There are those who believe that gang members are animals, without conscience or moral values, and that gang members need to be locked up for the rest of their lives or, worse, killed on sight. To understand how a gang member thinks, one must look through the eyes of that person and see the world as they see it. Gang members want the same things out of life, however, they just do not know how to get them. Understanding how kids who are in gangs think requires you as the treatment provider to look inside yourself. Most admit that they desire success.  How each person describes success is different. Priests who sacrifice financially will say that they have obtained supreme success.

Others find success in farming and producing food.  Still others feel successful when they have made a big sale and have gained financially.

Generally, most people surveyed describe success as work that produces a benefit for humanity.

Success brings with it the respect of associates and co-workers as well as family and friends. Self-respect produces a well-grounded person that is having a good life. At least that is what most say they strive to achieve.

Most people learn to succeed by practicing successful behavior in elementary school. In middle school students have one or more subjects and one or more teachers they enjoy, which can lead to excellence in a certain subject matter. In high school the student feels even more success as various successful opportunities occur. When a child has at least one parent who is well grounded, who can teach them the value of success, the child will likely grow into a responsible and successful adult.

The hope is then that these successful adults will teach their children the lessons of success as well. This same process applies to gang members.

They are attempting to develop a sense of personal success.  They want the "respect" of their fellow gang members, their gang family, their gang friends. So, if membership in a gang is an attempt to find a place in society, to belong somewhere, how can the situation produce such mean-spirited and violent persons? Random acts of violence committed by today's teens are common Internet, newspaper, radio and television headlines. Being bad enhances a gang member's image. Failure becomes success. Gang members do not feel good about themselves, despite their claims of "no fear" or their fatalistic approach to life.

"When my times, it comes, ain't no big deal, you can't live forever." ~ Nick, age 11.

From my experience to date, I can also say that these young gang members are living a life based on lies.  As such, they create a false persona. The apparent lack of concern for the pain of others, the bravado, the bluster - all of it is a facade to hide their fear of becoming a failure.

Because the human mind will not tolerate repeated failure, a person must find a level of success to survive. Repeated failure will force anyone to begin to rationalize why they are failing. Failure often becomes the fault of another person or group. Typically gang members focus their failure of "the system".  Society is preventing them from their success; therefore they ignore the rules and create their own. We all associate with people who share similar beliefs. Gang members are no different. They begin to associate with others who share their view that failure within the system is success. They are psychologically forced and reinforced their distorted view of success. The gang member then becomes a person who believes that success comes through what most of us consider conventional failure. After continued failure, a gang member will begin to take pride in their ability to fail. Failing becomes a spectacular way of achieving success. Most kids who have trouble with self-esteem first show this difficulty in grades six and seven. Many parents miss the signs and signals during this period and allow the deterioration to continue beyond their ability to then correct the problem. As a result a then frustrated parent does not know how their child got to the point of being arrested or, worse shot in a drive-by shooting. I recommend that you, the treatment providers, open your minds and attempt to view the world through the eyes of these children in your care. Many treatment providers have difficulty with imagination because they work so hard at living in the real world. These kids are young, however, they are not stupid.

Counselors, parents, police officers,  teachers, or any adult authority figure is not likely to influence the average gang member. Adults are too busy looking for complicated reasons on why gangs exist. Gang members call these authority figures fools, and they see them as the failure in life and themselves as a successful person.  This is what they have to believe in order to feel successful. Treatment center staff assisting gang members need to understand that the gangs provide basic needs that the teen did not feel they were getting: a sense of belonging, family, independence, protection, security, social acceptance and success.  To assist teens who have been in gangs and are now in treatment, you must understand the world of gangsters and you must be willing to open your mind to their reality. Remember that belonging to a group, security, and success are all things we all strive to achieve. They are worthwhile goals. Although we do need to hold these teens accountable for their actions, we mist also redirect as many of these youth as we can. To effectively accomplish this task, you need to understand how this teen got on the wrong track. 

Dr. Dore Frances, Ph.D. travels throughout the country speaking to treatment center providers about families, teens and how to keep on top of what is needed today.