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Arrest made in SF killing of Bob Lee – alleged killer also worked in tech

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Re: Arrest made in SF killing of Bob Lee – alleged killer also worked in tech

#111

Post by carrja99 »

BenSahar wrote: post #62
rubyn00bie wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah the exact same thing happens with Portland every time it pops up on here. The HN audience by and large irrationally hates progressive policies and cities with them. It’s weird watching people here parrot the opinions of the corporate overlords.

Yeah, I get the same thing with Chicago. Anything that allows them dump on their "enemies".

The Chicago one gets me. I am not in SF often but we have taken 3-day weekend trips to Chicago since my children were 3. Multiple times walking around downtown, enjoying Navy Pier, even a couple of cases where we were walking to our hotel probably later than we should have after the fireworks.

Not once did we ever feel unsafe in the 10 years we have made trips out there. But read the news and you'll think it was a lawless warzone.

Re: Arrest made in SF killing of Bob Lee – alleged killer also worked in tech

#112

Post by scarmig »

cemerick wrote: post #84
nemo44x wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I wonder how likely it is that the same population will comment here to say, "I was wrong"? Sure, people were wrong in their assumption that the murder was random. At least that's how it looks now. We haven't heard the suspects side, but.... But wrong that SF has become a dangerous and mismanaged city? Murder isn't the only violent crime and a lot of crime goes unreported. People don't feel safe walking around and…

People see homelessness and open drug use and petty property crime, filter it through their ideological lens, and amplify that into feeling that they are themselves somehow less safe. You can assert that that is rational, but it's as connected to reality as someone feeling afraid when e.g. a black person is walking behind them. Saying stuff like "a lot of [violent] crime goes unreported" is straight up fanciful think…

> People aren't reporting assaults? Sounds completely absurd.

One reason this explanation falls flat is that reported and recorded property crimes have risen more. If the city were exceptionally underreporting crimes compared to the past or other cities, you'd see those disappear from the statistics more than e.g. homicides; it's much easier to ignore a stolen phone than it is a dead body.

Re: Arrest made in SF killing of Bob Lee – alleged killer also worked in tech

#113

Post by clint »

kaycebasques wrote: post #24
xivzgrev wrote: post #9

I wondered if the killer knew him. That area of city is not a sketchy one, and while random violence can happen anywhere it just seemed unlikely, esp given descriptions that he would be unlikely to resist a mugging (and provoke an escalation). Glad they got their man!

He is not their man yet. Innocent until proven guilty. The word "alleged" is important here. In Journalism 101 they teach you to be very careful when talking about suspected criminals. You don't want to portray someone as guilty until that has been proven in court.

They literally have video of the dude stabbing him

Re: Arrest made in SF killing of Bob Lee – alleged killer also worked in tech

#114

Post by simplotek »

basisword wrote: post #82
cemerick wrote: post #2

This news really highlights the confirmation bias that was in full bloom throughout the "discourse" around the initial reports of Lee's murder (e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35448899 ). Everyone is so quick to jump on negative news about the rare violent crime in e.g. SF thanks to feelings about petty property crime that it's obviously impossible to have any kind of fact-based dialogue about policy. Worth…

The number of high profile tech bros on Twitter using the death to further their own views was disgraceful. SF may have big issues but using someone’s murder to further your political beliefs is horrible. I’m sure we won’t hear any retraction though.

> SF may have big issues but using someone’s murder to further your political beliefs is horrible.

What political beliefs are you referring to? The one about SF's crime wave sounds precisely on topic, for example.

Edit: those downvotes were very quick.

Re: Arrest made in SF killing of Bob Lee – alleged killer also worked in tech

#115

Post by baremetal »

robotbikes wrote: post #55
baremetal wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

If the claim of the former commissioner spraying people with bear mace is true then it is hardly a random attack but an escalation of violence after being attacked by a chemical weapon.

nice deflection but you aren't exactly making the case that SF isn't a violent and lawless place.

