Chicago Violence

Chicago is a wonderful city that is known its massive tall buildings, creative festivals, and cultured environment but aside from those great characteristics; Chicago is also known for the violence within the surrounding communities. In a large city with a population that has over 3 million individuals, violence has been an ongoing issue within this diverse city. Many families lost children, family members and friends due to this outrageous violence. 2016 has been one of the worse years when discussing violence within the city, the number of killings are unbelievable. According to CNN has compared the city of Chicago to war zone because innocent people are getting killed due to the gun violence. There have been 616 homicides within the city of Chicago. CNN stated, “October closed with 78 killings, 353 shootings and 427 shooting victims, authorities said. Earlier this year, Chicago saw its deadliest month for gun violence in 20 years: Ninety people were killed in the city in August. By September, the city had more homicides than in all of 2015” (Zenteno, Rolando). The violence has become so out of control that the Mayor, Rahm Emanuel, is trying to control he violence by adding more Chicago police officers to patrol the streets of Chicago in order to try to prevent the violence, but that has not been successful. Everyday when you watch the news, there will be a story about the gun violence within these communities. Many individuals have tried to create solutions in order to lower the violence, but it only seems the violence is getting worse. Before these most recent years, the violence within Chicago use to be only on the west side and south side of Chicago, but now gangs are going to the nice parts of Chicago, Michigan avenue, and the north side completely drive byes’ killing innocent individuals who have no part of this violence. When comparing Chicago’s violence to other large cities, such as New York, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, there is no comparison, Chicago wins when it comes to the amount of individuals being murdered on a day-to-day basis. According to ABC news, this is the statistics of Chicago homicides compared to New York and Los Angeles, “The statistics on such slayings in Chicago are staggering. There were 316 homicides from January 1^st to June 30^th of this year. No other city cracked the 300s. The nation’s largest city, New York- which has a population about three times Chicago’s- had 161 homicides in the first half of this year. There were 244 homicides in Los Angeles area, according to numbers from the Los Angeles Police Department and Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department” (Shapiro, Emily). These statistics are obviously very alarming, and with that being said there has been talk about bringing in the National Guard to Chicago in order to lower these numbers. We need to do something about the violence, and we need to do something immediately. According to NEWSONE there are many options such has more jobs for youths, and strengthening gun laws. Which ever solution Chicago decides is the best one, needs to be put in place immediately. We as a city are tired of seeing innocent individuals crying over their children, family and friends. Something needs to be done, we need a solution.