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Police -- Racism Isn't Why Black Men Get Shot, Media Ignores Facts
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Leroy N. Soetoro
Feb 3, 2018, 3:04:02 PM2/3/18
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http://www.nationalreview.com/article/449505/police-shootings-black-men-
race-not-reason-causal-effect
The context of each encounter is key, and the media can’t be bothered to
consider it.
By now everyone knows that police, whether consciously or subconsciously,
are targeting young black men, killing them at a disproportionate rate.
But what if everyone is wrong? What if race actually has little causal
effect on police shootings?
In fact, the data show just that. If we as a nation can look seriously at
the evidence, we can have a much more productive conversation about what’s
gone wrong and how to fix it.
The Washington Post recently ran an article about police killings
nationwide in the first half of the year. That story made the same mistake
Post reporters have been making for years by comparing the racial
composition of those killed with the overall racial composition of the
United States.
“Police have continued to shoot and kill a disproportionately large number
of black males, who account for nearly a quarter of the deaths, yet are
only 6 percent of the nation’s population,” the paper reported.
The Post’s unspoken assumption is that police killings should match
America’s overall demographic statistics. That might sound right at first,
but it is well understood in academic circles that using population as a
benchmark can be dangerous, because not all people are equally likely to
come into confrontation with the police. To borrow an example from
Michigan State University researcher Joseph Cesario, an officer is not as
likely to shoot the cashier selling him a cup of coffee as he is to shoot
a citizen with an outstanding warrant he has just pulled over.
And few activities, from the important to the trivial, conform to the
Census Bureau’s breakdowns of the American population. Black people, who
constitute about 13 percent of Americans — the Post had to focus on men
alone to get the figure down to 6 percent — are 1.4 percent of doctors, 38
percent of barbers, and 16 percent of cooks. They account for 14 percent
of pedestrian fatalities and 74.4 percent of NBA players but just 8
percent of NPR newsroom employees.
The media would have Americans believe that race is the single most
important and predictive element of fatal encounters between police and
civilians. Yet both the basic data and less superficial analyses than the
Post’s show that is not the case. With a few notable exceptions, violent
criminal attacks are the best predictor of whom police might shoot in
America.
Even the Post itself has noted the relevant data in the past. “In 74
percent of all fatal police shootings, the individuals had already fired
shots, brandished a gun or attacked a person with a weapon or their bare
hands,” the paper reported in 2015. “Another 16 percent of the shootings
came after incidents that did not involve firearms or active attacks but
featured other potentially dangerous threats.”
Those figures are consistent with other data. In 2015, two-thirds of
unarmed people of any race killed by police had been in the process of
committing violent crime or property destruction. Fourteen percent were
engaged in domestic violence. Ten percent were committing a robbery, 20
percent a burglary or vandalism, and 21 percent an assault on another
civilian.
More important, cops don’t usually initiate their contact with the person
who is shot. Three-quarters of fatal encounters start with someone
contacting police and reporting the suspect.
Further, more than half of the unarmed people killed by police suffered
from mental-health issues, drug intoxication, physical disability, or some
combination of them. That’s something public-health policies can address
head-on.
That’s why I get so angry at the Washington Post — and other media like
ProPublica and the Guardian — for conflating correlation and causation.
Their comparisons might spur outrage and sell ads, but they also foment
discord and distract from actionable data on police killings.
Had the Washington Post consumed as much digital ink reporting on mental-
health and drug-policy reform as it spends on shootings, I daresay the
ball would have moved farther than it has. As it stands, since the paper
started seriously tracking police shootings, only Texas has enacted
criminal-justice mental-health legislation.
