DC Shootings

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

jsteele wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Is there anything in this city that cannot be blamed on gentrification? Or are we simply using it to scapegoat and not look for other answers?

I don't think this is what posters in this thread have been doing. Obviously any sort of major social and demographic change in a city is going to have a number of impacts -- both positive and negative. Whether those changes are "blamed" or "given credit" for the results is obviously subjective. Connecting an outcome to its cause is more of an explanation than the assignment of credit or blame.

A discussion of policy changes aimed at addressing long-term inequities would be an interesting topic for another thread, but it is really not the purpose of this one. I am more interested in the specific causes of the increased shootings that DC has been experiencing. Certainly a lack of daycare 20 years ago could have contributed, but I doubt it was an important instigator in the specific events.

@JSteele has nailed the problem with this city. Everybody is so enamored with trying to solve today's problem instead of sitting down and trying to lay out roadwork for a brighter future. Planning for the future is hard which is why nobody wants to do it. It is far more satisfying to sit around and admire the problem today.

Daycare does not take 20 years to solve stress. (That is a short sighted view) It removes stress instantly as parents and siblings do not have to make the choice between working or the safe caring for their kids.

I have responded a coupe of times in this thread and I don't want you to think I am trying to be argumentative, I simply refuse to believe that this is not a SOLVEABLE problem. We simply as a city have decided that it is too hard to solve. I could show you studies (meaningless as none of them are really borne from execution, but that is what academics is) after study that link child rearing to teenage stability, success in school etc. I think that the Mayor's extended family leave is a great step, but it is a step she took only to put her name out there on the national stage.

Forget the national stage, let's do this for OUR city.

So, at the end of the day, why has the gun violence picked up this year. Interesting question, we could admire it for days and write a few PhD papers on it and we still would not agree with the proximate cause because we all see things differently (ban guns, but the guns are already illegal...). Or...now here is the tricky part, we can sit down and map out a solution for the next decade. Will it be expensive, maybe, I don't know, but if there is one thing this city has money for in spades it is useless social programs (needle exchange vans that don't exist etc). So let's create an auditable and actually useful service for those who need it most. And if it takes a year to start getting data back, who cares.

Bravo. I believe there is a direct correlation between the level of social safety nets a community / city / country provides and the level of violent crime. You never hear about daily gun battles in Scandinavian countries.

[Anonymous]

It’s complicated....

Stop and frisk is a short term solution that causes long term problems.

What Dc is experiencing is the stopping of “stop and frisk” without putting things in place to fix the problems it creates.


Jobs... when jobs are down murders are up

We have a whole generation of kids that know 1 or more friends that have died... been murdered. They have B experienced trauma and receive no counseling for it except some lame counselor at school the week of the death. Plus most are being raised by people that also experienced trauma. We need serious trauma therapy in the US. 75% of addicts experienced trauma.

The revolving door created by parole. Petty crimes put good kids in a cycle that leads to more and bigger crimes. Rich kids get a hood lawyer, get off snd the street is expunged. Poor kids get a record..., When people are on parole they can’t get jobs and they run from cops. They have no path out of the cycle of prison.

Using cops to treat addiction... drug court works but failing at drug court should end in rehab not jail.

Rape... 1 in 6 males, 1 in 4 girls... untreated trauma.

I could go on

[Anonymous]

I just stay in my little bubble so I don't have to worry about these issues.

[Anonymous]

One solution would be to treat violent crime like the mental illness it is. Forget the arrest-release cycle. Involuntarily commit offenders to mental institutions, where they can be medicated and monitored 24/7. Building an asylum system would go a long way toward fighting a LOT of urban ills, from homelessness to people whose brain chemistry tells them that a drive-by shooting is a valid conflict resolution skill.

[Anonymous]

Here is one fact that I find relevant to this conversation: the average household income for white families in DC is nearly $150K while for black families it is under $68K.

https://www.dchealthmatters.org/demographicdata?id=130951§ionId=936

And I don’t have a source for this, but I would bet a large percentage of black families are DC natives while most white families are transplants. Generations of black kids have seen outsiders come into their city and prosper while they struggle. I think the gentrification argument has some weight.

