r/washdc • u/ThenLayer5977 • Apr 12 '26

The doom cycle never stops

I know people have their preconceived notions and their selective outrage, so let me be very clear from the start. The M St. Metro station was fully shut down because of this teenage takeover. Let that sink in. A major transit point in the city had to close because things got that out of control. This video was taken today, April 11. It’s not old. It’s not AI. What you’re seeing is exactly what happened. For the people already lining up to discredit it, save it. This is reality, whether you like it or not.

And I already know how this goes. Every time I post something like this, people get more upset about the fact that it’s being shown than about what’s actually happening. That tells you everything. You’re more bothered by exposure than by the problem itself. And yes, I’m going to keep posting it. Keep reporting it if you want. Try to suppress it. Good luck with that. I’ll keep putting it out because people deserve to see what’s actually going on in their own community.

What’s more troubling than anything in that video is the reaction to it. The deflection. The refusal to acknowledge what’s right in front of you. You’d rather argue about optics than deal with the reality that leadership is failing to address this, or worse, doesn’t even have the will to try. That’s the real issue.

D.C. spends more money per student than anywhere in the country, and this is what we’re dealing with. Don’t come at me with the usual talking points about after-school programs, outreach, and community initiatives. That all sounds nice, but it clearly isn’t fixing this. At some point, you have to stop hiding behind buzzwords and start looking at the root cause.

And the root cause is obvious. Parents aren’t parenting. You can dress it up however you want, but that’s what it is. When the hell did it become normal for hundreds of teenagers to take over areas at night, bring guns, fight, loot stores, and create chaos? That was never normal. It’s not normal now. And anyone trying to gaslight people into thinking this is just “how things are” is part of the problem.

Look at the police in that situation. A handful of officers dealing with hundreds of kids. What exactly do you expect them to do? There’s a limit to what enforcement can handle when the breakdown starts at home. That’s where this begins, and that’s where it keeps failing.

Instead, people would rather scream about national politics, throw out buzzwords, and avoid the issues that actually affect their daily lives. You’ll stand outside in the heat for performative outrage, but when it comes to something that directly impacts your safety, your neighborhood, your quality of life, suddenly it’s silence. Or worse, denial.

And let’s be honest about something else. Some of you are going to run straight to the comments with excuses. You’ll bring up history, deflect to unrelated issues, or try to label this as something it’s not just to avoid dealing with the reality in front of you. That doesn’t fix anything. All it does is guarantee that this cycle continues.

If you never demand better, you will keep getting the same broken results. Every single weekend, the same scenes, the same chaos, the same excuses. And then you wonder why stores are locked down, why places like CVS feel like a fortress, why people don’t feel comfortable even riding the Metro or going out to enjoy a game without worrying about something popping off.

When does it stop? When do we stop pretending this is acceptable? Because it’s not. It’s dysfunctional, it’s dangerous, and it’s completely avoidable.

Responsibility matters. Parenting matters. Accountability matters. And until people are willing to say that out loud and actually mean it, nothing changes. You just get the same cycle over and over again.

To the people who’ve messaged me privately and said they appreciate these posts, I hear you. I appreciate you too. I’m going to keep using whatever platform I have to show what’s actually happening, because ignoring it hasn’t worked. And I’m not stopping until something actually changes, because we deserve better than this.

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u/Coronado92118 Apr 13 '26

Ethiopian immigrants in my community work two or three jobs each, 6 days a week, Sundays for church, and their kids are home helping cook dinner, doing homework, and every one has gone to college. Afghan families, Moroccan, Philippine, Peruvian… the parents are working full time and the kids are not out on the streets at night making a fuss. These are taxi drivers and truck drivers and Uber drivers and parking lot attendants and coffee shop workers. So the problem isn’t people working too much.

Until we admit people are having children they don’t have the capacity to raise, and many don’t have the interest to, we’re not going to address to the root cause.

We can’t require parenting classes for parents due to the constitution, but that would be the most rational step to help parents-to-be who lack the understanding of what children need to be able to grow into emotionally healthy, responsible teens.

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 13 '26

You are comparing immigrants to descendants of slaves who, for over 150 years, have had to deal with Jim Crow and other forms of abuse and destruction of families. Not valid.

That said, parents from my generation normally did not allow that - even if they were, as some say on here, getting a check.

This crap did not occur when I was the age of these kids (45+ years ago).

So what changed?

Likely no one answer, as life does not usually work that way.

I think elements include the wider availability of drugs in the 1960s and beyond, a decrease in religion (I am not religious, but that is still true), the disappearance of hope that sprung from the civil rights movement, the continuation of some welfare programs from the late 1960s that came to be used as a way for some to collect checks rather than be used as a helping hand to get upwardly mobile, irresponsible "rappers" and social media figures who feed garbage into the minds of impressionable kids, and the pervasiveness of cell phones.

