Personal Perspective : The Price of Social Neglect: Too Many 3-Year-Olds Die

The death of a 3-year-old is always tragic. But Stephanie Kuhen’s slaying has sparked some ugly responses, which only add to the madness of violence in many of our communities.

I once lived in the area surrounding the “Avenues,” where Stephanie was killed and her brother was wounded after their parents made a wrong turn. I even stayed on Isabel Drive, where my compadre rented an apartment. I knew hard-working, law-abiding and caring families there. In fact, there are many decent and courageous young men and women in the gangs living in the area. I know, I’ve lived and worked among gang members for many years in both Los Angeles and Chicago. And nobody I know in and out of the gangs condones or accepts the death of children.

In fact, Latino gangs in Los Angeles County, for some two years now, have been governed by a no-drive-by decree. Other recent trucing and peace efforts, including among Crips and Bloods in South-Central L.A., have resulted in a drop in such incidents. In the San Fernando Valley alone, there was an estimated 70% decline in gang violence as a result of one of these efforts. Churches, schools, parents--even men and women within the prison system--have been active for peace (although judging from most media accounts, you wouldn’t know any of this was going on).

I visited many of L.A.’s streets when most of these accords and decrees began to take effect. I talked to gang members and other youth who felt relieved they could step outside their homes, hang out and not worry about whether they were going to get shot in a drive-by.

But some of these efforts have begun to fall away. Some gangs have removed themselves from the peace pacts. Law enforcement hasn’t helped, either. The recent targeting, under the RICO act, by the government of a major Latino prison organization, in which key players and shot-callers were arrested and/or removed from the main prison population, has resulted in more confusion in the streets and correctional facilities.

Younger, less experienced and less knowledgeable people are beginning to dictate a new level of violence. As a friend of mine who was active in some of the peace accords among the gangs recently wrote me, “Now there’s no one to stop the youngsters from killing each other, in other words, they took all the power off the streets, so you know what L.A. is going to turn into.”

At the same time, and most important, there are even fewer economic means for young people. Jobs are nonexistent or far too few to go around. Programs have been cut. Social services, drug rehabilitation and meaningful teen-targeted activities have been slashed (in Chicago, 90% of young people who need drug-treatment programs can’t find them). There are fewer options for decent work, for decent education, for getting out of the violence, the drugs and the despair.

But everything is connected. There are some in gated communities, many of whom have “escaped” the urban areas, who have not been neglected, who support cutting more government assistance to communities such as Cypress Park. But gangs exist because there is a vacuum. Where there are no true community-based rites of passage, where there are no meaningful initiation stages of growth, and where young men and women are forced to establish their own paths to purpose and power without guidance and knowledge from their elders, you will find the kind of violence and chaos we presently have in our streets.

I’ve seen too many deaths in my lifetime. Some 25 of my friends had been killed by the time I was 18, when I was in a Los Angeles-area gang some 20 years ago. I’ve lost family members and loved ones. This summer, two of our young leaders in the Chicago-based Youth Struggling for Survival, which I helped found, were killed. Yes, even gang members grieve.

But I’m beyond anger. I want solutions. I want a heart-felt respect and dialogue to answer Stephanie’s death. These aren’t “animals” who are killing each other; they are often God-fearing, family-oriented and intelligent young people. Many of them need help. But all they seem to get is more guns (vastly more deadly and sophisticated than 20 years ago), more drugs as a means to survive (in some cases, the only economic life going on in some neighborhoods), and then, when they make mistakes, they are written off and abandoned.

For decades, there have been many young people shot and killed in our streets, but most of them have been forgotten. It’s time that all our institutions, all our resources, were placed behind one child, any child, crying out.