Police are already conducting work to identify and re-train or fire the
demonstrably small number of its ranks who behave inappropriately. To
presume that solves society’s ills is short-sighted. We must look to
reasons other than simple racism on the part of the police, who end up
holding the ball for a lot of failed systemic issues. A disproportionate
share of America’s violent offenders are African-American males, but not
because they are black. It is because America has failed its black
communities, and those of the vulnerable more generally, for decades. The
best predictors of crime are broken families, living in a bad
neighborhood, young mothers, and other risk factors known since the 1960s:
a lack of education, nutrition, after-school activities, music, art, and
other programs that create opportunity.
America cannot solve its problems in how police and citizens interact if
our most trusted public watchdogs in the press keep muddying the waters
with divisive, superficial analyses. To solve any problem, one must first
take accurate measure of it. Good reporters will see to it that the
information Americans act on is not just technically correct but also
grounded in meaningful and honest analysis.
--
Donald J. Trump, 304 electoral votes to 227, defeated compulsive liar in
denial Hillary Rodham Clinton on December 19th, 2016. The clown car
parade of the democrat party ran out of gas and got run over by a Trump
truck.
Congratulations President Trump. Thank you for cleaning up the disaster
of the Obama presidency.
Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
The World According To Garp.
ObamaCare is a total 100% failure and no lie that can be put forth by its
supporters can dispute that.
Obama jobs, the result of ObamaCare. 12-15 working hours a week at minimum
wage, no benefits and the primary revenue stream for ObamaCare. It can't
be funded with money people don't have, yet liberals lie about how great
it is.
Obama increased total debt from $10 trillion to $20 trillion in the eight
years he was in office, and sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood queer
liberal democrat donors.
race-not-reason-causal-effect
The context of each encounter is key, and the media can’t be bothered to
consider it.
By now everyone knows that police, whether consciously or subconsciously,
are targeting young black men, killing them at a disproportionate rate.
But what if everyone is wrong? What if race actually has little causal
effect on police shootings?
In fact, the data show just that. If we as a nation can look seriously at
the evidence, we can have a much more productive conversation about what’s
gone wrong and how to fix it.
The Washington Post recently ran an article about police killings
nationwide in the first half of the year. That story made the same mistake
Post reporters have been making for years by comparing the racial
composition of those killed with the overall racial composition of the
United States.
“Police have continued to shoot and kill a disproportionately large number
of black males, who account for nearly a quarter of the deaths, yet are
only 6 percent of the nation’s population,” the paper reported.
The Post’s unspoken assumption is that police killings should match
America’s overall demographic statistics. That might sound right at first,
but it is well understood in academic circles that using population as a
benchmark can be dangerous, because not all people are equally likely to
come into confrontation with the police. To borrow an example from
Michigan State University researcher Joseph Cesario, an officer is not as
likely to shoot the cashier selling him a cup of coffee as he is to shoot
a citizen with an outstanding warrant he has just pulled over.
And few activities, from the important to the trivial, conform to the
Census Bureau’s breakdowns of the American population. Black people, who
constitute about 13 percent of Americans — the Post had to focus on men
alone to get the figure down to 6 percent — are 1.4 percent of doctors, 38
percent of barbers, and 16 percent of cooks. They account for 14 percent
of pedestrian fatalities and 74.4 percent of NBA players but just 8
percent of NPR newsroom employees.
The media would have Americans believe that race is the single most
important and predictive element of fatal encounters between police and
civilians. Yet both the basic data and less superficial analyses than the
Post’s show that is not the case. With a few notable exceptions, violent
criminal attacks are the best predictor of whom police might shoot in
America.
Even the Post itself has noted the relevant data in the past. “In 74
percent of all fatal police shootings, the individuals had already fired
shots, brandished a gun or attacked a person with a weapon or their bare
hands,” the paper reported in 2015. “Another 16 percent of the shootings
came after incidents that did not involve firearms or active attacks but
featured other potentially dangerous threats.”
Those figures are consistent with other data. In 2015, two-thirds of
unarmed people of any race killed by police had been in the process of
committing violent crime or property destruction. Fourteen percent were
engaged in domestic violence. Ten percent were committing a robbery, 20
percent a burglary or vandalism, and 21 percent an assault on another
civilian.
