"Gang bangin' is not a lifestyle; it's a deathstyle." -- Lil' Monster, former Eight Trey Crip.
Director Cle "Bone" Sloan, a now inactive member of the notorious Blood gang, makes a call for change within contemporary gang culture with his new film for HBO, Bastards of the Party. With heavy archival footage of African Americans throughout history, the documentary follows the migration of blacks from the south to the west and the formation of black neighborhoods and clubs in Southern Los Angeles.
As African Americans moved west in the late '40s and early '50s, the violence between white and black youths caused the first formation of gangs -- black youths banded together to fight off white gangs. Cle's interviews with historian Mike Davis, author of City of Quartz, provides a detailed historical background of early gang culture and the rise and fall of black political leaders during the '60s and '70s. For example, he explains, the rise of Crips and Blood gangs, the so-called bastard offspring of the Black Panther party of the 1960s, is a result from the demise of this radical group.
