

everything red mpls is saying basically.

The system needs to change.  There were thousands of babies born into situations where they have little to no odds a successful life.  Everybody cant have equal odds but we can't continue to think the system is working. 

DC you know certain communities need additional help to raise up to a decent standard.  But those communities don't get that help.  Its for a reason blee dat

 

[DCAllAfrican]

Man unless you are going to blow up the whole city (literally), nothing realistically will stop the madness.

 

[dathbgboy]

In order for it to change, the entire United States system needs a complete overhaul. From the welfare system, to education, to the economy. I remember growing up there were a good amount of after-school programs and centers that kept me off of the streets but now with cutbacks, places like that can't afford to keep their doors open. Most of these kids' parents are working whatever hours they can to get by so where does that leave the child besides home alone w/ idle hands.

The things that need to be done to turn things like this around won't be done unfortunately

 

[jchambers]

We all know why....we all know the solution...the real problem is that certain Americans in power don't really care. 

What is the solution. I don't know

everything red mpls is saying basically.

The system needs to change.  There were thousands of babies born into situations where they have little to no odds a successful life.  Everybody cant have equal odds but we can't continue to think the system is working. 

DC you know certain communities need additional help to raise up to a decent standard.  But those communities don't get that help.  Its for a reason blee dat

They don't need, nor do they deserve additional help tho. Life's tough, we aren't all born with the same economic privileges or blessings. The government shouldn't be required to steal money from one group and give it to another just because they can't get their act together. Someone in here previously stated that after slavery, African Americans got together and started their own economies and were very successful. What happened after that is the welfare state and the belief that nobody is responsible for their own actions and that it is the government's responsibility to take care of everybody. A black man in today's United States doesn't have to take care of his children, because the government will do it for him. That's not a good thing. I can't pretend to know what it is like growing up as a black man in the U.S.A., but I can speak as someone who grew up in a lower economic bracket, and I can see that they need more positive black leaders, and less selfish rappers and entertainers to look up to. Many people are fearful of assimilating, believing that it is "selling out", but the only way to change a system is to join it, then subvert it from the inside. The glorification of drug and gun culture is a major issue that needs to be addressed. Please believe that when you sell drugs, or murder, you are not bucking the system in any way, but you are doing exactly what the system wants you to do to keep you in prison, dead or broke. People wanna boycott stores, when they need to be boycotting Rick Ross, BET and Time Warner, etc. Ultimately, the problems in Chicago will be addressed the same way they always are; more cops, harsher laws, more money thrown at the problem, and there will be no change. There is no solution really.

 

[powerballin]

We all know why....we all know the solution...the real problem is that certain Americans in power don't really care. 

What is the solution. I don't know

everything red mpls is saying basically.

The system needs to change.  There were thousands of babies born into situations where they have little to no odds a successful life.  Everybody cant have equal odds but we can't continue to think the system is working. 

DC you know certain communities need additional help to raise up to a decent standard.  But those communities don't get that help.  Its for a reason blee dat

They don't need, nor do they deserve additional help tho. Life's tough, we aren't all born with the same economic privileges or blessings. The government shouldn't be required to steal money from one group and give it to another just because they can't get their act together. Someone in here previously stated that after slavery, African Americans got together and started their own economies and were very successful. What happened after that is the welfare state and the belief that nobody is responsible for their own actions and that it is the government's responsibility to take care of everybody. A black man in today's United States doesn't have to take care of his children, because the government will do it for him. That's not a good thing. I can't pretend to know what it is like growing up as a black man in the U.S.A., but I can speak as someone who grew up in a lower economic bracket, and I can see that they need more positive black leaders, and less selfish rappers and entertainers to look up to. Many people are fearful of assimilating, believing that it is "selling out", but the only way to change a system is to join it, then subvert it from the inside. The glorification of drug and gun culture is a major issue that needs to be addressed. Please believe that when you sell drugs, or murder, you are not bucking the system in any way, but you are doing exactly what the system wants you to do to keep you in prison, dead or broke. People wanna boycott stores, when they need to be boycotting Rick Ross, BET and Time Warner, etc. Ultimately, the problems in Chicago will be addressed the same way they always are; more cops, harsher laws, more money thrown at the problem, and there will be no change. There is no solution really.

You can't be serious man. You sound like Mitt Romney or somebody that doesn't understand whats going in on.  Reread what Red Mpls wrote a page ago.

Lets see I'm born into the world.  I don't know my father or he's in prison.  My mother does drugs, drinks, and I'm unsupervised all day.  I live in city where gang violence is serious.  I can either join or be on the "outside".  I go to a school that is overpopulated and barely has books and computers. I have no real role models in my life. 

But yes I'm supposed to raise myself to learn right from wrong, survive my environment, and go to college.  Is it possible? Yes.  Should that be the solution to changing America? Hell no.

 

[jordan23dotcom]

LOL at money and rich people being the solution. The problem is that there is no solution. a lot of those people don't want change or even work towards it.

