Everyone was looking for trouble in Alcorcón last night. The ironically named “Parque de la Paz” (Park of Peace) was overrun with journalists waiting for chaos to break out; with a large deployment of police officers with batons at the ready; with residents of the neighbourhood holding placards against racism; and with neo-nazis sniffing for violence.

They were all waiting for a fight, a big fight, like the one that broke out last Saturday night in this south-western district of Madrid. Conflicting youth gangs had sparred late into the night, resulting in seven people wounded and nine arrested. The gangs, with names like “Dominicans Don’t Play”, or “Latin Kings”, define themselves along ethnic lines – although they aren’t exclusive like this, and Spaniards claim to be members of so-called South American gangs, and vice versa.

Journalists pounced on the few hooded youths who wandered the area in groups last night. The kids talked themselves up, full of rhetoric about “us” and “them”, seemingly keen to appear on TV, while keeping their faces covered just in case. In the end, there was little trouble in Alcorcón last night. “Enough for a photo, although nothing spectacular”, read one newspaper headline this morning, the disappointment almost tangible. The heavy police presence kept things well under control.

Last week’s altercation in Alcorcón has given the issue of ethnic conflict a high profile in the Spanish media. The issue is really one of gangs – but when the gangs characterise themselves according to their nationality, then immigration comes into the discussion. Madrid is not as multicultural as I had expected, especially in comparison with a city like London. There is a large population of immigrants though, mostly from Latin America and the Caribbean, but also from Morocco and other North or West African countries.

Attitudes to immigrants vary. There are those who are happy for people to come legally, to earn a living and to pay their taxes. There are those who just can’t help mocking the Latin American accents: it’s a subtle form of racism, but it irks me. And there are those who feel they’re being overrun with immigrants – the kind who start their sentences with “I’m not racist, but…” I haven’t had much to do with this last breed, but I think that’s more to do with the circles I mix in than anything else.

At school I haven’t seen any outright racism, but nor have I observed these interactions particularly closely. Social groups don’t seem to be entirely mixed – immigrants often stick with others from their country or region – and I gather that those from Latin America often feel a general sense of inferiority. They are often economically worse off than their Spanish counterparts (“Businessman in Peru, Homeless in Madrid!” I heard one exasperated house-hunting Peruvian exclaim on the street) and, especially at the higher school levels, have a less solid grasp on English, although I can’t speak for their education in other subjects.

Gangs are another matter entirely, though. The presence of “foreign” gangs, as I see it, contributes to a downward cycle of attitudes towards immigrants. The more prolific their presence, the more all Latin Americans are associated with gang violence and general attitudes to immigrants worsen as a consequence. Which of course leads to more young immigrants feeling aggrieved, increasing the appeal of violent gangs.

And their presence is rising: the number of “violent Latin gang members” has tripled in as many years, according to the police. They reckon there are about 1300 teenagers in Madrid who identify as belonging to a gang, although only 300 of these are proactively violent.

I feel like I should put some philosophical musings in here, about the nature of ethnic conflict and ways out of it, but I’m not sure what to say. I do tell off my friends who laugh at South American accents. I applaud the residents of Alcorcón who stood out in the cold in protest at racism last night. I wish the media wouldn’t be so quick to leap onto the Latin American slagging bandwagon and to hype up the conflict; but by blogging on this subject I’m also a guilty party, and when the gangs label themselves as Latinos, what is one supposed to do?

I guess the thing is, is that there are good eggs and bad eggs everywhere, and by labelling bad eggs according to their nationality or their race quietly builds the foundations of racism.

And maybe the kids of Alcorcón just need something better to do with their time, to keep them occupied and out of trouble.

Other posts by Katie Llanos-Small