According to the Daily Telegraph a spokesman for the Commission for Racial Equality (CRE) conceded that ‘fear of sounding prejudiced’ has discouraged frank discussion of black gang crime involving knives and guns. However, Home Office minister Baroness Scotland recently told the home affairs select committee: ‘We accept there is an increasing problem of the use of guns and we are trying to address it. We have not had any evidence that this issue is solely or disproportionately an issue for black young men.’
As a people we have become hyper-sensitive about race, but criticism of a phenomenon like gang culture can be race-related without being racially prejudiced. The guiding principle should be that everyone ought to be judged by their conduct, not their race. Black youths have been drawn disproportionately to gang life, but it’s not because they are black. The congregations of evangelical churches are also disproportionately black but that tendency too is not causally connected to race.
Despite saying that we should not pull our punches in dealing with knife crime because we fear false accusations of racial discrimination, the CRE statement was ambiguous. It went on to say that: ‘As a society we are failing young black kids’, thus implying that wrongdoing was not primarily a personal responsibility. But, as Tony Blair pointed out, most black youths are not gang members. They are, in truth, more likely to be the victims of gang criminality. There is no escape from personal responsibility.
Some neighbourhoods that suffer from teenage gangs are also home to churchgoing evangelical Christians who enjoy singing and dancing during church services. They made a choice. Gang members from the same streets made a different choice. Of course, local schools should be improved and plenty of youth activities provided, but in the short run gang crime is a police matter. Mr Blair is right to urge the police to identify, arrest and detain the ringleaders. They will not need to exceed their powers, gang leaders will be breaking the law several times a day. Without the gang leaders saner voices in the locality will have a chance of being listened to.
But it depends on the willingness of the police to stop being colour conscious and to start being colour blind by enforcing the law without fear or favour.