Gangs on the Internet 402
mikesd81 writes "Apparently street gangs have gotten Web-savvy. Web Bangers are posting potentially incriminating photos and taunts on their websites. Police departments suddenly faced with gangs are looking for help on the gangs' own easy-to-find Web sites. The director of the National Gang Crime Research Center has stated "In order to understand any subculture, be it al-Qaida, witches, devil worshippers or gangs, you have to be able to know their own language.'
Knox said it's important for police to learn how to read between the lines on gang Web sites and blogs. Just as time on the streets has given gang investigators the ability to read the hieroglyphics of wall graffiti, time on the Web helps them understand arcane Web clues. Gang identifiers, such as tattoos, graffiti tags, colors and clothing often are embedded in each site."
On YouTube. (Score:2, Informative)
http://youtube.com/watch?v=bMJjIFZYq3I [youtube.com]
http://youtube.com/watch?v=bhNuETvjakw [youtube.com]
http://youtube.com/watch?v=w2G_PwKwK7Y [youtube.com]
Re:Al Queda, witches, devil worshippers, and gangs (Score:2, Informative)
Dial 100 for assistance (Score:2, Informative)
http://nickciske.com/tools/binary.php
Balmer!
Re:Al Queda, witches, devil worshippers, and gangs (Score:3, Informative)
On Sunday, Bush warned Americans that "this crusade, this war on terrorism, is going to take awhile." [crescentlife.com]I'll leave it up to you to decide whether Bush really does want a Christian war in the Middle East or whether he's just stupid and ignorant.
Re:those evil Wiccans (Score:1, Informative)
First of all, she murdered him because he was leaving her. It wasn't as part of a ritual.
Secondly, it doesn't say anywhere that she was a wiccan - just that he was.
Even if she is a wiccan, it's no different to the numerous christians who commit murder despite the 'thou shall not kill' commandment.
Re:They aren't career criminals (Score:1, Informative)
It's not because they can't afford to, it's because they can't budget and most are their own best customers.
You should read the referenced chapter in Freakonomics. It's based on studies and statistics and tracing the money flows, not anecdotes, and the conclusion is that most drug dealers at the street level don't make very much money because it's the next layer up that makes it all, allowing the street dealers to keep just enough to keep them interested.
Re:Al Queda, witches, devil worshippers, and gangs (Score:2, Informative)
While we're at it, every "pagan" I've ever met follows a fairly recently concocted hodgepodge of dozens of individual, mutually contradictory bits of pre-Christian religions, along with a healthy dose of made-up nonsense. "Wicca" dates back to the 1920s, at best.
So yeah, I look down on it.
Re:those evil Wiccans (Score:1, Informative)
Not to be pedantic (well, yes, to be pedantic), but 'Qaida' is a perfectly fine transliteration of the term. If you want to be a bit more precise, I'd use 'al-Qa'idah,' but 'al-Qaeda,' 'al-Qaida' and 'al-Qa'ida' are virtually standardized in Western usage. 'al-Quaeda' is an outlier, and I'm not sure what transliteration system was used to come up with it, if any. I have seen it in a number of British newspaper articles, but it's a definite minority opinion, and really should be disfavored.
In written Arabic, the term is 'qaf-'alif-'ayn-dal-ta' marbuta' (qa'dH, where the 'H' is unvoiced). In pronounciation, it's something like 'KHAA-(glottal stop+i)-dah', in which the first consonant is a strongly plosive and gutteral 'kh'. Since it's rather difficult to properly pronounce Arabic in conversational English (hell, it's difficult to pronounce Arabic at all, properly or improperly!), 'ka'ida' and 'kai-da' are close alternatives, with the first being closer. Pronounciations like 'kay-da,' 'kway-da,' 'key-da' and 'kwee-da' are right out.
In any case, please don't follow the NYT convention of capitalizing the definitive article; 'al-' is standard usage.
Damned witches.
-tWB
Re:those evil Wiccans (Score:3, Informative)
Re:How about acting dignified in the first place? (Score:2, Informative)