Dogs’ Scrap Yard

Dogs’ scrap is the name young people call themselves in the hood where they live in projects situated in the near suburb of the French cities.

October27, 2005, Clichy-Sous-Bois situated in the near suburb North of Paris, Zyed 14 year-old and Bouna 16 year-old died electrocuted hiding and trying to escape a police patrol.

November 25, 2007, Villiers-Le-Bel situated in the near suburb South of Paris, Larami 15 year-old and Moushin 16 year-old died in a bike accident with a police car.

These two different events carry many similarities about the victims, the neighborhoods where it happened and the outcome. Following these events, despair it is what the youth from the hood felt.

The consequences are obvious but what are the causes?

In the background unfolds a national crisis, an economic crisis, a worldwide crisis even but for the youths of the hoods what difference does it make whatever the crisis is? Here nothing never change. There daily lives is always the same. In the hood, the finance never shows its face. The economy sounds like a foreign word and nobody has ever seen the effect of it. People have been living here for decades with nothing. The hood is the mirror of all political, social and economic failures. However, it is in these neighborhoods that the youngest and the liveliest French population live and it is also here that the population received the lesser help and where the level of education is the lowest.

It is not easy to access to the hood where gray walls, dirty sidewalk and burned cars make the decor. Coming here is to get into foreign territory. It is a different world. It is a mix of energy, tricks, games and violence.

Going there you might not feel welcome but it is more related to the language and the rules, which are different. To go, you need to be initiated because even a simple camera is not very welcome. But as time goes by they will adopt you and pay less and less attention to your presence.

Hopelessness brings inevitably desperation.