Greg Scott, an Assistant Professor at DePaul who studies gangs, is interviewed about the recent uptick in violence in the city. And some fierce Uptowners strongly disagree with him in the comments section. Check it out here.UPDATE: Mary Schmich of the Tribune has a column based on her interview with Dr. Scott. As a UU commenter mentions, the Trib removed and shut down the comment board.
I am writing an extended response to this post because I think that the two comments from Uptown reveal that people are misunderstanding what Dr. Scott has to say.
ReplyDeleteAbout me: I am not Dr. Scott and I do not know him. Please take my word that I am highly qualified to evaluate his research and the comments he made in this interview. I deeply care about Uptown, I live here and I read this blog frequently. My only goal here is to try to further “translate” what he was saying because I am concerned that there will be two incorrect & inaccurate responses to this interview. 1) I suspect that Uptown’s “pro-Shiller” forces will misunderstand and misinterpret Dr. Scott’s comments in service of their own agenda as evidenced by how they abused the broken windows theory debate on her website. Be prepared. 2) Likewise, the comments on the WBEZ website suggest that people are so angry and afraid of the violence in Uptown that they will overlook the nuances of his comments. I believe that Dr. Scott has some useful information for both groups of people.
About Dr. Scott: Most of his research involves studying drug abusers, gang members and drug sellers on the west side of Chicago. However, that is just the area he does his research in. He has to know about gangs throughout Chicago, the region and the nation in order to do his work. He spends a lot of time in the neighborhoods in which he does his research, including: meeting with/interviewing/ “hanging with” the drug dealers; tapping into their gun and drug supply networks. He has also ridden around with beat cops to understand how they do their work.
Dr. Scott’s argument: When the police department says a crime was “gang-related” it is partly due to a sloppy classification system that inappropriately classifies too much crime as “gang-related”. This sloppy classification system exists because there are large incentives to the city and the police department to identify gang members and gang-related crime. Beat officers are heavily encouraged to fill out gang membership cards on people but there is no auditing system to check how accurate this really is. In short, police departments get resources (i.e., bullet-proof vests, extra money) when they can show that they are fighting a formidable gang problem. However, it only stands to reason that in neighborhoods with a % of gang members, many people will be friends with or be related to gang members (and be caught hanging out with them) but not actually be in the gang. Later, if that person commits a crime or is a victim of a crime in these highly violent neighborhoods, it may be called “gang-related” when it really wasn’t. He points out that this is a “logical fallacy”: we assume that membership in the gang was what caused the crime when in fact it may have had nothing to do with so-called membership. Why does over-representing the gang epidemic matter? Because we tend to want to think that "the gangs" are the root of all evil, are what is causing all of the problems and if only we could get rid of them then we would be better off.
However, our efforts to squash the gangs often end up backfiring on us. This happens because gangs have changed over the years and law enforcement tactics haven’t really caught up to the new structure of gangs and drug dealing. He says that now you have small groups of 8-12 people (often coming from rival gangs) who work together to sell drugs in their territory. Therefore, you are not really fighting massive gangs who by definition hate each other, you are fighting these small “drug crews”. Dr. Scott finds that when the police try to destabilize one or two of these “drug crews” it effects the organization of the turfs & street corner markets. And, as he says, “conflict ensues.” He says that “cohesion goes up dramatically after a crackdown…nothing is better for gang solidarity and cohesion than a good rivalry with the police.”
So what does he suggest? Dr. Scott does not make any specific law enforcement recommendations about how to deal with these “drug crews” other than to point out that destabilizing the network of territories tends to bring more violence. Clearly, better tactics need to be developed & our understanding of gangs needs to change with the times too. He ultimately suggests that the most beneficial thing would be to cut the supply of guns and drugs off at its head. He says that we are focusing on the symptom but not at all on the cause. He argues that we have got to be more aggressive on the downstate gun distributors who are supplying the innercity with the guns and the non-gang members who are financing the large quantities of drugs coming into the city. He claims part of the financing network includes people working in the financial district downtown. Obviously, these approaches are much longer term ones and are more difficult politically.