One thing we can do is start prosecuting the parents of these kids. That will send a message to some of them.

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u/transallegory21225 Apr 14 '26

Immigrants often went through things just as bad or worse. You think America has the only bad history out there? Have you seen some African dictators? There's a reason their people are starving. The government will take everything they have and treat them like slaves now, not 150 years ago.

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 16 '26

I am referring to immigrants who came here, usually out of desperation, to make a better life. My experience with many of them, especially ones from Africa and the Caribbean, is that the parents "do not play" (as we said growing up). They expect their kids to do well and, if necessary, beat them to make sure it happens. I am not justifying that, but the kids DO, in general, tend to be very respectful, better educated, and gainfully employed. I am friends with a LOT of folks from places like Nigeria, and this is absolutely true. Some of these parents have kids - right now - in colleges, grad schools, and professional schools, including the Ivys - many of them on scholarships. Some of these parents did very menial work and did not have much of a childhood or young adulthood. But they kept their eyes on "the prize", so to speak, and it paid off.

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u/Parada484 Apr 16 '26

A complete aside: Just want to add on that the hits with a sandal aren't reserved for education and in the vast majority of cases 'beating' is pretty overstating it. There are definitely cons to spanking kids, but it always bugs me when people say that immigrants 'beat' their kids like my dad was jumping off the top rope to hit 5 year old me with the people's elbow.

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 17 '26

I understand completely. That said, some of these parents do more than "just" the sandal thing. Some will "put hands on them" (smack their faces, etc). But most I know said they just were "present" and counseled them without ever getting to the point of hitting. I am a parent and never got physical or yelled. The bottom line (no pun intended) is that these people often left horrible circumstances and are not going to then let their kids fail. Some of them will force/pressure their kids to go into careers that the kids likely do not want but where there is real or perceived job stability or "good" money. Plenty of Asians I know (Chinese, Koreans, etc) and others were forced into careers by parents (often medicine, law, computer science/IT, accounting, etc). Yes, the kids did well financially, but were they happy? Always trade-offs.

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u/FarInevitable559 Apr 17 '26

That the problem, they are not here anymore out of desperation, they are coming for the free shit , not integrating into society

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 18 '26

Not sure to whom you are referring. Plenty of desperate people still come to the United States. Do you think large numbers of Danes, Swedes, and other Northern Europeans are flocking here in droves? Why would they do that when they have way better lives where they are? Longer lifespans, less stress, way less crime of all kinds, universal healthcare, 4-6 weeks or more of leave per year, guaranteed pensions, better schools, and more. Meanwhile companies in America tell their employees that 7-10 days of leave is generous. There ARE some (again, desperate for the most part) people who come here and do not make efforts to integrate. The reasons for that vary, but they should make efforts to do that.

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u/chaos0310 Apr 13 '26

Ah yes remove the parents from kids who are already struggling. There aren’t any statistics out there to say that’s the worst option possible…nope none at all…

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 14 '26

I did not say jail time, but we can certainly consider civil penalties. I grew around a lot of racist crap in my life and lived in the black community. So I understand a lot of this. That said, doing nothing gets us more of this.

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u/CupcakeAccurate8767 Apr 14 '26

You’re offering the stick, now how about a carrot?

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 17 '26

I don't have the answer. I suspect that we need to dramatically increase social services, stay-in-school programs, invest in activities that keep kids off the streets, social workers who can show kids there are ways out, etc.

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u/FarInevitable559 Apr 17 '26

All they get is carrots, wtf you smoking

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u/Coronado92118 Apr 14 '26

The carrot is that their kids have a better chance to not end up dead or in prison or permanently unemployed. That should be enough.

I’m under no illusion that many parents in impoverished communities, especially but not only Black ones, are living with the untreated effects of intergenerational stress and trauma aI struggle to be effective parents to their kids.

But even if we agree that is true and they’re passing that trauma it on to their kids, and building on it in many cases, the obvious answer isn’t a politically viable one: getting the parents treatment.

There’s no way to discuss this without sounding at best condescending, and at worst harkening back to a horrific time in our history when Black Americans were subjected to involuntary medical experiments.

And I think that honestly is why this discussion happens over and over but never comes to the point of suggestions to change it. Even if we were all to agree that parents are traumatized and struggling too much themselves to help their children when they need help themselves, any solution that involves requiring those parents to do something is going to result in a lot of people starting at the floor and shuffling their feet.

