Ot: praying for peace

[Wheels]

This whole thing is sad. Mistakes made on both sides in these cases (not talking about the sniper indiscriminately killing white cops, talking about recent cops using lethal force cases). And people are quick to label those involved and judge them (both sides). We forget everyone involved is a fallible human. Here are some data that was shared with me:

Percentage of American population that is black: 13.2%. Percentage of total US crimes committed by black persons: 52%
If you are being arrested/being pursued or detained by police, the percentage of people in that situation who end up being killed by police -- if you are black, 4%. If you are white, 12%.

These are actual data and are facts and not judgments of anyone. This is such an emotionally charged issue, that it helps (at least it helps me) to take a step back and look at data sometimes. I understand what JH is saying about the birds a little more if you look at data. And I found it surprising that a white person is 3 times more likely to be killed by police than a black person is. Because that is not what the media shows us.

I think cops need some better training so that they can rely on 'muscle memory' when they get into a stressful situation. And I think that citizens need to avoid doing things that put them in a situation where they are going to be detained by police and need to obey the police when they do get detained. As I understand it, by a wide, wide margin, the majority of these tragic cases involve a person doing something illegal or threatening and then refusing to cooperate with police when confronted.

Until we do those things, this sadness will not stop, I am afraid. And this stuff is happening at a time when we need law enforcement more than ever as crazy people want to kill innocent people because they have twisted their religion in a way to justify hatred and violence.

TG

Just curious if the 52% is reflective of being pulled over and scrutinized more often? If say (and I'm making these numbers up as an example) 50% of stops were black people, 50% white, but only 5% of the white stops ended up in searches, while 30% of black stops ended up in searches, then it's highly likely the added scrutiny is inflating the crime statistics for the black drivers.

[Mister Hoarse]

Tine to profile this mug shots

[ArtistFormerlyKnownAsBKR]

The FBI publishes their UCR, Unified Crime Report which details everything about crimes in America including breakdowns of what groups committed the most crimes, which races commit the most crimes on their own and other races, the numbers of homicides by groups (including cops) and a lot more for anyone that cares to dig beyond sensational stories the media feeds us to form impressions and opinions to support agendas.

My understanding was that the UCR was insufficient for these kinds of cases. They supposedly were not collecting the necessary data points to understand who is killing whom and in what circumstances.

[floydefisher]

Just interesting results. Can't speak to the study's methodology and am troubled by trends shown in non-lethal cases. I have no particular slant on this issue, just a lot of sadness. But data is sorely lacking on this issue so any is worth considering.

http://mobile.nytimes.com/2016/07/12....google.com%2F

Not to get political, but here's why the disparity.

Cops patrol high crime areas more often, so it's only logical that the stats will skew to whatever area happens to be the high crime area. If high crime areas are predominately African Americans, the results will skew to that.

The answer is simple: If you don't like cops in your area, work with them to make crime vanish....once the crime rate goes down, the cops will relocate to the new high crime area, and everyone wins.

[Lightningwill_420]

Not to get political, but here's why the disparity.

Cops patrol high crime areas more often, so it's only logical that the stats will skew to whatever area happens to be the high crime area. If high crime areas are predominately African Americans, the results will skew to that.

The answer is simple: If you don't like cops in your area, work with them to make crime vanish....once the crime rate goes down, the cops will relocate to the new high crime area, and everyone wins.

I don't know the answer, but I know the answer is not simple.

[TTK]

Sniping and ambushing innocent cops certainly isn't going to make them less trigger-happy. It's going to have the opposite effect.

[WindsorUK]

Sniping and ambushing innocent cops certainly isn't going to make them less trigger-happy. It's going to have the opposite effect.

Yeah, that seems like a really weird strategy to me as well.
Wanting police to stop shooting you, so you shoot them? Umm, that's most definitely NOT going to work.

[Lightningwill_420]

Yeah, that seems like a really weird strategy to me as well.
Wanting police to stop shooting you, so you shoot them? Umm, that's most definitely NOT going to work.

Psycho killers aren't usually rational.

[6025]

Psycho killers aren't usually rational.

Qu'est-ce que c'est

[PowderBlues]

Qu'est-ce que c'est

Fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-fa-far better

[floydefisher]

I don't know the answer, but I know the answer is not simple.

Once you strip away all the bs and politics, you would be surprised how simple things become.

[Lightningwill_420]

Once you strip away all the bs and politics, you would be surprised how simple things become.

Considering that nobody has solved poverty and crime in any city anywhere ever, I'm thinking the answer isn't simple.

Cops are in my complex quite a bit. I don't think I'm going to change that.