London's Hidden War - The Untold Mental Health Crisis of Gang Violence Part 2

In part 2 of this video series we explore the toll of trauma and PTSD on the minds of people that are involved in, and have fallen victim to the drug wars and gang violence over the decades in London. This is a conversation that shines a light on a subject matter that is rarely spoken about in the mainstream media while offering solutions.

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Real change starts with people. It starts with us. At the AM to PM well-being service, we’re building a platform for grassroots action. When you like, share, and subscribe, you amplify our mission and help us empower communities to build a better future. This is how change happens. When people think of post-traumatic stress disorder, the first image that often comes to mind is a soldier returning from war, haunted by flashbacks, hyper alert to danger, plagued by nightmares, and unable to adjust to civilian life. This image is accurate but incomplete. In the streets of London, far from batfields overseas, another kind of veteran exists. The gang member, drug dealer, or street level hustler whose daily environment mimics a war zone in all but name. They too have seen comrades fallaced life or death decisions in seconds and lived in a state of constant threat. Yet, unlike military veterans, their trauma is rarely acknowledged, let alone treated. Instead, it fers in silence, shaping their behavior, decision-making, and emotional world in ways that keep the cycle of violence alive. PTSD in gang culture doesn’t come from a single traumatic event. It is often born from a long sequence of them. The term complex trauma describes this repeated exposure to life-threatening or deeply distressing situations, often beginning in childhood and continuing for years. A boy might first see violence at home, an abusive parent, a stabbing outside his block of flats, or a neighbor shot over a debt. By his early teens, he may already have been chased, robbed, or beaten. By his late teens, he could have lost friends to murder, been seriously injured himself, or participated in violence against others. This constant bombardment of fear, grief, and survival stress rewires the brain’s threat response systems, making hypervigilance and emotional numbing second nature. In both war zones and the streets, the ability to detect danger before it strikes can mean the difference between life and death. For gang members, this manifests in scanning every street corner, watching for unfamiliar faces, and checking exits in any enclosed space. The mind never rests. Loud bangs, even fireworks, can trigger instant fight orflight reactions. Sleep is shallow, often interrupted by nightmares. Over time, this constant adrenaline state exhausts the body and distorts reality. Threats are perceived everywhere, even when none exist, leading to paranoia and impulsive, often violent defensive actions. In some cases, flashbacks don’t just cause distress. They can trigger aggressive behavior if the person feels they are in immediate danger. Again, one of the most damaging coping mechanisms for trauma survivors in gang life is emotional numbing. To survive in an environment where violence is routine, many learn to shut down feelings of fear, sadness, or guilt. Tears are seen as weakness. Compassion is a liability. But this armor comes at a cost. Emotional detachment doesn’t switch off selectively. It dulls joy, love, and empathy as well. Relationships suffer. Families fracture and decisions become more callous. Killing or seriously injuring someone can be psychologically compartmentalized. But the numbness needed to do so eats away at the humanity of the person wearing it. In the military, survivors guilt is a wellocumented feature of PTSD. the feeling that one should have died instead of a comrade or should have been able to prevent their death. On the streets, this guilt is often just as heavy. It might come after surviving a shooting that killed a friend, being in the wrong place when a rival attacked, or encouraging someone into a situation that got them killed. Because the culture discourages open expression of grief, this guilt is rarely voiced and almost never resolved. Instead, it becomes a private burden, sometimes driving individuals deeper into violence as a way to mask the pain. Another feature often overlooked is the trauma that can come from committing violence. While some become desensitized, others are haunted by what they have done. The face of someone they stabbed, the sound of someone begging for their life, or the blood on their own hands can reappear in dreams or waking thoughts. This is complicated by the culture’s demand for bravado. Admitting distress over harming someone can be seen as weakness, leading to further suppression and internal turmoil. There is an argument supported by some trauma specialists that street violence can be more psychologically damaging than combat in war. Soldiers are trained, equipped, and supported, at least in theory, by a unit and a cause. Their deployment has an end date, and home is meant to be safe. For gang members, there is no end date. The battlefield is home, and there is no safe place to retreat. The enemy could be a neighbor, a former friend, or someone they pass in the local shop. The threat is personal, unpredictable, and endless. Perhaps the starkkest difference between military PTSD and street-based PTSD is the lack of recognition. A soldier can, at least in principle, seek help from veteran services, therapists, or peer support networks. A gang member fearing arrest or retaliation is unlikely to seek therapy. The stigma in their own circles often matches or exceeds the stigma in wider society. And when they do encounter the health care system, their symptoms may be misdiagnosed as personality disorders, depression, or simply aggression issues. Without acknowledging the root cause, trauma, complex trauma in the streets doesn’t die with the individual it is passed on. Children of traumatized parents inherit a worldview shaped by fear, distrust, and survivalism. A father who has seen friends die may teach his son to be suspicious of everyone, quick to defend himself, and unafraid to use violence. This generational transmission ensures that even those who never directly experience gang violence can carry its psychological imprint. In the episodes ahead, we will explore how this trauma manifests in specific experiences. The mental toll of killing and loss, the prison environment’s unique pressures, and the corrosive effect of constant threat from