It seems that I always have good intentions and no ability to follow up on them. My resolve to blog here daily is worn down by daily life. My laundry list of things that must be done (which often include the laundry) seems to stretch farther than the hours in my waking day.
Tonight is not really any different, except that I am waiting on B. to come to bed. He is playing Starcraft for at least ten more minutes. He is here while he attends a conference on gang violence. Talk about a scary subject. It seems almost impossible that the darkness and violence that has infected the large cities for years had stretched out into quiet of the mountains. It is sometimes hard to accept that the character of the Valley has changed so far. The question of balence between the prosperity of growth and the tranquility of sameness seems to have no answers. The only one that I can come up with is values. As a society, it seems, we no longer place any value on the morality that held sway only fifty (maybe less) years ago. God is scoffed at, ignored and actively maligned. The binding ties of family degrade and the concepts of responsibily and duty are cast off like so much debris.
So back to the gangs. It is a problem that I can't analyze, it is so incomprehesible to me. It seems like it is a play for instant grafication, and the unwilliness to work to achieve status. It also seems to hold central that fear equals respect. I will allow that my vantage point as a white middle class Mennonite woman I may not understand all the socilogical pulls playing on these typically teenage boys. However, it seems to me that the breakdown of the nuclear and extended family is a major player in the explosive growth of gangs.