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There could be, but why do you assume this is do to racial bias as opposed to the unfortunate fact that black people are more likely to commit violent crime? I

There could be, but why do you assume this is do to racial bias as opposed to the unfortunate fact that black people are more likely to commit violent crime? I assume that arrest rates should be a good proxy for police interaction, this is a logical assumption - if you disagree then you should give a reason of why your assumption is better, not just say that the assumption "could" be wrong. The unfortunate truth is that black people are more likely to commit violent crime in the US. To show racial bias you have to show that police are disproportionately targeting blacks relative to the rate of crime, if you make the false assumption that the rate of crime is equal between black people and white people then your conclusions will be wrong. http://www.amren.com/news/2015/07/new-doj-statistics-on-race-and-violent-crime/ http://www.amren.com/news/2015/07/new-doj-statistics-on-race... Even for something like traffic stops, you need to study whether or not black people are more likely to get pulled over because they are black or because they are more likely to be young and therefore more likely to speed. It isn't enough to just say that black people are disproportionately stopped, you have to show that the rate of speeding is the same to show bias. http://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/21/nyregion/study-suggests-racial-gap-in-speeding-in-new-jersey.html?pagewanted=all http://www.nytimes.com/2002/03/21/nyregion/study-suggests-ra...

DavidWanjiru 10y ago
Wait, what do you mean black people are more likely to be pulled over, not because they're black, but because they're more likely to be young and hence more likely to speed? Which stat are you using, young black drivers as a proportion of all black drivers? Youn black drivers as a proportion of all drivers? And assuming we can assume all young drivers, regardless of race, are more likely to speed (unless you say otherwise), are the patterns of being pulled over amongst young black drivers similar to the patterns for young white/other race drivers?
- jomamaxx 10y ago
  "Wait, what do you mean black people are more likely to be pulled over, not because they're black, but because they're more likely to be young and hence more likely to speed?" Speeding or not speeding - African Americans are significantly more likely to be involved in all crimes - according to arrest and conviction data. I think there is probably some bias, for sure, but bias can't quite explain it all away. Neither can income or education. Even normalizing for those, there is still more violence within African American communities. It's obviously a complex problem, god forbid I don't have the answer, but the more politically fearless research we can do the better. A study of the likelihood of being shot while interacting with police, as opposed to a study of just the likelihood of being shot given race - is really not very helpful in this situation.
  - bduerst 10y ago
    > African Americans are significantly more likely to be involved in all crimes - according to arrest and conviction data. And according to studies in criminal behavior, African Americans are not any more likely to be committing crimes than other races. They're just more likely to be arrested by police and convicted for behavior than other races. If you don't believe me, you can look into marijuana use and possession arrests between the different races.
    - michaelbuddy 10y ago
      You're Wrong. And murder rates tell you that. MJ posession and murder are two different things. Per capita, blacks murder more than whites. AND in other countries, blacks also commit more than their "fair share" of crime including murders. Fortunately the United States still keeps the data on this. Canada is so bad now they purposely scrubbed racial information.
      - bduerst 10y ago
        You're wrong, and it's because you're cherry picking yet again. Murder is highly race-on-race, and because blacks have a smaller percentage of the population, they only appear to be higher per capita [1]. Of course, since your last comment seems to hint at confirmation bias, I'm sure you'll dismiss any real statistical analysis as "scrubbing". [1] http://qz.com/556988/here-are-four-charts-on-race-and-murder-in-america-to-tweet-back-at-donald-trump/ http://qz.com/556988/here-are-four-charts-on-race-and-murder...
fweespeech 10y ago
> To show racial bias you have to show that police are disproportionately targeting blacks relative to the rate of crime, if you make the false assumption that the rate of crime is equal between black people and white people then your conclusions will be wrong. > Even for something like traffic stops, you need to study whether or not black people are more likely to get pulled over because they are black or because they are more likely to be young and therefore more likely to speed. It isn't enough to just say that black people are disproportionately stopped, you have to show that the rate of speeding is the same to show bias. http://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/janfeb-2014/driving-while-black/ http://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/janfeb-2014/driving-wh... > The key influence on who is stopped in traffic safety stops is how you drive; in investigatory stops it is who you are, and being black is the leading influence. In traffic safety stops, being black has no influence: African Americans are not significantly more likely than whites to be stopped for clear traffic safety law violations. But in investigatory stops, a black man age twenty-five or younger has a 28 percent chance of being stopped for an investigatory reason over the course of a year; a similar young white man has a 12.5 percent chance, and a similar young white woman has only a 7 percent chance. And this is after taking into account other possible influences on being stopped, like how you drive. Police focus investigatory stops on younger people, and so as people grow older they are less likely to be stopped in this way. But a black man must reach fifty—well into the graying years—before his risk of an investigatory stop drops below that of a white man under age twenty-five. Overall, black drivers are nearly three times more likely than whites to be subjected to investigatory stops. > Being black is also the leading influence on how far police officers pursue their inquisition in investigatory stops. In these stops, full-blown vehicle searches are relatively common. After taking into account other possible influences, black drivers in our survey were five times more likely than whites to be subjected to searches in investigatory stops. Searches are remarkably rare in traffic safety stops, and the driver’s race has no influence on whether the driver is searched in these stops. Fyi, investigatory stops means the cop pulls you over for reasons that don't involve a traffic violation.
