Talk:Gangs in the United States

Girl gang members
As part of a class project, I aim to widen the scope of this topic to include women associated with gangs. Street gangs comprised solely of girls have been documented and studied since the 1980’s, as has female membership in mixed-gender gangs (Moore & Hagedorn, 2001, https://www.ncjrs.gov/pdffiles1/ojjdp/186159.pdf). Under “Gang types,” I intend to add a “Girl Gangs” heading, where I will briefly address the structure and history of such groups. Additionally, I will devote an entire article to this topic which I will link to the heading I am adding. The full article will discuss many of the aspects of girl gang culture that have been addressed in the existing work on gangs, including demographics and history. It will also define the various types of girl gang member involvement, including original girl gangs, gangs that mirror existing male gangs, and female membership in male gangs. I also plan to address aspects of girl gangs that separate them from their male counterparts, including factors that lead to joining a gang, longterm effects of gang involvement, and incidence of domestic and sexual violence amongst female gang members. In addition to the suggestions above, I will add some data on the involvement of women in gangs under “Gang Demographics”. It should be minimal addition and include information on how many females are involved in gangs, what gender ratios exist in mixed-gender gangs, and what roles female gang members typically serve. Please pass along any suggestions you may have for how to improve my content and any aspects of girl gang culture you feel I have missed.

Hhoover42 (talk) 20:36, 3 October 2014 (UTC)

22nd century
"Street gangs in the United States date to the early 22nd century." Was this written by a time traveler? AnimalCrackerr (talk) 01:41, 27 January 2012 (UTC)

Check out my page Humm56700 (talk) 16:49, 17 September 2016 (UTC)

Evil Baby Deer?
Is this a joke? Admiral Norton (talk) 18:48, 20 January 2008 (UTC)

Is this proven or conjecture?
"As gang-violence accelerated, so too did police violence against African-American communities, which culminated in the arrest of Rodney King" was the police violence only agianst African-American Communities and not the Hispanic communities making up 47% of the gangs? How about this is this a proven fact? "As police continued to jail black youths in seeking to destroy the Black Panther Party" or this "The increasing social isolation felt by African-American communities across the nation continued unabated in the 1980's and 90's, leading to higher rates of social pathologies, including violence." I say slanted, bias, someone trying to make a point not enlighten. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Slantedmonkey (talk • contribs) 21:28, 15 April 2010 (UTC) fo show my bro —Preceding unsigned comment added by 12.186.2.189 (talk) 23:29, 10 October 2010 (UTC)

Updates regarding America's original gang history
This article overlooked the Italian, Asian and Irish mobs/gangs well before "African-American" gangs, although some are briefly mentioned later in the article. I see alot of articles giving blacks "credit" &/or notoriety for things they did not start/create. This is yet another example of how it mostly relates to African-Americans (especially the intro) and not Irish/Italian-Americans (original street gangs). Even movies have depicted early gangs well before the 20th/21st century ones. I am fixing it, in an effort to keep it from being too biased. Adding these examples will make it more neutral...


 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_mafia
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/American_mafia#Usage_of_the_term_Mafia
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_mafia
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gangster
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gangster#United_States_and_Canada
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang#History
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cowboy
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cowboy#Negative_associations
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gunfighter
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Social_bandits
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Outlaw#Popular_usage
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Al_Capone
 * http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jesse_James

Above articles are some/most of the sources I used for the "Original Gangsters" section. Done! 64.134.11.153 (talk) 12:31, 30 August 2012 (UTC)

External links modified
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External links modified
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Duplicate References
The Eurogang Paradox by Malcolm W Klein is both 26 and 57, can someone fix this? Houdinipeter (talk) 16:16, 22 September 2016 (UTC)

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External links modified
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 * Added archive https://web.archive.org/web/20090805025050/http://stripes.com/07/feb07/gangs/ncis_gangs.pdf to http://stripes.com/07/feb07/gangs/ncis_gangs.pdf

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Efforts by Gangs to Legitimize
This article is missing positive activities of gangs and efforts by gangs to go legitimate. See, for example: I also have in mind Philippe Bourgois' In Search of Respect: Selling Crack in El Barrio, which describes the largely failed efforts of a drug dealer to engage in legal businesses, which suggests to me that this is a common phenomena. Daask (talk) 10:36, 1 February 2019 (UTC)
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Almighty_Vice_Lord_Nation&oldid=880991581#CVLN,_Inc.
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Latin_Kings_(gang)&oldid=880712168#Reformation:_1996%E2%80%931999
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Latin_Kings_(gang)&oldid=880712168#Latin_Queens
 * https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Black_Guerrilla_Family&oldid=879878917#Baltimore_unrest
 * 2015_Baltimore_protests


 * This article is about criminal street gangs in the United States. In order to add information to this article about "positive" activities of gangs in the U.S., we need reliable sources directly discussing gangs in the U.S. An article about one gang or one drug dealer or multiple articles each about individual gangs doing various things someone might call "positive" cannot be used to support content in this article. Please see WP:SYN.


