- Oct 2015
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www.insightcrime.org www.insightcrime.org
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The gangs are the first suspects that come to mind. MS13 has been linked to rudimentary car bombs using grenades in the past. The simple booby-traps are set so the grenade's safety pin will be pulled as the victim opens a door or turns the vehicle's wheels.
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We ask him why a gang member would kill a 15-year-old girl. He speculates that it's because she didn't want to be someone's girlfriend or didn't want to do something for that gang. Is this normal, we ask? Does it happen to young women a lot? It happens every day, he says.
Girls are not safe and are just as much effected by the violence in El Salvador as are the male gang members. This leads to the idea that there is either the choice to join a gang or be at risk and have to isolate yourself from the world around you.
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- Sep 2015
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www.nytimes.com www.nytimes.com
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For the country to gain some traction against crime, gang members who want to leave the streets need to find another way to earn a living. The word for it here is re-insertion, which means a chance at a normal life. There are efforts to set up bakeries and chicken farms for former gang members, or to allocate street market stalls to their families.
Great initiatives are taking place in El Salvador to keep gang members off the streets and away from violence by providing anyone who was involved with gangs the opportunity to work and earn a living while contributing to society and their families.
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www.adamhinton.net www.adamhinton.net
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All they asked from me was to get them some fried chicken and chips for lunch. They were hungry and poor in communities that felt under siege from the state. For the brief time I was there this small community suffered two gang related deaths. These guys have little choice and their story needs to be told, for them and their communities.
Following up with the article from last week I thought sharing the work of Hinton would be appropriate to give an insight as to what he experienced first hand with the gang violence in El Salvador while staying with the community.
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www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com
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"Hinton wants to foreground the story of the civil war and the class conflict that still rages in El Salvador. He doesn’t present gangs as mindlessly violent; their violence springs from an impoverished, divided society."
Adam Hinton was welcomed by one of the most dangerous gangs in the world, MS-13, to photograph their community and learn about the reasons why gangs are unavoidable in their communities. Hinton through his photography and documenting of stories helps reveal that Salvadorians are normal people, like us, struggling everyday to survive.
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