Newark cops, with reform, didn't fire a single shot in 2020

I've done a deep dive into the numbers. Murder rate data from the FBI has a large "unknown" category, so I'll handle that in a few ways for simplicity. Focusing on murders rather than other violent crime is the best thing to do because, while there may be a lot of ambiguity about what constitutes "assault", how often it's reported, etc., there really isn't much ambiguity about murder. We don't lose track of bodies very often. Here's the murder rate in the U.S. broken down by race. All numbers are murderers (offenders) per 100,000 people:

White (simple, ignoring "Unknown"): 1.8 Black (simple, ignoring "Unknown"): 13.3

White (assuming all "Unknown" are White): 3.7 Black (assuming all "Unknown" are Black): 23.2

White (splitting up "Unknown" by existing proportion of total): 2.6 Black (splitting up "Unknown" by existing proportion of total): 18.8

The difference is stark. Using the 2.6 vs. 18.8 numbers, probably closest to the truth, Black people in the U.S. are about seven times more likely to murder in a given year than are white people. The number becomes even more stark if you compare Black to non-Black (because Asians are less likely to murder than Whites), and yet more stark if you just look at men (women murder at something like 1/8 the rate of men, so having them in the system dilutes all differences). If you remove Black Americans from the system, U.S. murder rates look like much of Western Europe.

This is a hard thing but it is a true thing. Most of the differences in how police treat Black vs. White people in the U.S. are driven by this phenomenon, not racism on the part of cops or "the system". There is an argument to be made about a legacy of slavery or systemic racism, and maybe it's important to do that, but those arguments are completely irrelevant to the cop who's walking a beat in a bad neighborhood--White or Black. That cop will (involuntarily) collect statistics on the world around him or her, and will act accordingly. We call it learning. You can't help but do it. I think some small proportion of this enormous difference is due to a feedback loop, i.e. people end up murdering more because they're policed more.

Insofar as you are "outraged" by this simple statement of fact, you are part of the problem--not the solution. Real solutions to the real problems of murder and differential policing in the U.S. require people who are brave enough to look the problem right in the eye. Ignoring the obvious truth proves to me that you don't really care about actually helping people, and are really in it to impress your friends with how woke you are.

There's a lot of work to be done, please be part of the solution.

FBI UCR murder offender data: https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2019/crime-in-the-u.s.-... Census data: https://www.census.gov/newsroom/press-kits/2020/population-e...

If someone wants to do it, they can put in the work to 'get the paperwork through the system'; if they just want it to be available to them and their friends, well, now it is, because someone else has put in that work. I don't really see the issue?

(But then, I'm glad to live in a country that hasn't legalised it, so what do I know.)

https://knowyourmeme.com/memes/despite-being-only-13-percent...

EDIT: themgt, this is not a throwaway account. I'm a long time user that often gets banned and returns to try again to have reasonable discourse. I find it hard because for educated people, many on this site are full of unexamined biases.

Ok, so I cited another take on crime statistics when presented with the super-trope of OP citing the FBI crime statistics. What I'm trying to do is educate you and others that if you don't socialize with the other half of the internet, well they see someone post the FBI crime statistics and they think, "Wow, what a total racist or a total knucklehead."

What is the truth that you want me to know that you don't think I don't?

I'll tell you the truth that I want you to know: if you reach for the FBI crime statistics instead of the testimony and experience of law-abiding people of color then your trust is in authority and not in the integrity of good people everywhere

Regardless of what you want to call it in the time between the event later deemed criminal, and the sentencing, surely you see that that's what GP was referring to? That there may be differences in demography of 'who is involved in these events'.