When I was much younger, I heard NYC politicians saying how their violence problem was because of guns from outside the city....
After Washington DC banned possession of a loaded or even fully assembled handgun within DC, the district became the murder capitol of the US, eclipsing NYC, and Chicago in numbers of gun homicides annually. The mayor, and others blamed guns from Virginia, and Maryland, etc.
Now the mayor of Chicago is repeating the same tired cliché' , "its not US, it the guns from OUTSIDE!"
Now, I'm not a Chicago native, so I'll take your word for it, that gangs are a part of the culture, but I think that accepting the current level of violence and the bodycount as just part of the gang culture is a dodge.
Look at what went on during the gang wars of Prohibition. Rival gangs shot each other, and the cops, and actually took pains to see that they didn't shoot other people. Not only was it bad for business to do so, it was bad for their image.
Today's gang culture goes in just the opposite direction. They glorify their eagerness to kill, and make it a status symbol.
There is a cure for this, but our political system is reluctant to pay the cost. It is much, much cheaper to simply pass laws affecting only the law abiding, and claim victory, for a while, then, when the laws are ineffective at curing the problem, pass more laws that won't fix the problem, and claim victory, again.
The real problem is the elephant in the room no one talks about, except in terms of "mental health". We talk about the mental health of the mass shooters, and what to do, etc, but what we don't talk about is less dramatic and more deadly. It is not the type of guns (assault weapons are a red herring), its not the availability of guns, it is the willingness of people to pull the trigger.
Now, we have been glorifying "outlaw" behavior for a long time, from the cheap novels regaling us with tales of he outlaws of the Wild West, and later there was some admiration for some of the "motor bandit" outlaws, like Bonnie and Clyde, but these things were primarily in the abstract for regular people. Like the weekly serial at the movie theater, it was escapist entertainment, not a way of life to emulate.
That's changed now. One of the many. many changes in our society since those earlier days. Some of those changes have been for the better, for all of us. Some, apparently have not.
Why do we feel some places are "sanctuaries" for crime? Because we see so many repeat offenders it seems that they are not being punished.
After Washington DC banned possession of a loaded or even fully assembled handgun within DC, the district became the murder capitol of the US, eclipsing NYC, and Chicago in numbers of gun homicides annually. The mayor, and others blamed guns from Virginia, and Maryland, etc.
Now the mayor of Chicago is repeating the same tired cliché' , "its not US, it the guns from OUTSIDE!"
Now, I'm not a Chicago native, so I'll take your word for it, that gangs are a part of the culture, but I think that accepting the current level of violence and the bodycount as just part of the gang culture is a dodge.
Look at what went on during the gang wars of Prohibition. Rival gangs shot each other, and the cops, and actually took pains to see that they didn't shoot other people. Not only was it bad for business to do so, it was bad for their image.
Today's gang culture goes in just the opposite direction. They glorify their eagerness to kill, and make it a status symbol.
There is a cure for this, but our political system is reluctant to pay the cost. It is much, much cheaper to simply pass laws affecting only the law abiding, and claim victory, for a while, then, when the laws are ineffective at curing the problem, pass more laws that won't fix the problem, and claim victory, again.
The real problem is the elephant in the room no one talks about, except in terms of "mental health". We talk about the mental health of the mass shooters, and what to do, etc, but what we don't talk about is less dramatic and more deadly. It is not the type of guns (assault weapons are a red herring), its not the availability of guns, it is the willingness of people to pull the trigger.
Now, we have been glorifying "outlaw" behavior for a long time, from the cheap novels regaling us with tales of he outlaws of the Wild West, and later there was some admiration for some of the "motor bandit" outlaws, like Bonnie and Clyde, but these things were primarily in the abstract for regular people. Like the weekly serial at the movie theater, it was escapist entertainment, not a way of life to emulate.
That's changed now. One of the many. many changes in our society since those earlier days. Some of those changes have been for the better, for all of us. Some, apparently have not.
Why do we feel some places are "sanctuaries" for crime? Because we see so many repeat offenders it seems that they are not being punished.