Also, the halfway-legalization of pot hasn’t helped. I know at least some shootings have occurred around pot pop-up markets where there is a lot of cash and therefore guns. If these markets were in legal storefronts you would hope the potential for violence would be lower.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:One solution would be to treat violent crime like the mental illness it is. Forget the arrest-release cycle. Involuntarily commit offenders to mental institutions, where they can be medicated and monitored 24/7. Building an asylum system would go a long way toward fighting a LOT of urban ills, from homelessness to people whose brain chemistry tells them that a drive-by shooting is a valid conflict resolution skill.

This is pretty Orwellian.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:One solution would be to treat violent crime like the mental illness it is. Forget the arrest-release cycle. Involuntarily commit offenders to mental institutions, where they can be medicated and monitored 24/7. Building an asylum system would go a long way toward fighting a LOT of urban ills, from homelessness to people whose brain chemistry tells them that a drive-by shooting is a valid conflict resolution skill.

This is pretty Orwellian.

I'm okay with that. We can give it a nice double-speak name like Stress-Relief Retreat.

[Anonymous]

I blame social media. They see these rappers and entertainers doing so well, they think they can do the same by scamming, yes scamming. They use CPN to access goods and services to buy the latest designer clothes. It’s who can outshine the next person to who has this or that. It’s jealousy at the end of the day.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:(same poster) OR, stand back and let everyone murder each other. It tends to be contained with a little spillover. Sorry, but that's the truth. I worked with this crowd (who one one are promising, intelligent, adorable etc.) and most of their life altering (meaning ending) crimes were aimed at each other.

This is a sad, hard truth. I wonder if people seem to care more about it now because we are seeing a bit more “spillover”

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Here is one fact that I find relevant to this conversation: the average household income for white families in DC is nearly $150K while for black families it is under $68K.

https://www.dchealthmatters.org/demographicdata?id=130951§ionId=936

And I don’t have a source for this, but I would bet a large percentage of black families are DC natives while most white families are transplants. Generations of black kids have seen outsiders come into their city and prosper while they struggle. I think the gentrification argument has some weight.

Also, the halfway-legalization of pot hasn’t helped. I know at least some shootings have occurred around pot pop-up markets where there is a lot of cash and therefore guns. If these markets were in legal storefronts you would hope the potential for violence would be lower.

Funny, when I worked extensively with extremely poor DC black youth ( have you?) Very few's radius was off their non-gentrified block. There were DC teenagers who had never, ever been to the National Mall. They did not know, nor give one shit about, "white families moving in" . Try again.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is one fact that I find relevant to this conversation: the average household income for white families in DC is nearly $150K while for black families it is under $68K.

https://www.dchealthmatters.org/demographicdata?id=130951§ionId=936

And I don’t have a source for this, but I would bet a large percentage of black families are DC natives while most white families are transplants. Generations of black kids have seen outsiders come into their city and prosper while they struggle. I think the gentrification argument has some weight.

Also, the halfway-legalization of pot hasn’t helped. I know at least some shootings have occurred around pot pop-up markets where there is a lot of cash and therefore guns. If these markets were in legal storefronts you would hope the potential for violence would be lower.

Funny, when I worked extensively with extremely poor DC black youth ( have you?) Very few's radius was off their non-gentrified block. There were DC teenagers who had never, ever been to the National Mall. They did not know, nor give one shit about, "white families moving in" . Try again.

what were their hopes and dreams? It seems inevitable that some percentage of boys who have no other options for hope and achievements will turn to crime. I’m positive my teenage brothers would have been those boys in other circumstances. Humans want belonging, excitement, challenge. You deprive healthy adolsescent boys and young of productive ways to use their testosterone, crime is inevitable.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is one fact that I find relevant to this conversation: the average household income for white families in DC is nearly $150K while for black families it is under $68K.

https://www.dchealthmatters.org/demographicdata?id=130951§ionId=936

And I don’t have a source for this, but I would bet a large percentage of black families are DC natives while most white families are transplants. Generations of black kids have seen outsiders come into their city and prosper while they struggle. I think the gentrification argument has some weight.