 

[kaygee6]

JChambers: I can't sit here and debate with you about crime, the fact of the matter is people do not respect the police due to what my predecessors before me have done. If you come out to DC I will show you the light my friend. I aspire to become a commissioner/director one day and I will be damned if I lose control of the city. 

 

[powerballin]

As someone who lives in a high-violence community in Chicago and works with the youth that are in the streets, these are my views. First and foremost, the "root issue" is that society doesn't value the lives of the young people in these communities and they know it.

When they wake up in the morning and walk outside, their neighborhood literally looks like it's a war zone. Crumbling, boarded up buildings and unkempt vacant lots with three-foot high grass and discarded garbage make up more than half of their block.

When they get to school, they walk through metal detectors and have armed city police officers patrolling in their buildings daily. A lot of schools don't have basic amenities like enough books, copy paper, toilet tissue, etc. The walls haven't been painted in God knows how long. In some of these schools, one in three teachers are not in school on any given day.

When classes are over for the day, they have few if any after-school programs available at the school. Sports are available on an extremely limited basis as few sports are offered and few slots are available on each team. Some school literally have four sports teams - football, boys basketball, girls basketball, and cheerleading. There are no community centers available for them to spend the hours after school safely and in a constructive environment. The police line up outside the school, often on horses and sometimes with police canines, when the final bell rings and clear the school grounds as if every student were involved in a plot to start a riot.

They go home and there's barely enough food in the house and little in the way of nutritious food because it costs too much, there isn't a grocery store for miles, and their mom doesn't have a car. Their apartment is dilapidated due to overuse and landlord neglect throughout the decades. They may have roaches and mice or an occasional rat because the city fails to properly maintain the vacant lots on either side of their building.

Their mother works but barely has enough to make ends meet. No jobs exist in their community so the mother has to take two buses and a train to get to and from work everyday. In fact, few of the adults in the community are regularly employed. And of those that are, all are barely making it. They know that there really is no place for them in the national (or global for that matter) economy. Even service sector jobs are being automated and putting even the most menial workers out of jobs.

Their interactions with mainstream institutions is essentially limited to school and law enforcement. Their experiences with both of these institutions are stressful and dehumanizing.

People are killed and incarcerated with regularity in their community and among their friends and family. These outcomes are much more normal than getting a college degree and a great career. In fact, they don't really know anyone personally who has graduated from college and is doing great.

At the same time, they know that their experience is not normal. It's not how every young person has to live. It's not how most young people live. But because they're Black and poor or Latino and poor it's how they have to live.

Thus, aside from maybe their parents (which can be powerful, don't get me wrong) and maybe a teacher they like, their entire existence screams at them that they do not matter. That they are considered expendable to society at best and parasitic at worst.

WHY WOULD THEY FEEL ANY DIFFERENTLY ABOUT THEMSELVES THAN WHAT THEIR EXPERIENCES IN SOCIETY HAVE TRAINED THEM TO THINK? Why would they properly value the lives of those around them when they don't value their own life because they feel they have nothing to live for other than some semblance of respect on their block and being treated as a martyr for the hood when they're dead?

It's truly amazing that these issues aren't much bigger...

I'll quote this again.

 

[DCAllAfrican]

LOL at money and rich people being the solution. The problem is that there is no solution. a lot of those people don't want change or even work towards it.

I don't think they DON'T want change, I don't think they even understand that there CAN be a change.

They know their world and how their world operates. Many don't even understand that there is another neighborhood outside of their own.

So I can't agree that they don't want to change.

 

[jordan23dotcom]

I don't think they DON'T want change, I don't think they even understand that there CAN be a change.

They know their world and how their world operates. Many don't even understand that there is another neighborhood outside of their own.

So I can't agree that they don't want to change.

I see what you're saying. Looking at your SN I'm assuming that you're from DC also, I've lived in the south east side for 18 years and from my experience everyone smart got out, and lazy people living off the government and people who loved "the streets" (for lack of a better way to describe it) stayed. I don't think they're oblivious that a better life is out there, I think they'd rather just not try

 

[DCAllAfrican]

Seriously though, some folks in the hood don't believe that there is room enough for THEM to suceed in this world. They don't understand that athletics and music aren't the only ways out. They just don't get it man.

 

[rellireloaded]

LOL at money and rich people being the solution. The problem is that there is no solution. a lot of those people don't want change or even work towards it.

How would you know what they want  They're a product of knowing what they know since birth with little to no exposure to anything outside of what they've seen in there communities. 

 

[jordan23dotcom]

Seriously though, some folks in the hood don't believe that there is room enough for THEM to suceed in this world. They don't understand that athletics and music aren't the only ways out. They just don't get it man.

LOL yes! I feel like its either all or nothing with them guys. I still have boys that still think their music careers are a week away from popping off. When I tell them that I have a degree, own a house, car, and have a 9-5, they laugh at me... talking about I gave up.... The hell?