Will He Be A Criminal?

This is a question that I ask myself quite often of late. I'm talking bout my lil bro-he just turned 9, and to say the least I'm worried for him! His role model is my soon to be 23 year old brother-who's worked for about 3 days out of his adult life, has been arrested more times than I can remember, and has had 3 (i think) visits to jail for stupid shit. His girl is pregnant-and yep, he still has no job. He's always going on about he's looking to get a job and all this, but up till now, nothing. Obviously his criminal record doesn't help, but he's lacking the determination!

So anyways, back to my baby bro....he's soooo much like how my other brother was when he ws growing up: Very picky about food, puts tomato ketchup on EVERYTHING, and (here's where the conceren is) steals from the house. examples: My mum sent him to the shop to buy rice. She gave him £2 to buy a big enough bag to do for dinner that night. He comes home with the smallest bag - now bear in mind that currently there's 6 mouths to feed, that bag of rice wouldn't do. So anyways, my mum says to him 'why did you buy this one' he tells her there wasn't enough money for the bigger one. Now as it's a corner shop, the prices aren't really cheap, so my mum figures ok, well I'll do potatoes as well. She asks for the change, and my bro gives it up. My mum counts, then recounts.....yep-money's missing. She asks my bro where the rest of the money is, he claims that's all the money that he was given. So he's been short changed right? Wrong! My bro took some of the money to buy bubble gum-which is the reason WHY he didnt have enough money to buy the bigger bag of rice. My mum tells him off - so when I start talking to him, I ask him why he took the money. He says he didn't. We go back and forth, and then I eventually say, ok, well since you've been shortchanged, let's go back to the shop to get the rest of the money then. He then admits the truth. I try and talk to him on a level-you know, find out why he took the money with out asking...he has no answers for me.

He has done this a few times-taking change that's not his to spend on sweets and crap. The other day I sent him to go and get my phone outta my bag-he ate all the sweets that I had in there, and just yesterday he was sitting in my mum's room eating the chocolate out of the bag-without asking. When confronted, he acts like he's done nothing wrong. I said to my mum 'he's gonna be a thief when he grows up' (not that I'm tryna wash my mouth on him or nothing) and she was like 'yeah I know'. That response got me-I thought, ok you can see the traits of my other brother, and you're not gonna try and so something to try and prevent him turning the same?

See, I've tried to talk to my brother. You know, I've told him you know that he needs to get a good education to get a good job-his response ' N (my other bro) didn't! N has a street name. my bro calls him self 'younger *N's street name*. He doesn't understand that he will face many obstacles in his life, and being armed with a good education and determination will help him get somewhere. His school as referred him to this behavioural scheme thing-his teacher has referred him as he's been identified as 'a child that has anti-social tendencies' (my words). I was abit angry when he came home with the letter, cos it's like, right so cos he's a black boy, he clearly fits the stereotype for being anti-social. But as I read the leaflet, I now see that it may be good for him. I mean prevention is better than cure right?

Back in the day, he was a very angry little boy. I told my mum that she needed to find out why he was so angry-it fell on deaf ears. I have tried to talk to my little brother-but I honestly think it's a situation where he's seeing if mum isn't telling me this-why the heck are you? And I'm not saying that he's lacking attention, but honestly, the only real attention he gets from my mum is when he's getting told off by my mum for fighting with my sister. But no one can tell my mum nothing-she's not tryna hear it. I've said try and have 1 on 1 time with each of the younger kids (there's 3), but she's not hearing me. I mean, me and my mum don't have the greatest of relationships, but i'm at an age where I don't feel like I need the attention from my mum-most definately not as much as the younger kids do.

Ok, so I've rambled a bit, but ultimately what I'm tryna say is that, the fact that my mum can see my baby bro 'becoming' my other brother, he's said he's gonna smoke weed, he's not gonna go college-all because it's what he's seen his 'role model' do, surely you gotta sit up and take notice? Honestly, my lil bro has no positive black male role models in his life-his dad's a punk, and my brother - well, what more can I say? I just get the impression sometimes that my mum isn't tryna steer him in the right direction. He's only 9-he's not a lost cause you know?? But as I said, I can't tell my mum nothing, cos she ain't tryna hear me. And yes, I know it's hard being a parent, tryna raise boys (in particular)- but I mean, at what point do you give up encouraging your child to be good??

*This probably makes zero sense-i've just typed as I've thought, and now I can't be bothered to re-read and edit*