compared to the stereotypical frontier community portrayed in low budget western motion pictures, in which an outlaw gang effectively dictates the behavioral norms of the community. In the motion pictures, some brave marshal, after about an hour and a half, rescues the town, and dispatches the bad guys. There are, however, few such brave and effective marshal type heroes for urban neighborhoods plagued by extensive street gang activity. For the greater part, such neighborhoods effectively become war zones (Huff, 1990, pp. 188 206). The examples of communities successfully reclaiming their neighborhoods from street gangs are few in contemporary urban America (Huff, 1990, pp. 188 206).
The effects on families of the membership in a street gang of a family member tend to vary according the character of each specific family. Many families from which street gang members are drawn are dysfunctional at the time a family member joins a street gang (Huff, 1990, pp. 50 61, 161 175, 206). Often, the dysfunctional character of the family is a major motivation for joining a street gang (Bing, 1989, pp. 51 60; Taylor, 1990, pp. 32 39). Even in a dysfunctional family, street gang membership
by a family member is not a positive experience. The problems for the family stemming from street gang participation by one of its own members, however, is just one more in a veritable litany of serious problems, adverse events, and disruptions to stability which must be confronted by such a family.
Highly stable, functionally effective families seldom supply the troops for street gangs (Huff, 1990, pp. 50 61, 161 175, 206). When a member of such a family does participate in a street gang, however, the effect on the family tends to be devastating. Chaos replaces stability, and dysfunctionality begins to appear where it has not been previously experienced.
A strong interrelationship appears to exist between gang membership and the families of ...