If Mort Divine ruled the world

[Dak]

You can't separate those two things and make following policy the bottom line with no ulterior motivations. That's not how bias works.

Why would she enforce the policy for two black men and not for white people? Maybe she just dislikes them so much that she uses the policy as a means to stage her prejudice--in which case, that's bias in asking them to leave. Or maybe she unconsciously feels that two white people sitting down without buying anything aren't likely to be dangerous; but two black people sitting down without buying anything might be planning some kind of violence--in which case, again, that's bias in asking them to leave.

The bias enters into play when someone acts differently than they normally would. Just because something is policy doesn't mean it reflects some baseline of standard behavior. For example, it's policy to drive under the speed limit (that's why it's a "limit"), but people regularly drive five to ten miles-per-hour over it and don't get pulled over.

Again, we don't have counter evidence that enforcement has been different. All we can somewhat safely assume is that no prior situation has escalated to the point of police being called (based on a lack of customer responses/complaints/media coverage), and we can safely assume that these are not the first two black customers the store ever had. Making a ton of assumptions over a single incident where the customers were equally willing to escalate the situation despite numerous requests to comply with a reasonable, non-racially based policy, seems to me to be a form of base-rate neglect and special pleading.

We can both agree the policy for the store is probably a poor one, although I hold the caveat that nonpaying occupants are social miscreants.

A better example of bias people should be focusing on is how the Tennessee shooter had multiple incidents prior to the shooting, and yet the police either let him carry on or weren't even called. We can be reasonably sure that would not occur with a black or hispanic person.

 

[Blurry_Dreams]

On another forum I visit with a large transgendered population

i want to post on t

On another forum I visit with a large transgendered population, there was just an amazing argument/shitfest between a radical feminist and a few transwomen. I always have had time reconciling transgenderism with anti-genderism, and seeing it blossom so beautifully with terms like "gender misappropriation" (a transwoman wearing a dress is equivalent to blackface, you see) thrown around was just amazing.

i want to post on this forum you're referencing

 

[Dak]

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-...s-killed-in-attack-after-school-idUSKBN1HY1TU

7 killed, 12 injured in knife attack on school children.

Knives are most commonly used because gun controls are extremely strict in China.

 

[viewerfromnihil]

Too bad the guy didn't have an AR-15. Certainly somebody would have been able to stab him before he could maim so many.

 

[Dak]

Too bad the guy didn't have an AR-15. Certainly somebody would have been able to stab him before he could maim so many.

The argument has been that knife attacks are less severe (possibly the case, depending on setting), or that somehow schools/children/society will become safer by removing the guns. Yet we see crime spiking in many civilized countries and everything from bombs to trucks to axes to knives being employed. Ultimately, people kill people, and we can't bubble wrap everything, or even afford to bubble wrap many things.

 

[Einherjar86]

I think the myth is that with guns people would miraculously be able to present themselves at every incident and neutralize the threat. It's true that there was no one with a gun in China to take out the knife attacker; but overall, violent crime and murder rates are lower in China than in the U.S. (unless the Chinese gov't tweaks the numbers, but I doubt they tweak them that much).

Introduce guns into the environment, and you're bound to have more scenarios in which a "good guy with a gun" takes out a "bad guy with a gun." But you're also bound to have exponentially more violent incidents overall.

So no, we can't bubble-wrap everything; but we can afford to bubble-wrap many things, and we can bubble-wrap more things than we do.

I'm an advocate of more bubble-wrap, but I realize it's not going to make problems of human behavior go away.

 

[rms]

but overall, violent crime and murder rates are lower in China than in the U.S. (unless the Chinese gov't tweaks the numbers, but I doubt they tweak them that much).

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/chinas...everyday-behavior-even-jaywalking-2018-04-24/

But you're also bound to have exponentially more violent incidents overall.

assuming that guns don't make people violent. don't you mean exponentially more casualties?

 

[Dak]

Incidentally the CDC recently released data backig an old study showing more than a million reported defensive gun uses per year. Even with exaggeration that is substantial.

 

[Einherjar86]

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/chinas...everyday-behavior-even-jaywalking-2018-04-24/

For the record, I'm not saying we should more like China. I'm simply comparing one specific factor.

assuming that guns don't make people violent. don't you mean exponentially more casualties?

Well, sure; but I'm not sure I understand the objection to my comment.

I said that violent incidents are bound to increase, not violence itself (whatever that might mean). What I mean is that guns, although they might be used in self-defense, overall facilitate the execution of violence, i.e. violent incidents.

So yes, casualties are bound to increase, but so is the number of violent incidents (even those that don't result in casualties).

 

[rms]

For the record, I'm not saying we should more like China. I'm simply comparing one specific factor.

just havin' a laugh, man

Well, sure; but I'm not sure I understand the objection to my comment.

