In trying to understand and control youth gangs, investigators and scholars have assembled
what amounts to anthropological studies of gang characteristics. Police files record everything from the face that the Crips in Los Angeles wear blue while rival Bloods wear red to intricate details of the Satanic rituals and grave desecrations committed by white gangs known as "atones" or "heavy metalers." These and other rituals make it clear that youth gangs ate fat more than mere social clubs or business organizations--they are highly developed subcultures.
The key determinant of gang's culture is the neighborhood, known bu blacks and Hispanic gangs members as "the' hood." Hispanic gangs, especially, identify strong with their "barrios," swatches of land often sandwiched between freeways and railroad tracks in which the same gang might have lived and fought for several generations.
The nature of the hood can make a difference in how police approach gang crime. Hispanic gangs that sell drugs ate more likely to consummate deals with friends and acquaintances inside selected shops, restaurants, or apartments, according to San Francisco gang researcher Dan Waldorf. Doing business this way requires police to have insider knowledge -- to know a gang's secret hand signals, for example. Black gangs, by contrast, usually make sales out in the open, often to strange, in front of housing projects or small stores.
A gang's name also reveals much. Names are often designed to inspire gear (as in New York's Savage Nomads), to boast about a gang's modus operandi (Miami's Mazda Boys steal Mazda cars) or to celebrate the gang's street or housing project (as in the Main Street Crips or the 11-Dwuce Hoovers in the neighborhood of 112th and Hoover Streets in Los Angles). In many cities, police seek to avoid publicizing the names of gangs because, as Boston police spokesman Scott Gillis said, "it gives them undue notoriety."
The dress codes and colors provide further evidence that gangs are determined to thrive in their own cultures -- gang members persist in wearing their distinctive colors even though it helps police keep track of them. Today's gang members frequently wear baggy Khaki pants riding low on the hips, patterns shaved into their heads, a single glove or earring, and shoelaces laced to one side or the other. They also have sport bandannas and colored rags hanging from their back pockets. Many have cigarette burns on their hands to signify courage, while other display knife cuts. Tattoos are popular with black gangs. Some members wear rapper-style. sunglasses and "cake cutter" combs with sharp metal tines.
Quite often they wear expensive sneakers (the BK on British Knights means "Blood Killer" to the Crips) Hats and jackets with the names of rival professional football teams have been known to provoke fights between gangs. Asian gangs ate known to color and spray their hair in bizarre styles, a disguise that can be altered quickly by the wind as their speeding car leaves the scene of crime.
Graffiti is thought to be the essence of gang membership, the essence of gang fear. For many gangs, the act of marketing graffiti is a declaration of control of a neighborhood. Defacing a rival gang's graffiti can provoke deadly retaliation. Common images in graffiti include pitchforks, guns, dollars signs, Profanity, and sometimes the name of a targeted shooting victim. Hispanic graffiti is characterized by stylized, three-dimensional or block lettering with serifs. Black graffiti, L. A. police say, has fewer flourishes.
Gang cultures can be highly ceremonial. Many gangs have daunting initiation rites that require an aspiring member to steal car, fight the gang's leaders, or participate in a drive-by shooting. Gang marriage ceremonies have also been recorded; one in New York City involved the sharing of blood from knife cuts and the pouring of a can of beer over the couple's heads.
A．they follow unwritten codes of behavior
B．their clothing symbolizes their values
C．they separate themselves from mainstream society
D．they adhere to Satanic laws
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