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Criminilization of Latino Identity |
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Written by Xiuhcoatl
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Nov 19, 2005 at 08:12 PM |
The Criminalization of the Latino Identity Makes Fighting Gangs That Much Harder
Written by David E. Hayes-Bautista and Gregory Rodriguez
Submitted by Tejan0
Lately, many Californians have been lamenting "there
goes the neighborhood" over the prospect of an increasingly Latino
state. Images of streets overrun by menacing gangbangers with shaved
heads, tattoos and baggy pants are their worst nightmare. News and the
entertainment media have reinforced these anxieties by seemingly
adhering to an unwritten rule that the only Latino stories worth
telling are about troubled youths or the people who strive to steer
them straight. One local-TV news program even handed out spray paint to
Latino youngsters in order to better catch them on videotape for
broadcast during "sweeps month." Having bought into the '60s
glorification of outlaws and criminalization of minority identities,
some Latino artists and intellectuals have depicted the cholo, the
Latino gang member, and his refusal to conform to society as heroic and
representative of the Latino American experience.
But too many
school therapists, teachers, activists, reporters, moviemakers and
others mistake gang culture for the larger Latino culture or view
Latino social ills as if they were either the norm or the natural
reaction to the Latino American predicament. Past and current incidents
of police brutality reinforce these misconceptions by buttressing the
idea that Latinos are either wildly overrepresented in the ranks of
criminals or disproportionately jailed by overzealous and racist cops,
judges and juries. Compounding this impression, many Latino
spokespersons are wont to run to the defense of hoodlums as if the
youngsters had no other choice but to break the law. Antisocial
behavior is exactly that, regardless of ethnicity.
Throughout,
the countless victims of these young men's crimes - members of a
strongly pro-law-and-order Latino population - are routinely forgotten.
Civil-rights lawyers and community activists don't stage protests or
hold news conferences when an 11-year old girl is shot in the back of
the head with an automatic weapon on her front porch.
There are
nine times more Latinos in California's colleges than there are in its
prisons and jails. An estimated 11% of Latino males aged 20 to 29 were
in the state's criminal-justice system-prison, jail, probation or
parole-in 1995, compared with 39% of African Americans and 5% of whites
in the same age group. James Q. Wilson, a crime scholar, suggests that
while he would expect higher overall rates of incarceration for
Latinos, because a greater proportion of the group's population is
young, poor and living in socially disorganized neighborhoods, he
suspects that if age and income are controlled, Latino rates would not
differ markedly from the norm.
Indeed, when controlling for
youth and income, the estimated rate of incarceration for the state's
Latinos is roughly equal to the state norm. At 34%, Latinos currently
make up the largest 'group of inmates in the state's prison system. But
they also comprise 36% of all 20 to 29-year-olds in the state, the age
group who commits the majority of all crimes. (Latinas have lower rates
of incarceration than either white or black females.)
Thirty-six
percent of those arrested in California in 1995 were Latino. The only
major felony category for which Latinos record above-average arrest
rates is driving offenses. For misdemeanors, Latinos have a
higher-than-average arrest rate for driving under the influence and for
gambling.
For the crimes of forgery, arson, drug offenses,
prostitution, assault and battery, lewd conduct and indecent exposure,
Latino rates are below average. For all major misdemeanors and
felonies, Latino rates remain average.
Anne Piehi, a professor
at Harvard University's Kennedy School of Government, has found that
Latino immigrants, most of whom are of Mexican origin, have lower rates
of incarceration than do the U.S.-born, Including native-born Latinos.
She also contends that although recent Latino immigrants may fit the
assumed demographic description of a criminally prone population
(youthful with high rates of poverty and low levels of education),
cities with dramatic Increases in the Latino immigrant population don't
experience higher-than-average increases in crime. According to the
California Department of Corrections, however, illegal immigrants are
overrepresented in the state's prison system. While the overall
undocumented-immigrant population usually mirrors the legal-immigrant
population in behavior and values, a large percentage of rootless,
single males among the undocumented may account for this aberration.
Another explanation is that because of their immigration status,
illegal immigrants are more likely to be sentenced to longer prison
sentences and have little chance of receiving probation once convicted
of a crime.
None of this, though, gets to the root of the real
crime that burdens lower-income Latino neighborhoods. The statistics
don't shade the fact that Latino gangs were responsible for a quarter
of all homicides in Los Angeles County last year. They don't soothe the
nerves of first-graders who sometimes are forced to hit the floors of
their classrooms because of gunfire outside.
The numbers do,
however, put Latino criminality in perspective. And such perspective
may go a long way toward combating gangs, the most serious Latino crime
problem.
Undoubtedly, alienation from mainstream culture plays a
role in the appeal of gang life. In addition, much of today's
mainstream American culture glorifies even fetishizes marginality,
particularly among non-Anglos. To a great extent, gangs are a
lamentable holdover from when Latinos were truly marginalized, when we'
were defined by our apposition to the mainstream. Gangs are the default
lifestyle for those who have fallen in the cracks between mainstream
Latino and Anglo cultures.
But now that Latinos have reached
critical mass in Southern California, they are holding onto their own
norms and values more than ever before. Being American no longer means
forsaking traditional ideals and bonds that give life meaning.
Reinforcing the strong family and religious ties, as well as the
healthy work ethic of the majority of Latinos, is essential to
containing the destructive, deviant behavior of the few. For any
community, two of the most important crime-fighting elements are its
residents' intolerance for anti-social behavior and its acknowledgment
of the successes of average youngsters. Unfortunately for Latinos,
rarely do normal youngsters see themselves in the policies that affect
them and in the portraits that fill the media. But there are plenty of
ads for the gang lifestyle.
Diana Chavez, a 21-year-old student
at Cal State L.A. who grew up in a housing project in Boyle Heights,
complains that throughout her youth, most programs, government and
private, and attention were aimed at gang members. Two years ago, she
helped form a group of similarly frustrated Latinos. They call
themselves The Chain of Strength, and their mission is to keep 'each
other on track and to recruit and support younger kids. "It was up to
us to make a change here," she says. "But because we were the 'others'
and not the gang members, we had to support each other on our own."
Effectively
combating Latino crime requires that both social institutions and the
media first decriminalize Latino identity. Our grim "Escape From'
L.A."-style visions of a Latinizing future are not only uncalled for
but dangerous.
David E. Hayes-Bautista and Gregory Rodriguez,
associate editors at Pacific News Service, are, respectively, executive
director of the Alta California Research Center and research fellow at
the Pepperdine Institute for Public Policy.
From the LA Times September 1996
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Last Updated ( Nov 28, 2005 at 01:20 AM )
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