This has been a long post (!) so I will stop for now. Astute readers will pick up on the parts of Dr. Scott’s argument that Helen Shiller’s supporters will rally to. However we should not lose sight of the fact that more needs to be done to stop the violence and that we all have some learning to do so that we can demand workable solutions.
The first post by Dr. Who is a very fair summary of what Scott had to say. If you want to hear for youself, the interview is only seven minutes long and pretty interesting. The stuff he's saying is no great revelation. Of course the drug wholesalers are one of the roots of the problem, and I would not be surprised at all if it turned out the men behind it are rich white-collar types whose live on a plane far above "the street."
ReplyDeleteBUT, even if gangs are only a sympton, that is no reason to not fight them on a street level. And whether it's a gang or a drug crew, I have no problem with a police response that "merely moves" them to different turf (and away from mine). Sure, that's a selfish perspective, but if every block had a "not on my block" mentality towards this then there'd a far less attractive retail environment for the drugs in all corners of the city.
I posted on the WBEZ site, and agreed that there are some valid points made by Greg Scott. However, his message came across as arrogant to people who experience violence in their neighborhoods. Look at the reaction it caused. The Trib even closed down postings to respond to Dr. Scott's article.
ReplyDeleteThere are multiple causes for this violence and multiple solutions will be needed to resolve them. This is not a city that has done a good job on utilizing best practices to identify the causes of violence in inner city neighborhoods, nor has it done a good job of finding the solutions.
One solution grounded in best practices is neighbors getting to know their neighbors. The event this Saturday at Sunnyside Mall, along with the 3 other events, is certainly a positive step in the right direction to addressing the violence in our neighborhood.
I have no problem with a police response that "merely moves" them to different turf (and away from mine).
ReplyDeleteThis may be the most shocking statement I have read thus far on Uptown Update. We all complain that other areas of the city have pushed off crime to our neighborhood and now some of us are saying that we are willing to do the same and are no better?!!? As a city area, Uptown is pretty large. When y'all put in those cameras at Wilson and Sheridan it just pushed the problems northward to Lawrence and Sheridan. Pushing problems around doesn't solve them. Residents of Uptown should be the last community to advocate this approach!
Wow, way to take my "shocking statement" out of context. Try reading the sentence after it.
ReplyDeleteI agree that Dr. Scott's arguments are a bit hard to swallow when you are half a block away from where these shootings are occurring...but he's right in that there are other things that need to be done to make this problem better. The gun control issue is very important. Better management of CHA housing would be another step. But perhaps most important of all is that we need more programs for the kids that live in this neighborhood so that they can participate in positive activities and be off the streets. These programs need volunteers to run them. So if people are REALLY interested in making this a better, safer neighborhood, they need to get involved and spend some time with the kids - who knows, you might even be saving the life of a child who would have been caught in gunfire or recruited to sell drugs.
ReplyDeleteThe Trib article also had these quotes which seem applicable to what we have been discussing here in Uptown.
ReplyDelete"People who live in violent areas want police attention," he said, "but they don't want a police state, which is what police risk creating."
"They'll probably make a lot of arrests," he said. "Most of the arrests won't stick. Along the way, they've created animosity, which is what the gang thrives on."
Arrests are good! It tells the gang members that the cops/community are watching. The more the get arrested, even if it doesn't stick, makes them see that a particular area is bad for "business." The idea is to make ALL areas bad for business. Look, obviously you want all arrests to lead to conviction and preferably some time inside. But, I'll take an arrest. The irritation is causes is not a bad thing. Somebody might scream about civil liberties, and believe me when I say I'm very concerned bout our civil liberties right now, but a violation of the 4th Amendment on an arrest and cops torturing murder confessions and two very different things in my opinion.
ReplyDeleteThis goes along a bit with what Uptown Blue has said on other threads. They are concerned about how to do their jobs because Weiss and Daley and now on a bit of a witch hunt for dirty cops and are showing more interest in convictions than arrest rates. Arrests can have the SAME chilling effect on crime that convictions have. Safe neighborhoods and limited gang activity through the city should be the goal, not high conviction rates!