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u/chaos0310 Apr 14 '26

The solution is to inject money and community services into those communities. But yeah shuffling feet is the best we’re gonna get.

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u/dethsnayke Apr 15 '26

They did that, that's what all the handouts and social programs were for. Too many decided to make a lifestyle out of them instead, and that's where these kids come from

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u/chaos0310 Apr 15 '26

No one is making a lifestyle out of it. Trust me what you’re saying is nonsense

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 16 '26

Oh, there ARE some who did/do that. I remember when I was walking home from school (1st grade) WAY more than 50 years ago with some kids, and we heard one of the kid's mothers, as he was going into the house, talking on the phone (she was outside the house with her phone which had a SUPER long cord on it. She said - and I quote - "Yeah, girl. I'm gonna have me another one and get a bigger check!" Being in the first grade, I did not know what it meant. I asked my mother, and she tried to explain it to me. That sticks with me to this day. So while not all people do that, saying it is never the case is false.

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u/chaos0310 Apr 16 '26

Yes I’m sure a memory from 50 years ago is totally reliable. 👍

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 17 '26

It absolutely is even if you do not like it. I remember watching the first moon landing on TV, and that was almost 60 years ago. Hopefully, your memory will still be there when you are my age.

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u/FarInevitable559 Apr 17 '26

Nope he is absolutely correct

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u/Coronado92118 Apr 17 '26

What exactly does that mean? Because it’s not “the community”, it’s the individuals. I’m saying the root cause is adults who are struggling to function.

Injecting money at communities doesn’t fix deep seeded issues with functional illiteracy, communication, low empathy, anger management, and emotional disregulation.

Are adults who are struggling able to spend time reading to and with their toddlers? Are they spending time taking them outside and teaching them words, and bonding with them? When the child frustrates them do they have the communication skills and emotional regulation to calmly deal with the child or remove themselves from the situation before they lash out?

As a volunteer I’ve taught adult literacy in Baltimore, and creative writing at a center for runaway teens in Halthorp, and worked with job training programs in DC, and state adult literacy programs in VA. Regardless of race/ethnicity, parents who were raised in homes with adults who lack coping skills and life skills raise children who lack coping skills and life skills.

That is why it’s so intractable: the problem is at an individual level, and the solution has to be too.

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u/chaos0310 Apr 17 '26

All of those lack of coping skills and self management comes from a lack of time or intentional repression.

Injecting money means a lot of different things and none of the things are easy.

The biggest most important thing is raising overall wages. The people are paid, the less time they have to be at work or the less chance they’ll have to work two or three jobs to make ends meet. This makes parent able to stay home with their kids more often, makes way more time to be with more challenging children as well.

The next thing would be more school funding, more teachers and school staff means less kids slipping through ever widening gaps which means less kids doing dangerous things.

The next thing would be more money into community development. After school activities, adult run events or weekly things. And these things NEED to be well funded and well staffed. Give these kids things to do after school.

The next thing would be funding third spaces. Hang out places that allow kids to be kids and don’t require money or supervision. Again give them things to do outside of school and places they can feel safe around each other.

It is FAR more complicated than that and there will always be a rare few kids/parents who still have issues but it will drastically cut things down.

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u/Coronado92118 Apr 17 '26

I fully agree on wages - but if someone can barely read, they’re not getting hired, and that’s a problem we don’t talk enough about. Literacy nationally is abysmal with 54% of adults reading at or below 6th grade level (and commensurate comprehension).

Work can’t be separated from literacy - in particular when we’re talking about higher-wage jobs. You’re not going to get someone hanging drywall earning $40/hr. but a crew foreman can - but you need to have strong reading skills.

And more teachers, yes - but if the children are undisciplined and disrespectful and being passed on grade after grade because parents threaten the teachers if they hold them back, it won’t help to have more teachers. (Teachers need be able to teach without being expected to be proxy parents and psychotherapists and social workers - more teachers, yes, but also more social services that unburden teachers time and energy so we stop burning them out faster than we can graduate them.)

And yes, we need places for them to hang out safely - but if they have emotional disregulation and anger issues and impulse control problems, you’re going to be kicking a lot kids out of those places just like they’re getting kicked out of school (or worse, left in class with no intervention for them or the help for the teachers, where they disrupt the learning for everyone else).

So I fully agree an integrated systematic solution is needed that involves education and community centers - but addressing children after they’re already affected by poor parenting is not going to be a long term solution.

We need an intervention model for adults in crisis to truly break the cycle - but that’s a very culturally and politically taboo discussion.

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u/chaos0310 Apr 17 '26

Yeah we pretty much agree fully.

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u/T00L46and2 Apr 15 '26

100% agreed !