debts, kidnappings, and torture. But it must be understood from the outset, London’s gang wars are not just producing casualties in the morg. They are producing legions of walking wounded, carrying invisible injuries as debilitating as any shrapnel wound. Killing changes a person. It doesn’t matter whether it happens in a battlefield, a back alley, or a prison cell. Taking a life leaves an imprint on the psyche that cannot be undone. In London’s gang and drug wars, death is both a currency and a constant companion. Some will take lives to climb the ranks, settle debts, or send a message. Others will watch helplessly as friends, brothers, or childhood acquaintances bleed out in the street. Many will experience both sides of the coin, the perpetrator and the mourner. And it is this dual exposure that creates some of the deepest and most complex trauma imaginable. The moment of killing is often described by those who have done it as both unreal and hyperreal. Time slowing down while every sound, smell, and detail becomes etched in memory. For some, it is a blur, the result of adrenaline and panic. For others, it is coldly deliberate, carried out with calculation. But no matter the mindset at the time, the act itself can echo for years. The image of the victim’s eyes, the sound of their final breaths, or the weight of their body can intrude into thoughts and dreams unbidden and unwanted. Some cope by hardening themselves further, convincing their minds that the victim deserved it or that it was just business. Others drown the memory in alcohol, drugs, or reckless behavior, trying to bury the guilt beneath chaos. In gang culture, speaking openly about remorse is almost impossible. Admitting guilt or emotional distress can be seen as weakness and weakness invites danger. Many therefore suppress the feelings adopting a mask of indifference. The problem is that suppression is not the same as resolution. The emotions don’t vanish, they seep out in other ways. Sudden rage, paranoia, emotional numbness, or reckless disregard for one’s own life. Suppressed guilt can also lead to self-destructive patterns where the individual unconsciously seeks punishment, whether through dangerous behavior or by placing themselves in situations likely to lead to prison or death. Beyond PTSD, there is another layer to the psychological damage, moral injury. This occurs when a person acts or fails to act in a way that violates their own deeply held moral beliefs. Even in hardened gang members, there are often unspoken moral codes, lines that if crossed, leave a deeper wound. Killing someone known personally, killing in front of a child, or killing for reasons that feel dishonorable can all produce moral injury. Unlike PTSD, moral injury is less about fear and more about shame. A corrosive emotion that eats away at selfworth and can lead to depression, suicidal thoughts, and withdrawal from life. If killing leaves scars, so does losing people. And in the gang world, loss is frequent and often brutal. One week you might be laughing with a close friend, the next you’re standing over their coffin or hearing from a cellmate that they’ve been done in while you were inside. The violence is often sudden without time to prepare or say goodbye. This abruptness can leave the grieving process frozen, stuck in the disbelief stage. Many gang members attend multiple funerals before they are 20 years old with grief compounding on grief until it becomes a constant background presence. Survivors guilt is a heavy shadow. The questions it raises are relentless. Why did I live when he didn’t? Could I have done something different? Was it my fault for bringing him there? In some cases, the survivor may feel they should have been the target or that they owe a debt to the dead, a debt that can manifest as retaliation, further feeding the cycle of violence. In other cases, survivors guilt can drive withdrawal from gang life altogether. But the trauma remains unprocessed and unhealed. Gang culture often demands a response to loss. When a friend is killed, the expectation is not to seek therapy, but to seek revenge. This transforms grief into fuel for violence, offering a full sense of closure. Retaliation may temporarily relieve feelings of helplessness, but it rarely brings peace. Instead, it exposes the individual to new trauma, either as a victim or perpetrator, deepening the psychological damage. Even in mourning, there is no guarantee of safety. Funerals in gang circles can be tense affairs with rival crews watching or even attacking mourners. The presence of police, helicopters, and covert surveillance can make the event feel less like a moment of remembrance and more like a scene from a crime drama. The lack of safe spaces to grieve intensifies the trauma, forcing people to bottle up emotions they cannot safely express. Every killing sends shock waves through families and communities. A mother loses her son and carries grief that reshapes her entire life. Siblings lose a protector. A partner loses a future. Children lose a parent. These losses fracture families, increase financial strain, and create a climate of fear in entire neighborhoods. For those directly involved in gang life, this ripple effect is magnified. Their social networks are often tightly connected, meaning that each death resonates through multiple circles at once. Deaths in the gang world differ from natural losses in crucial ways. Violence and brutality make them more traumatic. Blame and revenge complicate the grieving process. Stigma means families and friends may not receive societal sympathy. Ongoing danger prevents safe mourning. This combination ensures that the grief is rarely clean or complete. It is messy, layered with anger, guilt, fear, and unresolved questions. Over time, those who have killed or lost people carry them like ghosts. They may appear in dreams, in flashes of memory, or in the quiet moments between chaos. Sometimes they are reminders of danger. Sometimes they are reminders of humanity, but they are always there. Without proper intervention, therapy, support groups, culturally sensitive trauma care, these ghosts become permanent residents in the mind, influencing choices, shaping relationships, and perpetuating the cycle of harm. In the next episode, we will step inside another arena of this hidden war, the prison system. There, the violence does not end. It mutates, sometimes intensifying, creating a unique environment where trauma is layered on top of trauma and mental health is pushed to its breaking point.

London’s Hidden War – The Untold Mental Health Crisis of Gang Violence Part 2