Also, the halfway-legalization of pot hasn’t helped. I know at least some shootings have occurred around pot pop-up markets where there is a lot of cash and therefore guns. If these markets were in legal storefronts you would hope the potential for violence would be lower.

Funny, when I worked extensively with extremely poor DC black youth ( have you?) Very few's radius was off their non-gentrified block. There were DC teenagers who had never, ever been to the National Mall[b]. They did not know, nor give one shit about, "white families moving in" . Try again.

How so? Every DC school took kids to the National Mall for field trips. I’m a graduate the DCPS and we went too often. I currently have two kids in the system and of who graduated on 2018 and they’ve been several times as well. I find that statement hard to believe.

[Anonymous]

*Pp here, excuse my typos and it’s no reflection of the school system, haha as I’m sure some snark is forthcoming.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is one fact that I find relevant to this conversation: the average household income for white families in DC is nearly $150K while for black families it is under $68K.

https://www.dchealthmatters.org/demographicdata?id=130951§ionId=936

And I don’t have a source for this, but I would bet a large percentage of black families are DC natives while most white families are transplants. Generations of black kids have seen outsiders come into their city and prosper while they struggle. I think the gentrification argument has some weight.

Also, the halfway-legalization of pot hasn’t helped. I know at least some shootings have occurred around pot pop-up markets where there is a lot of cash and therefore guns. If these markets were in legal storefronts you would hope the potential for violence would be lower.

Funny, when I worked extensively with extremely poor DC black youth ( have you?) Very few's radius was off their non-gentrified block. There were DC teenagers who had never, ever been to the National Mall[b]. They did not know, nor give one shit about, "white families moving in" . Try again.

How so? Every DC school took kids to the National Mall for field trips. I’m a graduate the DCPS and we went too often. I currently have two kids in the system and of who graduated on 2018 and they’ve been several times as well. I find that statement hard to believe.

Most of my students had dropped out of school and read at a 5th /6th grade level. Maybe they skipped the field trips. Downtown DC was not theor "comfort zone". The corner and the carry out were. Thats where the action was, thats where they lived. White people moving in might as well be space aliens.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Here is one fact that I find relevant to this conversation: the average household income for white families in DC is nearly $150K while for black families it is under $68K.

https://www.dchealthmatters.org/demographicdata?id=130951§ionId=936

And I don’t have a source for this, but I would bet a large percentage of black families are DC natives while most white families are transplants. Generations of black kids have seen outsiders come into their city and prosper while they struggle. I think the gentrification argument has some weight.

Also, the halfway-legalization of pot hasn’t helped. I know at least some shootings have occurred around pot pop-up markets where there is a lot of cash and therefore guns. If these markets were in legal storefronts you would hope the potential for violence would be lower.

Funny, when I worked extensively with extremely poor DC black youth ( have you?) Very few's radius was off their non-gentrified block. There were DC teenagers who had never, ever been to the National Mall. They did not know, nor give one shit about, "white families moving in" . Try again.

what were their hopes and dreams? It seems inevitable that some percentage of boys who have no other options for hope and achievements will turn to crime. I’m positive my teenage brothers would have been those boys in other circumstances. Humans want belonging, excitement, challenge. You deprive healthy adolsescent boys and young of productive ways to use their testosterone, crime is inevitable.

They wanted "respect", whatever that is. Fame/fortune (maybe through rap music, easy money)..Instant gratification (a smoke, a snack, nice shoes, new "do" (the boys were as vain as the girls) a laugh). They loved their friends and their grandparents. Parents were sort of amorphous. They otherwise had trust issues, tho they theoretically wanted love, safety and when they werent being fatalistic a future - but the skills gap to secure that was large. They weren't playing with a full deck of cards in terms of life skills or education. At least my students knew they had to close that gap, but the time/effort/demands could be very frustrating.