Posts by Rich Lock
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Named after the Biblical giants?
Yes, but I'm pretty sure it's 'as viewed through the filter of Irish mythology', in this particular case.
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The Magogs have a website, call themselves a "motorcyle club" and are kind of respectable. The Road Knights, not so much.
I do need to finess my last comment a little wrt 'all established gangs being criminals'.
It's not impossible that an independent group like the Magogs could have gone 'respectable' as the core members get older and less inclined towards hell-raising. However, claims like this do need to be examined closely. The HA have been running a sucessful PR campaign along these lines for decades - 'just a club for like-minded guys to get together and ride bikes. All that crime stuff is just nasty slurs from The Man'. Ya RLY.
If there's ever a serious bikie turf war between the majors down that way (not very likely, but it might happen), they'll either be patched-over by the winner or cease to exist.
The Road Knights are strongly rumoured to have a lot of connections with some very unpleasant people - the Harris gang in Chch and SI white power groups, for example.
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There are also the 'ethnic' gangs, such as the King Cobras, which formed primarily as vigilante self-defence groups (see also LA Bloods).
However they originally formed, the common factor between then and now for all the established gangs seems to be the gradual slide into organised crime as the more ruthless members realised they could get more power and money through crime than through some sort of 'brotherhood'. The less criminally-inclined members have mostly been squeezed out or 'retired'.
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edit button pls.
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I remember moving to a North Island town where I lived and worked near the local Mob house. It was plenty intimidating the first time I had them queuing up behind me in the dairy. But I figured that nobody who (a) queues, and (b) buys iceblocks for their kids on a hot day can be all bad, so I started acknowledging them with the universal "eyebrow flash" greeting when our paths crossed
Well, gang members are people, too. They're just not the sort of people that you and me want to associate with. Craig more or less nails it:
casual brutality, glorification of criminality, abuse of women, and utter disdain for the property and human dignity of 'outsiders'
As individuals, you might find them to be ok in casual encounters like the one you describe. But as a group, they need to be treated with extreme wariness.
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New Zealand gangs, formed within prison walls, for the most. And, the drug most causal to imprisonment was alcohol (crates and jugs).
Well, I guess it does depend which gang we're talking about. I think you're right about the provenance of NZ's own 'street' gangs (Mongrel Mob, Black Power).
However, the NZ Hells Angels have the dubious distinction of being the first chapter formed outside the US (back in around 1969-ish), when they (and the US mother chapter(s)) were far more oriented towards the street thug/hooligan end of the scale than the highly organised, large-scale franchise operations they are today.
NZ's other home grown 'bike' gangs (Magogs, Highway 61, Road Knights, etc) were more or less copying the (US) Hells Angels.
Over time, all these groups have evolved and 'purified' from pure street thuggery into nastier and more organised enterprises.
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On the origins of New Zealand gang culture. It was more a product of institutionalization than drinking crates of piss, wasn't it?
Can you elaborate a bit?
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Gangs in New Zealand are an unstudied mystery.
Actually, not.
Start with Bill Payne's 'Staunch'. Move on to 'The girls in the gang' by Greg Newbold and Glennis Dennehy. Have a chat to this guy. Finish up with 'True Red' by Tuhoe 'Bruno' Isaac.
That's just the NZ-specific stuff.
For gangs which are the NZ branch of the multinational franchise, there's:
Arthur Veno's: The Brotherhoods; Inside the Outlaw Motorcycle Clubs.
Ross Coulthart's: Dead Man Running (the Bandidos Motorcycle Gang).
Julian Sher and William Marsden: Angels of Death : Inside the Biker Gangs' Crime Empire".
Come back when you need some more :)
Almost certainly these gangs would contain some good strategic minds.They are outside the law in that they have made their own laws more important. And some of these gangs must be making some good dosh and others must just squeak along. How are they operating?
Drugs.
In the west, bike gangs are the main players in manufacture and distribution of methamphetamine/P. That's their speciality.
In the US, for example, the four main players (Hells Angels, Bandidos, Outlaws, Pagans), basically divvied up the US and Canada between them and eliminated any other group that threatened their turf.
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Re: gang patches.
Here's an analysis from someone who should know what he's talking about (scroll down to 'banning gang patches'). I'd guess he probably sits on the opposite side of the fence from most of us politically.
He's agin it. I can't really fault his analysis.
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She cannot wear her glasses at the moment, due to the bandages on her head
Probably time to buy her that monocle she's always wanted.
Yay for modern western socialised medicine.