 * So, for example, I might find various articles about individual police officers who have been diagnosed with alopecia. Those articles are not sources to add a section to Police officer. Yes, some criminal street gangs certainly do some "good" things, much like some cops have alopecia. These are not significant aspects of gangs/cops, unless independent reliable sources discussing gangs in general (or cops in general) discuss that significant numbers of gangs (cops) are going "legitimate" (are losing their hair). - Sum mer PhD v2.0 20:43, 1 February 2019 (UTC)

Edit warring
The standard for including information in this article is verifiability, one of Wikipedia's pillars. What you know or think you know about gangs is irrelevant. Wikipedia articles are based on independent reliable sources.

If you think another gang is an ally or rival, do not add them unless you can cite an independent reliable source for the information. Unsourced changes will be reverted.

If you think a gang listed no longer exists but a reliable source lists them as an ally or rival, do not remove them. You will need to cite independent reliable sources for the change. Wikipedia articles are not meant to be a "current" snapshot of subjects. Obviously things change over time. Unsourced changes will be reverted.

If you thing dates, names, locations or anything else in the article is simply incorrect or out of date, you will need to explain changes. Unsourced/unexplained changes will be reverted. Merely asserting that you are right is meaningless. If the information is not sourced, you can use that as a reason to remove it. You cannot add unsourced info in its place. If information cites a reliable source, you will need to discuss the issue. - Sum mer PhD v2.0 22:47, 16 January 2019 (UTC)


 * This edit introduces several changes not supported by the source cited or otherwise explained. Additionally, the source cited is not obviously reliable for the changes made


 * The IP editor has been blocked for edit warring/proxy editing. - Sum mer PhD v2.0 00:48, 17 January 2019 (UTC)


 * The IP was blocked for editing from an open proxy, disruption, edit warring and personal attacks, initially for 31 hours, later upped to one week. I have reverted the edit per the discussion above and WP:BRD. - Sum mer PhD v2.0 04:47, 17 January 2019 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 154.126.213.253 (talk)

Reference no. 3
Ref 3 is quoted as a source many times throughout this page. The link is to the main FBI homepage, where even searching for the word 'gangs' does not provide any of the referenced material (or anything else to validate the site's inclusion as a source). Generally,the page contains too much conjecture and too few valid references. Some of the references and links do not match up with the points being made. Sadly, I read an essay (online) today which referenced some of the unproven conjecture from this page as fact. Now I've flagged the issue, I'll leave it those of you more knowledgeable on the topic to check\change as you see fit. Thanks — Preceding unsigned comment added by Codeye (talk • contribs) 23:40, July 28, 2019 (UTC)


 * Good catch on the link.


 * Cobweb links. The actual report cited in reference number 3 was and is a reliable source. The linked url was outdated. I have updated the location.


 * If you can be more specific as to what you feel is conjecture or unsourced, we can look at that next. - Sum mer PhD v2.0 19:23, 29 July 2019 (UTC)


 * Thanks for that. My issues were mainly related to the missing or inaccurate reference, IIRC. Your word regarding the veracity and suitability of the source material is more than good enough for me!

My heart sank when I read the essay I mentioned above, which was frankly terrible, then checked the reference he'd given (for this Wikipedia page), only to find his reference was actually correct, but the wiki source for the information wasn't! Your help in resolving that is very much appreciated. Thanks again. ....

Police gangs?
Was surprised to find zero coverage of police gangs here, despite it being linked from Los Angeles Sheriff's Department as that organization alone contains 18 known gangs. --Golbez (talk) 18:54, 16 November 2022 (UTC)

Wikipedia Ambassador Program course assignment
This article is the subject of an educational assignment at Rice University supported by the Wikipedia Ambassador Program&#32;during the 2014 Fall term. Further details are available on the course page.

The above message was substituted from by PrimeBOT (talk) on 16:16, 2 January 2023 (UTC)

Wiki Education assignment: This is America
— Assignment last updated by Llynn2 (talk) 17:36, 15 December 2023 (UTC)