• theonlytruescotsman
    link
    fedilink
    English
    arrow-up
    4
    arrow-down
    16
    ·
    3 days ago

    A) crime reporting is hit or miss, mostly miss. We really expect the people that can’t tell the difference between a cell phone and a gun to tell the difference between murder, suicide, or just missing?

    B) this is very much like saying “the economy is doing great” to people struggling to pay bills. Their reality is different from the stats.

    Now either there is a problem with how we compile stats, or the majority of people are just living in a fantasy world. In either case pointing to the stats does nothing whatsoever, except make people distrust authority.

    • FireTower@lemmy.world
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      8
      arrow-down
      2
      ·
      3 days ago

      A) The National Crime Victimization Survey surveys victims and their surviving relatives.

      B) The economy ≠ the poverty rate. But towards the point, what does you even mean. The existence of a statistic doesn’t deny the reality of those victimized. It simply expresses the commonality of an occurrence.

      People are living in a fantasy world perpetuated by a media that stands to gain by over reporting tragedies while being silent on any good news. Pointing out statistics may lead people to trust the unreliable sources less. But that is a good thing. And knowledge of statistics is critical in coming to policy conclusions.

      • theonlytruescotsman
        link
        fedilink
        English
        arrow-up
        2
        arrow-down
        12
        ·
        3 days ago

        So it’s an inaccurate statistic, by it’s own method. Thanks for agreeing with me.

        • FireTower@lemmy.world
          link
          fedilink
          arrow-up
          8
          arrow-down
          1
          ·
          3 days ago

          Each year’s data is relative to the past years data. NCVS is about as good as it gets and is probably better than the UCR for this type of data.

          • theonlytruescotsman
            link
            fedilink
            English
            arrow-up
            1
            arrow-down
            10
            ·
            3 days ago

            Sure for reported murders by victims families.

            That’s not the murder rate, that’s not a measure of how safe things are. It’s a measure of how often a victim has surviving family members that are willing to report the murder.

            • FireTower@lemmy.world
              link
              fedilink
              arrow-up
              8
              arrow-down
              1
              ·
              3 days ago

              NCVS data isn’t limited to murders or just homicides. And even if reports by victims or surviving members of their families was a significant issue it’d be mooted by the fact the core value of this study isn’t how much data shows in any one year but how it cross compares to other years.

    • futatorius@lemm.ee
      link
      fedilink
      arrow-up
      4
      arrow-down
      1
      ·
      3 days ago

      Reporting of homicides is as near rock-solid as any kind of reporting can be.