"violent incidents" means incidents that are violent

100 shootings that kill 1 person each is different than 1 person killing 100 people at one time. the obvious answer the left has to gun violence is 100 instances killing one is better than 1 instance killing 100.

but so is the number of violent incidents

if the assumption is that guns are more prone to self/accidental harm than knives, that's about the only difference

 

[Einherjar86]

"violent incidents" means incidents that are violent

100 shootings that kill 1 person each is different than 1 person killing 100 people at one time. the obvious answer the left has to gun violence is 100 instances killing one is better than 1 instance killing 100.

If we look purely at that abstract example, then I understand the objection.

My point is that the proliferation of instruments that facilitate violence will lead to more incidents of violence. In the context of gun violence, the instrument also happens to result in more damage than, say, a knife. So the premise of 100 incidents with one death, versus one incident with 100 deaths, is counter-intuitive to the logic of this context:

i.e. Not only do guns lead to incidents in which more people are likely to be harmed than knife incidents; they also lead to more incidents overall.

if the assumption is that guns are more prone to self/accidental harm than knives, that's about the only difference

Actually, I would venture that intentional harm to others also increases when a particular instrument facilitates violence.

 

[Dak]

I've seen no data to suggest guns increase incidence of violence. They do seem to increase likelihood of success in a suicide attempt, but that's not an objectively bad thing.

 

[rms]

they also lead to more incidents overall.

what is your reasoning behind this, because this doesn't make sense

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Incidentally the CDC recently released data backig an old study showing more than a million reported defensive gun uses per year. Even with exaggeration that is substantial.

Link? There's a CDC study/studies I'm aware of that report between 20k and 40k defensive uses per year depending on the interval, but the million defensive uses one comes from a much more questionable source.

 

[Dak]

Well, I went back to pull the link and now I'm getting a "not found" error, where it was before:

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3124326

Here's a Reason article on it:
http://reason.com/blog/2018/04/20/cdc-provides-more-evidence-that-plenty-o

Multiple articles linked to the same source but it's now down for some reason.

 

[HamburgerBoy]

Very interesting, Kleck was the guy I was thinking of regarding the old 1mil/yr study, but I didn't know about this new finding. Apparently it was taken down temporarily to factor in that it wasn't technically a national survey but instead one of a dozen-odd states.

 

[viewerfromnihil]

The argument has been that knife attacks are less severe (possibly the case, depending on setting), or that somehow schools/children/society will become safer by removing the guns. Yet we see crime spiking in many civilized countries and everything from bombs to trucks to axes to knives being employed. Ultimately, people kill people, and we can't bubble wrap everything, or even afford to bubble wrap many things.

Spiking compared to what? The prosperous 90s marked by the end of a global bi-polar conflict which ushered in something of an era of good feeling, albeit brief, across the West? Oh wait, the Troubles didn't end until 1998. I'll admit the employment of trucks seems a rather recent development, and one which oddly seems to keep occurring in cities where I'm living, but I just wanted to point this out: these sorts of attacks aren't exactly new, and there's a case to be made that it was just is bad if not worse in Europe from the 60s until the late 90s. The rhetoric that everything was better yesterday really gets under my skin because, in fact, yesterday sucked.

In any case, I have zero interest in this debate. Yes, these attacks will happen with or without guns and they will also sometimes happen with guns when they're already banned. My support, however, of banning semi-automatic firearms from all other than very well trained individuals who must pay exorbitant fees if they want to tickle their little pecker has less to do with these sort of one-off attacks than it does with the everyday violence experienced by thousands of Americans across the country everyday.

 

[Dak]

Spiking compared to what? The prosperous 90s marked by the end of a global bi-polar conflict which ushered in something of an era of good feeling, albeit brief, across the West? Oh wait, the Troubles didn't end until 1998. I'll admit the employment of trucks seems a rather recent development, and one which oddly seems to keep occurring in cities where I'm living, but I just wanted to point this out: these sorts of attacks aren't exactly new, and there's a case to be made that it was just is bad if not worse in Europe from the 60s until the late 90s. The rhetoric that everything was better yesterday really gets under my skin because, in fact, yesterday sucked.

Well I'll be the first to agree that yesterday sucked, at any given point, for a variety of reasons. There's a rampant problem of presentism, which was likely also a problem yesterday, but has not improved. However, even if overall rates are low compared to historical numbers, I can find numerous articles about rising crime in Europe/GB over the last year. My point is that all of these articles on HuffPo et al whining "why can't we be more like Europe???!!" about everything shows a lack of awareness about both current and historical facts. It's not apples to apples to begin with, and Europe isn't a wonderland anyway.

In any case, I have zero interest in this debate. Yes, these attacks will happen with or without guns and they will also sometimes happen with guns when they're already banned. My support, however, of banning semi-automatic firearms from all other than very well trained individuals who must pay exorbitant fees if they want to tickle their little pecker has less to do with these sort of one-off attacks than it does with the everyday violence experienced by thousands of Americans across the country everyday.

"Little pecker" analogies can extend (heh) to many things, not only guns. SJWs love their pens and microphones. Wonder why? Semantic silliness aside, why the fixation on one off attacks? This is the same issue that drives people's greater fear of sharks than auto accidents (and contributes to the ongoing distracted driving issue). Texting while driving is far more broadly dangerous than owning a gun, yet we lack a "national movement" against that.