More important, cops don’t usually initiate their contact with the person
who is shot. Three-quarters of fatal encounters start with someone
contacting police and reporting the suspect.
Further, more than half of the unarmed people killed by police suffered
from mental-health issues, drug intoxication, physical disability, or some
combination of them. That’s something public-health policies can address
head-on.
That’s why I get so angry at the Washington Post — and other media like
ProPublica and the Guardian — for conflating correlation and causation.
Their comparisons might spur outrage and sell ads, but they also foment
discord and distract from actionable data on police killings.
Had the Washington Post consumed as much digital ink reporting on mental-
health and drug-policy reform as it spends on shootings, I daresay the
ball would have moved farther than it has. As it stands, since the paper
started seriously tracking police shootings, only Texas has enacted
criminal-justice mental-health legislation.
Police are already conducting work to identify and re-train or fire the
demonstrably small number of its ranks who behave inappropriately. To
presume that solves society’s ills is short-sighted. We must look to
reasons other than simple racism on the part of the police, who end up
holding the ball for a lot of failed systemic issues. A disproportionate
share of America’s violent offenders are African-American males, but not
because they are black. It is because America has failed its black
communities, and those of the vulnerable more generally, for decades. The
best predictors of crime are broken families, living in a bad
neighborhood, young mothers, and other risk factors known since the 1960s:
a lack of education, nutrition, after-school activities, music, art, and
other programs that create opportunity.
America cannot solve its problems in how police and citizens interact if
our most trusted public watchdogs in the press keep muddying the waters
with divisive, superficial analyses. To solve any problem, one must first
take accurate measure of it. Good reporters will see to it that the
information Americans act on is not just technically correct but also
grounded in meaningful and honest analysis.
--
Donald J. Trump, 304 electoral votes to 227, defeated compulsive liar in
denial Hillary Rodham Clinton on December 19th, 2016. The clown car
parade of the democrat party ran out of gas and got run over by a Trump
truck.
Congratulations President Trump. Thank you for cleaning up the disaster
of the Obama presidency.
Under Barack Obama's leadership, the United States of America became the
The World According To Garp.
ObamaCare is a total 100% failure and no lie that can be put forth by its
supporters can dispute that.
Obama jobs, the result of ObamaCare. 12-15 working hours a week at minimum
wage, no benefits and the primary revenue stream for ObamaCare. It can't
be funded with money people don't have, yet liberals lie about how great
it is.
Obama increased total debt from $10 trillion to $20 trillion in the eight
years he was in office, and sold out heterosexuals for Hollywood queer
liberal democrat donors.
Just Wondering
Feb 3, 2018, 3:33:33 PM2/3/18
to
no meaningful and honest analysis by gun control advocates.
Just Wondering
Feb 3, 2018, 3:35:50 PM2/3/18
to
On 2/3/2018 1:04 PM, Leroy N. Soetoro wrote:
> http://www.nationalreview.com/article/449505/police-shootings-black-men-
> race-not-reason-causal-effect
>
> http://www.nationalreview.com/article/449505/police-shootings-black-men-
> race-not-reason-causal-effect
>
> By now everyone knows that police, whether consciously or subconsciously,
> are targeting young black men, killing them at a disproportionate rate.
>
> But what if everyone is wrong? What if race actually has little causal
> effect on police shootings?
>
> are targeting young black men, killing them at a disproportionate rate.
>
> But what if everyone is wrong? What if race actually has little causal
> effect on police shootings?
>
> “Police have continued to shoot and kill a disproportionately large number
> of black males, who account for nearly a quarter of the deaths, yet are
> only 6 percent of the nation’s population,” the paper reported.
Public service announcement:
> of black males, who account for nearly a quarter of the deaths, yet are
> only 6 percent of the nation’s population,” the paper reported.
How not to get your ass kicked by the police.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uj0mtxXEGE8
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