Apparently Eagan isn't so safe.. (Minneapolis, Coon Rapids: middle-class, car insurance, crime)

[kurls]

I heard that Eagan was a nice place to live but apparently they have shootings too.

[Slig]

posting a link usually helps...

3 arrested after Eagan home is struck by gunfire

This doesn't change my opinion about Eagan. Just another case of suburban kids with nothing better to do. Maybe they're the same punks who smashed the windows on my car while I was living in Eagan. Thanks for contributing to increasing car insurance rates you jerks.

[Double]

It's funny how kids in the suburbs commit crime out of boredom, while kids in the city do it because they are born evil and want to hurt you. (sarcasm)

[Slig]

Originally Posted by Double

It's funny how kids in the suburbs commit crime out of boredom, while kids in the city do it because they are born evil and want to hurt you. (sarcasm)

I'm not suggesting that, I just think there isn't enough to do in most suburban areas which causes kids to get into more mischief. I grew up in Blaine, Coon Rapids and Ramsey so that basically described my childhood. If I grew up in the city I can guarantee you I would've done far less destructive things out of boredom.

[Clifford63]

Originally Posted by Slig

I'm not suggesting that, I just think there isn't enough to do in most suburban areas which causes kids to get into more mischief. I grew up in Blaine, Coon Rapids and Ramsey so that basically described my childhood. If I grew up in the city I can guarantee you I would've done far less destructive things out of boredom.

Boredom does lead to mischief sometimes, but I would not file gunshots under the category of mischief. Mischief would be more like TP treatment on somebody's trees, smashing up a yard troll or laying down a rubber patch in somebody's driveway.

[uptown_urbanist]

This reminds me of a shooting that happened when I was in high school or maybe a couple of years later - a group of white, middle-class kids mostly from SW Minneapolis ended up starting what I believe the police classified as a gang. They were involved in drugs, including, I think, selling it, and in the end a kid got shot. In the newspaper articles some of the parents were quoted as saying things along the lines of "gangs only exist in North Minneapolis," or "these aren't those kind of kids." Stuff like that. There was a problem for some people to accept that these kids had veered into dangerous (and deadly) criminal behavior. I don't remember the whole story, but I think it probably started as "mischief" and boredom and a desire to be "tough" but people didn't take it seriously because they were just a bunch of white boys from Fulton.

[cdubs3201]

I'm a product of the Eagan environment, and I can tell you some of the richest kids I went to school with got in trouble the most with police. Yeah they had a lot of drinking parties but a lot of kids do that. Same with TPing houses or Egging houses.

However, I remember it got beyond that to the point where my friends were stealing golf clubs or other valuables out of their neighbors garages. After the movie "fight club" came out, dozens of kids from my school were arrested for starting their own fight club at a nearby park. I also know a particular kid who was out bashing mailboxes with a baseball bat and wasn't paying attention and smashed his own head into a mailbox and was hospitalized for a month.

Now these kids could easily get this stuff by asking mom and dad for it, but for them it was more fun to "gank" it from other people. These spoiled kids also never saw any punishment from their parents. I feared my parents' wrath anytime I got caught doing something wrong, but I can't say the same about the friends I grew up with.

Reason #183 why I got out of there.

[cdubs3201]

Originally Posted by Slig

I'm not suggesting that, I just think there isn't enough to do in most suburban areas which causes kids to get into more mischief. I grew up in Blaine, Coon Rapids and Ramsey so that basically described my childhood. If I grew up in the city I can guarantee you I would've done far less destructive things out of boredom.

This isn't true either. I have cousins who are in their early teens who are living in Chicago, they are just as michievous as suburban kids. There's more around them to cause trouble with and they have more options of things to do, and they don't need a car to get there.

I think the "boredom" comes from our culture promoting "immediate gratification". Just hanging out with friends or playing sports at the park isn't enough anymore, they want more and feel they need more stimulation....constantly. Why are there all of a sudden more diagnosed ADD and ADHD cases in kids today than there were 20, 30, 40 years ago? Because they gotta have it and they gotta have it now, and parents today pretty much give them what they want.

[Ben Around]

Originally Posted by uptown_urbanist

In the newspaper articles some of the parents were quoted as saying things along the lines of "gangs only exist in North Minneapolis," or "these aren't those kind of kids." Stuff like that. There was a problem for some people to accept that these kids had veered into dangerous (and deadly) criminal behavior. I don't remember the whole story, but I think it probably started as "mischief" and boredom and a desire to be "tough" but people didn't take it seriously because they were just a bunch of white boys from Fulton.

Reminds me of the things small-town people say when a murder is committed in their community: "These things aren't supposed to happen here!"

[Slig]

Originally Posted by cdubs3201

This isn't true either. I have cousins who are in their early teens who are living in Chicago, they are just as michievous as suburban kids. There's more around them to cause trouble with and they have more options of things to do, and they don't need a car to get there.

I think the "boredom" comes from our culture promoting "immediate gratification". Just hanging out with friends or playing sports at the park isn't enough anymore, they want more and feel they need more stimulation....constantly. Why are there all of a sudden more diagnosed ADD and ADHD cases in kids today than there were 20, 30, 40 years ago? Because they gotta have it and they gotta have it now, and parents today pretty much give them what they want.

I guess the difference would be motive. My car windows have been smashed in Minneapolis and Eagan, but in Eagan it was just pure vandalism. They bashed the front and back windshield with a bat and shot through two other windows with a bb gun. In Minneapolis just the passenger side window was smashed and my stereo was ripped off.

One of these crimes was purely for profit, the other was apparently somebody with too much time on their hands and felt like breaking something.