Les Enfants Terribles

"Children may or may not be blessing, but to create them and then fail them was surely a damnation"

Lois McMaster Bujold, "Barrayar", 1991


The above image is from City of God, basically showing a younger boy being initiated into the "gang". What you don't see are the two people he has infront of him, of which he has to shoot one. Those two were children, one his age the other younger. It's those children that I want to talk about. While drugs were being sold and a gang war was going on there was a group of young children who were basically living lawless. Raiding stores, robbing people and commiting any type of crime that they could. I have found a variation of them in the blocks surrounding my job. Two of them are the younger cousins of some of my clients. In regards to their family they are the ones everyone is waiting to see killed or arrested. The mother of those two (she has a total of 4 children) had a nervous breakdown not long ago. The situation is not unique and this is the problem. I see these boys all the time when they should be in school. I hear from their cousins and a friend of mine in the area their exploits. A rash of cars broken into. Homes broken into (a brand new Glock stolen from one), grown men beat down. All I can think is these are the children of the 90's. Families who don't know what to do with them. Schools that can't wait until they turn 16 so they can be dropped from roll. Cops building cases so the first time they are caught for a crime of circumstance they can be charged as adults and sent away. I have already posed the question what will the children of double aught buck be like ('00 don't mind my old miner terminology). I'm not sure I want to find out. I myself walk a thin line with these boys. I see them enough that we speak, but I don't trust them and would be willing to lay one out if it came to it. That's not really even my style, however, with each passing year it's not the rawness of young people that increase - it's the number of young people who are raw. I knew someone like them growing up, I didn't know 10...not until late middle/early high school. I used Les enfants terribles not because of the play or movie but from a video game. In Metal Gear Solid the phrase was coined from two clones produced from a great soldier who were taught to be the best. I wonder if in a sense it isn't almost the same type of situation. These cats are more advanced in several ways. They are willing to do more and have been through more than most people I knew coming up. They have less fear and less support. More people are willing to accept that they will be killed or go to jail. I can't help but believe that we are creating these "enfants terribles". They are in the proper environment to grow up into criminals and killers. They will probably end up having children as well, children who will be a step ahead in the same game. As we ponder our progress I see more regression. What's sad is that though I work in a field that's created to "help them", none of them are old enough for me to do anything for them. I have to wait a year for the oldest and 4 for the youngest. I can't help but think what difference a year will make.