Thread by @ConorBronsdon

Ever wonder why the virulent panic over violent gangs of the late 80s and 90s has subsided?

It’s not because cops fixed the problem – it’s because it was a racist moral panic that was leveraged to increase police budgets and incarcerate people of color.

Here’s how 👇🧵

Yes, violence in cities was a problem - yet violent crime fell substantially in the 1990s while rhetoric ramped up.

Meanwhile, between 1989 and 1991 the FBI claimed the number of gangs increased threefold.

Their source? Surveys of cops - who gained $ from the supposed crisis.

There was also a massive increase in media coverage - in Las Vegas in 1983 there were 4 articles about gangs in local LV papers.

By 1991 there were 174 articles and cops were bringing media along to drug busts.

If you read the paper or watched TV, the Black people were coming.

What did this spike in gang coverage hinge on? The perfect story for racist dog whistles - the wrongfully accused Central Park 5; 5 young black kids accused of violently attacking a white woman in the center of NYC's media

Coverage of gangs exploded.
nytimes.com/2019/05/30/art…

Las Vegas's gang unit in 1986: "Area street gangs in addition to drug trafficking are also increasingly involved in burglary, vandalism, animal abuse, and satanism."

Complete fear-mongering - building supposed reliance on police, and increasing their funding. #DefundThePolice

Per the LA District Attorney, just 1 in 7 gang members in LA sold drugs more than once a month. However, suddenly they became the problem in our nonsensical drug war.

Meanwhile, corrupt gang units and police militarization are sucking up public funding.
bloomberg.com/news/articles/…

And oh yes, I REALLY mean corrupt - gang units have awarded plaques for killing or injuring suspects, mass arrested anyone in the vicinity of anybody they suspect, faking numbers, murdering, and more.

All to confront a problem that they're exacerbating.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rampart_s…

Police in Phoenix claimed there were 4,000 gang members in their city - while having just 12,000 minority youth.

Cops repeatedly counted people as members of multiple gangs and targeted youth - often forcing them to find groups for protection.

podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gan…

Gangs are purported to be both national syndicates, with massive organized drug distribution networks and also feral groups of young men bent on violence.

However, the origin of gangs is more about protecting your community from racism and the state than anything else.

The notorious CRIPs stood for Community Resources for Independent People.

It was formed out of the ashes of the Black Panther Party after law enforcement effectively destroyed them and assassinated their leadership - the CRIPs had a social program too.

socialistalternative.org/panther-black-…

Yet while white gangs such as Irish immigrants in the 1800s and early 1900s - or Fraternities on college campuses - end up making their way into local politics and business, Black people and other BIPOC have consistently been marginalized and targeted.

theatlantic.com/politics/archi…

By 1993, one survey said 89% of Americans felt gangs were a national crisis, giving cover for the passage of the horrific 1994 crime bill that targeted communities of color and fed the mass incarceration crisis we're experiencing.

aclu.org/blog/smart-jus…

Police have for decades sold a big lie - that violent young Black men are out to get you.

They've justified militarizing themselves, mass incarceration, drug prohibition, and massive increases in their funding - through racism.

We must #DefundThePolice/#AbolishThePolice.

I cannot recommend @RottenInDenmark & @Remember_Sarah's amazing podcast @yourewrongabout and their 2019 deep dive into the myths of gangs enough - check it out⬇️
podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/gan…