History of gangs, including historical facts about all gangs. The history of gangs website has history, facts and current news on: Blood Gangs, Crips Gangs, Greek Mafia, Hells Angels, Italian Mafia, Mafia Crips, Mafia of the 1920’s, Mexican Mafia, Mongols MC, New York Mafia, Outlaws MC, Russian Mafia and more. Bringing you all the goods on all the gangs.
Historical criminal gangs
A wide variety of historical gangs, such as the Muslim Assassins, Adam the Leper ’s gang, Indian Thugs, Chinese Triads, Japanese Yakuza, American Old West outlaw gangs and Italian Mafia crime families have existed for centuries. These early gangs were known for many criminal activities, but in most countries could not profit from drug trafficking prior to twentieth century drug prohibition laws such as the 1912 International Opium Convention and the 1919 Volstead Act. Gang involvement in drug trafficking increased during the 1970s and 1980s, but some gangs continue to have minimal involvement in the trade.
Classification
School-yard gangs and the dissimilarity between different gangs has prompted some officials to designate categories to classify gangs based on age, finances, criminal activities, and levels of sophistication. Sometimes these are referred to as “wannabes.” Gang activity can also account for some of the higher drop out rates in some public school systems.
Scavenger gangs are characteristically disorganized and often represent the least successful of all the types of gangs. Members of scavenger gangs may be low achievers, and may be prone to violent or erratic behavior. Because these gangs are not well organized, leadership of scavenger gangs may change frequently and without reason. Scavenger gangs often turn to low-level crime, usually committed spontaneously and without planning. If a scavenger gang can become more organized, it may be able to grow into a territorial gang.
Territorial gangs are typically more organized than scavenger gangs, but their primary purpose is still social. Some may sell drugs, but this is not a defining characteristic of the territorial gang. Territorial gangs will often use violent means to defend their territory; in some cases this helps the gang to bond and reinforces the social structures of the gang. Gang members may be attracted to territorial gangs because they have difficult home lives. Two examples of such gangs are the Bloods and the Crips.
Corporate gangs are highly organized conspiracies, constructed for the purpose of marketing drugs and gaining maximum profits. The symbolism and turfs that are significant to territorial and scavenger gangs are meaningless to corporate gangs. Members of corporate gangs are expected to follow a certain etiquette, and severe punishment can be expected for any faux pas. Leadership of a corporate gang requires a higher level of intelligence than other gangs, and bosses in these gangs will often be highly successful career criminals.
Notable gang members
Gang signs
Gangs often establish distinctive, characteristic identifiers including graffiti tags, colors, hand-signals, clothing, jewelry, hair styles, fingernails, slogans, signs such as the swastika, the noose, or the burning cross, flags for example the Confederate flag, secret greetings, slurs, or code words and other group-specific symbols associated with the gang’s common beliefs, rituals, and mythologies to define and differentiate themselves from rival groups and gangs. As an alternative language, hand-signals, symbols, and slurs in speech, graffiti, print, music, or other mediums communicate specific informational cues used to threaten, disparage, taunt, harass, intimidate, alarm, influence, or exact specific responses including obedience, submission, fear, or terror. One study focused on terrorism and symbols states: “… Symbolism is important because it plays a part in impelling the terrorist to act and then in defining the targets of their actions.” Displaying a gang sign, such as the noose, as a symbolic act can be construed as “… a threat to commit violence communicated with the intent to terrorize another, to cause evacuation of a building, or to cause serious public inconvenience, in reckless disregard of the risk of causing such terror or inconvenience…an offense against property or involving danger to another person that may include but is not limited to recklessly endangering another person, harassment, stalking, ethnic intimidation, and criminal mischief.”
Original article: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gang#Historical_criminal_gangs
