OK A Book About Criminals: The Gangs of New York

Never saw the movie ... surprised to see that Herbert Asbury wrote the book in 1927!


The author begins the book in the early 1800s, emphasizing the Five Points tenements and gangs as the cradle of NYC violence.  While it doesn't finish with West Side Story, it does document gangs and their leaders through the wars in Chinatown and especially the Civil War draft riots.

While my motive to reading about criminals was to find a commonality and individual flaws that predict violence, this book leads one to believe that all of the following contribute to crime:  poverty, tenements, lack of education, lack of opportunity and no urge to climb the social ladder; numbers of people in similar situations; corrupt politicians and police.

I really didn't read this to figure out how individual men and women chose a life of crime, but rather to see how New York City dealt with and weathered the curse of violence.

As I mentioned earlier, I cannot get enthused about someone's choice to be violent and disregard not only the law, but most of the standards of human decency.  As Darwin's book summarizes, certain human propensities are of course universal and to contrast that premise with Fox's, who is to say that there is a universal urge to correct this, as there are always the poor, uneducated, and people desiring money and fame.

How to minimize if not curtail mass violence?  Asbury to identify contributing factors:  crooked cops, politicians who used strong arm gang members to get out the vote; corporate leaders who paid thugs to break up unionization; judges who were paid to dismiss charges.  Human weeds will grow; we need better gardeners.