Back to guns, I've read a lot of criticisms of the old Lott study, which, even if it wasn't problematic, is now pretty old. The problem is that the opponents don't seem to be doing a better job at objective measurement, at least if the following is any indication:

https://www.thenation.com/article/actually-guns-do-kill-people/

The authors of this new paper have taken advantage of cutting-edge statistical techniques. They constructed synthetic control groups for states and used what’s known as a LASSO analysis to pick the best variables for comparison. The important thing to know about these methods is that, no matter the relative trade-offs of the statistical tool, the findings were consistent: When states passed right-to-carry laws, violent crime ended up higher than it would have been otherwise.

The report also found that a right to carry has no deterrent effect on property crimes. (Indeed, in some of the calculations, such crimes increased.) This lack of deterrence isn’t surprising, given that victims of violent crimes fail to defend themselves with a gun 99.2 percent of the time.

I'm not a stats wiz but I know a little something (I'll even stress the little qualifier). First of all they constructed synthetic controls, this raises a red flag as a process ripe for bias. Secondly they used LASSO, which is supposed to help reduce bias in predictor selection, but is not indicated for assessing predictor variables with multicollinearity, that is, predictors which correlate highly with each other, as it can dramatically reduce accuracy. But why would we expect no relation between crime related variables?

I thought it was interesting the writer mentioned that victims fail to defend themselves with a gun almost all the time. That's a statement emblematic of the poor scientific thought in writers. What is not asked is how often are people, who are carrying, victims? Effectively implying that guns don't provide protection for people who don't have them doesn't help make the writer's point.

 

[viewerfromnihil]

Well I'll be the first to agree that yesterday sucked, at any given point, for a variety of reasons. There's a rampant problem of presentism, which was likely also a problem yesterday, but has not improved. However, even if overall rates are low compared to historical numbers, I can find numerous articles about rising crime in Europe/GB over the last year. My point is that all of these articles on HuffPo et al whining "why can't we be more like Europe???!!" about everything shows a lack of awareness about both current and historical facts. It's not apples to apples to begin with, and Europe isn't a wonderland anyway.

I can't say I'm surprised that with a quick Google search you can easily find numerous articles about rising crime today, as opposed to, say, the 70s

Europe certainly isn't a wonderland and just how wonderful it is differs greatly on the country in question, but they do get some things right and I think it's fair to question why the US doesn't occasionally to look to other developed countries for potential models for addressing our own social problems.

"Little pecker" analogies can extend (heh) to many things, not only guns. SJWs love their pens and microphones. Wonder why? Semantic silliness aside, why the fixation on one off attacks? This is the same issue that drives people's greater fear of sharks than auto accidents (and contributes to the ongoing distracted driving issue). Texting while driving is far more broadly dangerous than owning a gun, yet we lack a "national movement" against that.

I would hardly call the movement toward gun regulation a national movement, at least when compared with the very real movement against it. And while there's not necessarily a national movement against texting and driving, there are in fact public awareness campaigns which warn of its dangers and action at the state level intended to prevent it.

Back to guns, I've read a lot of criticisms of the old Lott study, which, even if it wasn't problematic, is now pretty old. The problem is that the opponents don't seem to be doing a better job at objective measurement, at least if the following is any indication:

https://www.thenation.com/article/actually-guns-do-kill-people/

I'm not a stats wiz but I know a little something (I'll even stress the little qualifier). First of all they constructed synthetic controls, this raises a red flag as a process ripe for bias. Secondly they used LASSO, which is supposed to help reduce bias in predictor selection, but is not indicated for assessing predictor variables with multicollinearity, that is, predictors which correlate highly with each other, as it can dramatically reduce accuracy. But why would we expect no relation between crime related variables?

I thought it was interesting the writer mentioned that victims fail to defend themselves with a gun almost all the time. That's a statement emblematic of the poor scientific thought in writers. What is not asked is how often are people, who are carrying, victims? Effectively implying that guns don't provide protection for people who don't have them doesn't help make the writer's point.

I need to get off here and torture myself with reading Kant in German, so I'll skip the article, but it's not the first time that I've heard that concealed carry does not actually prevent crime, and it's also something which I don't find at all surprising.

 

[Blurry_Dreams]

The argument has been that knife attacks are less severe (possibly the case, depending on setting), or that somehow schools/children/society will become safer by removing the guns. Yet we see crime spiking in many civilized countries and everything from bombs to trucks to axes to knives being employed. Ultimately, people kill people, and we can't bubble wrap everything, or even afford to bubble wrap many things.

i think part of what's happening is where the shooter is completely convinced that no one is going to shoot back
think about it like this
if every school teacher was required to carry a gun to class every single day
(a thing people are actually proposing)
then when someone decides to shoot up a school
the teacher would shoot back
and the death toll would be just 2 instead of 20