I too live on Magnolia and am an educator. I could not agree more with Educator on Magnolia's post about having "more programs for the kids that live in this neighborhood so that they can participate in positive activities and be off the streets." Couldn't have said it better. Educator, I don't know where you work, but if it is for CPS and in the neighborhoods I work in, it sure seems like a no-brainer to me. I would love to start something in our neighboorhood for kids during the summer. I have no idea how to go about it but would bewilling to collaborate with others.
ReplyDeleteto I don't have any idea how to do it. = like the nike ad says just do it - don't wait for one else - remember - the democrats mantra - it takes a village -
ReplyDeleteHas anyone notice since the democrats run the city, state, and congress, violence and social ills have gotten worse? we are getting what we paid for... democrats social policy. violence, drugs, and shooting... way to go democrats
I couldn't agree more with both of the educators comments. It is frustrating to see all of these social programs in our ward and none of it going towards the youth. If all of you can't see the oppression of our alderman's administration you're blind.
ReplyDeleteWhat kept me out of trouble was having a part time job in high school. I used the money to buy clothes and extra cash to do stuff with my friends. I didn't do drugs because I knew the value of money early on.
ReplyDeleteI am more apt to push for encouraging high school kids to work. The parks department, the schools, Alternatives, and the Boys & Girls Club offer tons of activities for the kids already.
Anon 12:30...you are blaming this all on the democrats?? I think a more accurate description of the problem is that government is usually less responsive and more corrupt when power is concentrated and when money talks. Clearly, the Daley administration and the Cook County Democrats have some explaining to do. But so did the Republicans at the state level and the federal level when they had a strangle-hold on offices at those levels. Making the argument that that it is all going to hell in a handbasket because we've now got democrats from federal government on down is quite a stretch.
ReplyDeleteNo matter who is in office, we would be doing a hell of a lot better if people would turn off their reality TV, start paying attention, start asking questions and start voting!!!
@ Educators and others interested, what about Kuumba Lynx? http://www.kuumbalynx.org/ They're on Beacon and Leland. Their program looks similar to Street-Level (www.street-level.org, the one in Humboldt park, not Uptown).
ReplyDeleteKuumba Lynx...teaching the "art" of graffiti to a whole new generation.
ReplyDeleteI wrote an initial response to Dr. Scott's interview and i am finding it amusing that as you read through the 15 comments we come back to political finger pointing. The bottom line is that sitting here doing nothing achieves a net result of nothing. the community needs to come together, bring all suggestions to the platform, and work in unity to HELP. I do not believe that the political finger pointing will be welcome on Saturday's gathering so if that is what this will turn into then leave me out. This is no place for Republicrats or Democans because a stray bullet has no political boundries nor does it have any racial descrimination. we will be armed with suggestions and are willing to share perspectives so we as a community can begin to be part of the solution. I stand by my original statements with regards to Dr. Scott and his interview. If an individual is associating with or involved in illegal activity they need to be held accountable. I am of the conviction that if Dr. Scott knows so much about the inner workings of drug use and gangs he should have the ability to ascertain a solution and be willing to work with these communities in education and what kinds of programs might best benefit these children. I think many of us want to help and it starts by all of us getting involved in the community gatherings. Dr Scotts finger pointing of the larger problem is just that without substantiated facts. If he had the facts then he should be working with the CPD that he so clearly appreciates in giving his knowledge to the powers that be. this is no problem to hand off to some other region of the city as it will just flow back and forth as it always has, but doing nothing is not the answer either. I am very much looking forward to the Sunnyside event on Saturday and will be bringing MY suggestions and what I can do to help. Hopefully those of you that chose to make this a "political thing" either just stay away or change your mind about what is most important. The safety of our community.
ReplyDeleteCould someone describe to me exactly what gun shots from father away sound like? I have been hearing periodic "pop pop pops" all afternoon (from 3 on). They are not rapid procession pops. It is more like a firecracker-like single pop and then another one a few minutes later. I am hearing this around Lawrence and Lakeside.
ReplyDeleteThanks.