Slang: sometimes difficult to decipher.
Thomas Hawk/Flickr.
The relationship between street slang used by young people and secret codes deployed by gang members is not always straightforward.
South African President Cyril Ramaphosa at the launch of a national anti-gang unit in Cape Town.
GCIS
The law aimed at fighting gangs lacks the power to disrupt their activities.
Gavin McInnes speaks on stage with members of the Proud Boys.
Reuters/Andrew Kelly
Law enforcement’s historical tendency to treat crimes committed by white power groups as isolated incidents has allowed them to flourish.
Screenshot from Republican John Rose’s campaign ad ‘Build the Wall,’ which equates all immigration with the Salvadoran gang MS-13.
John Rose For Tennessee via YouTube
MS-13 is not the biggest or most violent gang in the US. But its grisly murders and Latino membership inflame Americans’ anxiety about immigration. GOP campaign ads stoke those fears to attack Democrats.
In a political world, where words are pregnant with moral meanings, language is not innocent of racist content. Here a young man walks in his neighbourhood in Mississauga, ON.
Steven Van/Unsplash
Toronto Mayor John Tory’s use of race-coded words to describe gun violence in Toronto, including “thugs, sewer rats and gangsters,” stokes racism and serves to justify policing Black communities.
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The policing of black British culture has a long history.
African-Australians protesting what they perceive as biased media coverage outside the Channel 7 studios in Melbourne last weekend.
Ellen Smith/AAP
The problem is the disproportionate amount of attention on the so-called African gang problem and the way these incidents are being reported.
Youth workers use a ‘window of opportunity’ to try and stop cycles of violence.
via shutterstock.com
Youth workers try to use a ‘window of opportunity’ to help young victims of violent crime get out of a cycle of violence.
The United Nations has called a new Trump administration policy of separating migrant families and detaining children ‘abuse.’
Reuters/Patrick Fallon
Trump hopes migrants won’t come if they know their children will be taken away. That grim logic ignores the inescapable dangers that drive thousands of Central Americans to flee their homes each year.
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Mental distress, addiction, debt, family dysfunction and abuse are all problems to be milked for profit.
Shutterstock.
When big data is used for police profiling and surveillance, it puts human rights on the line.
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Violence in UK schools is at record levels, but expelling pupils isn’t always the answer.
iDJ Photography/Flickr
Thousands of young people have got on their bikes to make a political statement in London’s streets. The government would do well to pay attention.
Tributes in Tottenham, London.
PA/Victoria Jones
The British government is not facing up to the serious challenges it faces.
Clampdown: gang members arrested in El Salvador in 2016.
Ericka Chavez/EPA
Young people in El Salvador are finding themselves caught up in the war between the gangs and the state.
Violent crime is a vicious cycle.
PA
Attacks can have a serious impact on mental health – and contribute to a disturbing negative cycle.
A Salvadoran man believed to be a member of the MS-13 gang as he is arrested.
AP Photo/Josh Reynolds
Trump’s plans to crack down on immigration could create the same conditions that led to MS-13’s birth and expansion.
Hundreds of small-scale miners are scraping out tiny quantities of increasingly precious gold in El Corpus, southern Honduras.
Edgard Garrido/Reuters
Are high levels of violence and displacement in Central America and Mexico caused by natural resource exploitation?
Violence in El Salvador is not perpetuated by the gangs alone.
Reuters/Jose Cabezas
El Salvador stands at the centre of the current refugee crisis in Central America. But gang violence is not the only reason why its people are fleeing their country.
A boy contemplates the guns handed in during an amnesty for gang members in Panama City. How do communities respond to violence?
InSight Crime
Many communities struggle with crime, violence and abuse, but they are not all the same. Those that look to local expertise for solutions offer hope in a world where success in preventing violence is rare.