Mastodawn

Glenn Fleishman

I’ve been pointing out for years that the actual stats from the police even haven’t matched the panic in the media. In America (and much of the world), we’re at a near all-time low for violent crime and most other crime, so any tiny increase looks huge, as it did during the pandemic. We’re now reverting to the (new) norm.

@glennf
Do you have any sense of how reliable the "actual stats from the police" are? The phrase makes me wonder about a who-watches-the-watchers situation.

@geoffduncan There is research into how accurate they are (but this varies by city) and about underreporting of crime. The thing is, though, that they are typically the stats used by those *claiming* a crime wave. So when the actual #s don't match the claims that's key by itself—during the high pitch of the panic, we were still at historical lows using the same numbers. The panic was often “murders are up 50%”—from an all-time low, and they increased in nearly every city and town for no reason.

@glennf
Gotcha—thanks for the context.

My experience is (obviously) hyper-local and anecdotal to a few business owners I've spoken with. One comment that stuck with me was along the lines of "We no longer report anything unless insurance requires a police report," but that business is in a fairly chancy location: I wouldn't generalize from any of it.

@geoffduncan …and if you live in some places, it can seem like the idea there isn’t some kind of crime wave or huge increase in crime is ridiculous. They are obviously hotspots. Stats only capture some of the data and only averages, unless you drill down to specific precincts or even neighborhoods. The Trader Joe’s in the university district had to hire security after a guy got into their drop ceiling! That was after people just walking in and taking liquor off the shelves day in and day out

@glennf
Agreed. Examples like these don't seem hard to find, but translating from them to broader trends is a difficult job, and by their nature those even the most rigorously analyzed trends won't precisely reflect on-the-ground reality at a location, well, anywhere. Such are stats.

@geoffduncan I think what's useful is when you see the Federation of Retail Stores or whatever it’s called publicly admit that their analysis of their latest stats, which in the past have been seen as extremely reliable, were wrong—they exhibited rigor in admitting this and a lot of academics were happy to see that. (It was more about categorization of loss than an error in stats.) Those numbers from stores help to balance the police reporting, b/c stores provide more data to the federation.

@glennf
Yeah: the usual result of errors like that is quiet "never mention it again" or, worse, doubling-down on why they're not errors at all. I guess they value their long-term credibility over short-term reputational damage.

Kerry Allen Dec 18, 2023

@glennf The Culture of Fear by Barry Glassner from ‘99 opened my eyes to this media phenomenon. I’ve viewed crime reports differently ever since. Few people realize that violent crime was worse during the good old days. It’s been on a downward trend for decades.

famousringo Dec 18, 2023

@glennf I feel like there are a lot of changes from the past few years that people are just assuming are long-term trends, rather than a spike from a once-in-a-century crisis.

@famousringo Some people haven't gotten over the trauma of the 1980s/1990s, to be fair, when crime was at an all-time modern high (probably in the century). Police and politicians still use the rhetoric. Some cities haven't fully recovered—shockingly, these are cities in which people of color, primarily Black, were restricted in housing, investments weren't made in school, and Black men were heavily overpoliced and thrown in prison (often for charges white men weren't). Systemic!