I happened today to come across two media pieces dealing, at least tangentially, with the issue of gangs in Los Angeles. Gangs and related problems of crime and drugs are issues in virtually every major metropolitan area in the US, but LA seems to be the epicenter both in terms of incidence and as a barometer of how the country generally addresses the issue.
I’ll start with the good news. My friend David Wiltz is garnering still more media attention for the work that he has done with youth in LA. He and one of his former debaters were interviewed in this National Public Radio segment.
There are nearly two dozen urban debate leagues in the US, and I’m more familiar with some than with others, but everything I’ve seen suggests that few leagues do as good a job as LA has done to reach young people already in gangs or at high risk of getting involved with one. To some extent, this is simply a matter of necessity. Gangs are such an omnipresent part of urban life in LA that it would be nearly impossible to work with the populations Dave does without addressing the issue.
But I also know that in some leagues, and unfortunately I must count my own Boston Debate League among these, coaches and administrators have not done everything they could to reach out to these students who may ultimately have the most to gain from an activity like debate. The temptation, especially for young leagues and teams, is to start with the “naturals”, students who are already, responsible, high-achieving, engaged with their schoolwork, and generally on a relatively good track. There’s certainly nothing wrong with this, as these students deserve opportunities as much as anyone and will often still have college access difficulties for economic reasons or because even the best students at their schools simply do not receive an education that is on par with that provided to their competitiors from wealthier areas.
But debate has the power to change lives, to interest students in academic subjects in a way that school does not, to engage them in a way that traditional pedagogy does not, and to imbue them with a sense of confidence and power that they sorely need. I’ve seen many seemingly unlikely students take a remarkable interest in debate and change the trajectory of their lives because of it. I really admire the work that Dave has done to reach students most in need, and he’s a constant reminder to me of what I could and should be doing in Boston.
On the flip side of the coin, however, I also came across a New York Times article entitled “The Wrong Approach to Gangs” that argues,
“No city has failed to control its street gangs more spectacularly than Los Angeles. The region has six times as many gangs and double the number of gang members as a quarter-century ago, even after spending countless billions on the problem. But unless Congress changes course quickly, the policies that seem to have made the gang problem worse in Los Angeles could become enshrined as national doctrine in a so-called gang control bill making its way through both the House and Senate.”
LA is a paradigmatic example of a city that over-invests in heavy-handed and punitive responses to drug- and gang-related problems and under-invests in prevention and avoidance measures, including educational initiatives like the LAUDL. The willingness of policy-makers to write off people as young as 11 or 12 as irredeemably criminal is both heartbreaking and self-fulfilling. As my namesake Michel Foucault observed in Discipline and Punish, nothing breeds crime like prisons. Handing out prison sentences for petty offenses serves only to harden the offender, limit his access to legal employment, and connect him to other criminals.
It is beyond disheartening to see the federal government on the brink of replicating LA’s preference for punishment over prevention.