Re: Arrest made in SF killing of Bob Lee – alleged killer also worked in tech

#116

Post by pclmulqdq »

Swizec wrote: post #33
cemerick wrote: post #2

This news really highlights the confirmation bias that was in full bloom throughout the "discourse" around the initial reports of Lee's murder (e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35448899 ). Everyone is so quick to jump on negative news about the rare violent crime in e.g. SF thanks to feelings about petty property crime that it's obviously impossible to have any kind of fact-based dialogue about policy. Worth…

The argument I made to all my friends in this debate (but not publicly) was along the lines of “tech exec found dead at 2:30am near his home in an upscale neighborhood with zero night-time activity … that doesn’t sound random” My guess was drug deal gone wrong. But tech deal gone wrong makes sense too, I guess. edit: my drug guess was before the person was named, not implying anything, just know drugs are a popular h…

It could still have been a drug deal - some companies have a guy who is the "hookup."

The problem with the discourse was that everyone forgot that people basically never get randomly murdered. There's almost always a reason for a murder - number 1 is domestic disputes, number 2 is gang-related, and the list goes on, but almost nobody gets murdered randomly. Assaults and thefts are a different story, and SF's problem with those crimes got conflated with a murder (which is a rare crime in SF).

Re: Arrest made in SF killing of Bob Lee – alleged killer also worked in tech

#117

Post by IndoorPatio »

rconti wrote: post #42
cemerick wrote: post #2

This news really highlights the confirmation bias that was in full bloom throughout the "discourse" around the initial reports of Lee's murder (e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35448899 ). Everyone is so quick to jump on negative news about the rare violent crime in e.g. SF thanks to feelings about petty property crime that it's obviously impossible to have any kind of fact-based dialogue about policy. Worth…

Oh I'd absolutely cop to that. My first thought upon reading the article was "holy crap, we were all wrong".

This could be an opportunity for people to evaluate the accuracy of their mental models.

Re: Arrest made in SF killing of Bob Lee – alleged killer also worked in tech

#118

Post by rubyn00bie »

pclmulqdq wrote: post #97
TigeriusKirk wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So sorting by Violent Crime (Total), we see San Francisco is 37th out of the 100 listed.

Citing murder rates (and ignoring other crimes) is one of the preferred tactics of people who want to say that big cities have low crime rates. Police in big cities go after big crimes like murders, but tend to ignore "lesser" crimes, so as a result, gangsters and other career criminals stick to those lesser crimes, and generally do a lot more of them.

Provide a link to an empirical source or you’re literally just making this up based on feels and shit you see on TV…

Re: Arrest made in SF killing of Bob Lee – alleged killer also worked in tech

#119

Post by IndoorPatio »

vimax wrote: post #37
f38zf5vdt wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As soon as I saw the reported murder I figured it was a business partner who felt scorned, but then HN narrative continued for a full week about the lack of safety in SF. While things might be bad, random murders by strangers are still a rarity compared to targeted killings.

I find it strange that nobody is mentioning the Hindenburg Research report against Square that came out a week before the stabbing, and the fact that there’s likely a fraud investigation underway. https://hindenburgresearch.com/block/

+1

Re: Arrest made in SF killing of Bob Lee – alleged killer also worked in tech

#120

Post by hn_throwaway_99 »

cemerick wrote: post #2

This news really highlights the confirmation bias that was in full bloom throughout the "discourse" around the initial reports of Lee's murder (e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35448899 ). Everyone is so quick to jump on negative news about the rare violent crime in e.g. SF thanks to feelings about petty property crime that it's obviously impossible to have any kind of fact-based dialogue about policy. Worth…

The thing that's so weird about that confirmation bias is that some folks held these inconsistent views even within a single HN comment.

There was a comment that was on that initial thread where the commenter said that they heard from "very well placed sources in the US Intelligence community this is probably a hit", and the commenter still went on to blame San Francisco for being a "crime ridden shithole". I responded with this, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=35456746 , it was just bizarre to me.

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