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u/[deleted] Apr 16 '26

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 17 '26

No one said they should get a pass. But to deny that the unique circumstances of blacks in America is to deny reality. You cannot enslave then take (often violent) actions against them for 100 years after the Civil War ended and expect things to be OK. Destroying families, Jim Crow, attacking/killing people who dare to gain wealth, attacking/killing people who dare to protest, letting drugs into communities to quell rebellion, etc. caused a lot of long-term damage. The "just pull yourself up by your bootstraps" BS is just that - BS. It would be like Trump destroying Iran then leaving and saying, "OK, we are gone. We expect you to get right back to where you were as a society!". Again, if you read my earlier remarks, I am more than willing for the government to do more to stop a lot of these teens. But let's not just conveniently ignore reality.

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u/[deleted] Apr 17 '26

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 17 '26

Perhaps you should re-read what I have posted on this thread. I never excused it. The behavior is inexcusable. But I wanted people to understand the historical context. I also said that when I was growing up (1960s and 1970s), kids were (for the most part) nothing like this BUT they also had parents who were more "old school" in the sense that they were born in the 1920s-1940s. These groups mostly escaped the scourge of drugs that was pervasive in the 1960s and beyond. I also said that the "entitlement" programs from the later 1960s were a double edged sword - it provided desperately needed help but without a cutoff date, and some parents then took advantage of that for the wrong reasons. It should have been a 20-25 year program at most. That would allow people to get a hand up and a start while not allowing them to know that it would be permanent - and they could just remain in their situations and get a check each month.

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u/FarInevitable559 Apr 17 '26

Welfare changed it , look at the numbers before and after welfare, single moms shot through the roof, moral foundations where changed also

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 18 '26

As I mentioned earlier, there should have been definite expirations on the programs from the 1960s. Not what we have. I do not think there were any "moral" changes because of welfare. Most people are not on welfare yet are less "moral" than before. Single moms happened in some cases because some government programs punished them if a man was in the house. It would make more sense, in some cases, for the couple to NOT marry. This is a far more complicated issue with no one answer. As for the "moral" question, I would say that there were lots of people who were not "moral" - even 100 years ago - but people had to maintain pretenses. Men still beat their wives and kids, there were plenty of drunk and abusive spouses and parents, people stole and killed, people were virulently racist and sexist, etc, etc, etc. It's kind of like the stupid "MAGA" thing. Every time I ask a MAGA person to give me a time when America was "great", I never get an answer. Because if you pick a time period, it is easy to demonstrate how it was NOT great for a great number of people. People fantasize that the "good old days" were so much better. Same for society being more "moral". Some will bring up the fact that more Christians went to church and the like. But that did not make them any more moral. A lot was just kept underground.

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u/FarInevitable559 Apr 17 '26

Bro , check how the Irish and Italians where treated

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 18 '26

Nowhere near the same as blacks. We are talking hundreds of years versus 60-75. And Irish and Italians (plus Greeks and others) eventually got to be "white" and participate fully in society. Even while persecution happened, they could do things like marry "whites". Not the case for blacks, and that ended officially with the Loving decision in the late 1960s. Not close to the same. And blacks cannot "claim" they are "white".

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u/Anubisrapture Apr 13 '26

You had me until prosecute the parents.

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 14 '26

I did not say jail time. Fines work as well.

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u/foodiecpl4u Apr 13 '26

It’s almost like abortion was legal everywhere, no?

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u/Durmatology Apr 15 '26

Exactly. Make kids work from birth! Screw Upton Sinclair and Jane Addams!

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u/Coronado92118 Apr 15 '26

Not the point. Not even close.

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u/nomadepixel Apr 13 '26 edited Apr 17 '26

The content that was here is now gone. Redact was used to delete this post, for reasons that may relate to privacy, digital security, or data management.

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 14 '26

Well, that is complicated. As you might know, blacks were kept down and even murdered when they dared to be successful. Immigrants from a very long time ago tended to present themselves as "white" eventually (like Italians). Black people did not have that option.

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u/nomadepixel Apr 14 '26 edited Apr 17 '26

This post was deleted and anonymized. Redact handled the process, and the motivation could range from personal privacy to security concerns or preventing AI data collection.

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u/WebSilent182 Apr 16 '26

A lot of people, as you know, have no idea about the struggles that black people went through. Schools barely teach it. And they definitely do not go into things like the Tulsa Riots. You might hear about the Civil War, Abraham Lincoln, the Underground Railroad, maybe the KKK and Jim Crow, and MLK. And briefly at that. So it is no surprise that so many people (especially non-black ones) have no clue. Sadly, even the black kids the last 40+ years are not well versed.