- timbuckley 10y ago
  Could you edit your post to make it clearer where you are quoting a user and where you are quoting something else?
MaysonL 10y ago
Ask any well-compensated black person who drives a reasonably expensive car how often they've been pulled over. The answer won't surprise me, but it might surprise you.
- micahbright 10y ago
  I'm a reasonably well compensated white person, and you might be surprised at how often I get pulled over. I don't get shot because I keep my hands on the steering wheel and I don't make any sudden movements.
  - bduerst 10y ago
    If we're going to go with anecdotal data here, I had an A/B test experience in St. Louis some years ago. As a white intern, I was pulled over for a speeding ticket on the commute to work and just given a ticket. That same morning a cop pulls over a black intern for speeding on the same route, but before giving him the ticket he pulls the intern out of the car and pats him down on the side of the car. In hindsight we should have compared the tickets to see if it was the same officer, but we were both wearing boring business casual attire.
    - micahbright 10y ago
      Yeah, but when you show me a video of a man getting shot by the police and you want me to show some sympathy, he better not be obviously resisting arrest. It's the "clean hands" principle. I feel bad, but I feel bad that nobody's there teaching these guys how to deal with cops in a civil manner that keeps you alive. Instead, we're just stirring the pot.
      - bduerst 10y ago
        > nobody's there teaching these guys how to deal with cops in a civil manner that keeps you alive Blaming the victim? Really? That's what the protest in Dallas was about. That Philando Castile, an African american, was politely complying with police and was still shot and killed in his car with his fiance and her daughter.
ryanmonroe 10y ago
>The unfortunate truth is that black people are more likely to commit violent crime in the US. It doesn't make much sense to cite the proportion of black people convicted of a crime by US law enforcement as evidence refuting the claim that the US law enforcement's interaction with people changes according to their race. The proportion of black people convicted of [category] crimes could be high for many reasons, including actually higher incidence of such crimes among blacks, racial prejudices at various points along the legal path of alleged criminals, and any combination of those or other factors.
- micahbright 10y ago
  You're right - it could be. But we don't like to make assumptions since we're having a rational scientific discussion. BTW, since the proportion of convictions is so high, it is going to require some pretty good explaining. Not some, off the cuff, hand-wavy, un-falsifiable, muh prejudice. Since our justice system is built on principles like "It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer", you better have a whole pile of evidence that people are getting convicted erroneously here.
  - cloudjacker 10y ago
    hm, but it isn't built on those principles and not practiced in any consistency throughout the myriad of jurisdictions in the united states the district attorneys and prosecutors have discretion on what facts [of the case] are relevant, have discretion on what crime to levy which influences the burden of proof, have discretion on what recommended sentence to pursue, and the judges have discretion on pursuing that sentence or not
    - micahbright 10y ago
      That's all interesting, except you have to realize that DA are motivated by convictions. Convictions are hard because it requires a unanimous vote from a jury of your peers. So, yes, they exercise their discretion on what facts are relevant and which cases to pursue. But they do not drop cases because its a white guy and keep them because its a black guy as you are insinuating. At most, race is going to be a minor factor when compared with the gravity of the crime and the likelihood of conviction.
sp332 10y ago
why do you assume this is do to racial bias Because this is America and there is a continuous history of racial bias since the country was founded. Or did you think that all went away with the 13th amendment? Or the 14th? Or maybe the 15th? The Department of Justice has reports detailing racist enforcement in Ferguson http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/04/us/justice-department-finds-pattern-of-police-bias-and-excessive-force-in-ferguson.html http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/04/us/justice-department-find... and Newark http://time.com/3020180/newark-police/ http://time.com/3020180/newark-police/ and the New York Bar Association had a report on stop-and-frisk being a racist policy in NYC http://www2.nycbar.org/pdf/report/uploads/20072495-StopFriskReport.pdf http://www2.nycbar.org/pdf/report/uploads/20072495-StopFrisk... [PDF] and a St. Louis police union is calling out racism in the department http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/king-black-union-st-louis-slams-department-article-1.2702852 http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/king-black-union-st...
bduerst 10y ago
There is already evidence of bias with arrests for other crimes. Marijuana possession accounts for 46% of all drug arrests. In terms of marijuana use, 14% of blacks and 12% of whites have used marijuana in the last year, yet blacks are 373% more likely to be arrested for possession. In some areas of the U.S., like Cook, IL, the bias gets as high as 720%. [1] If police are racially biased with arrests for one set of criminal behavior, isn't it likely there is some bias towards other types of behavior too? Like in stopping cars? [1] https://www.aclu.org/files/assets/aclu-thewaronmarijuana-rel2.pdf https://www.aclu.org/files/assets/aclu-thewaronmarijuana-rel...

DavidWanjiru 10y ago

Wait, what do you mean black people are more likely to be pulled over, not because they're black, but because they're more likely to be young and hence more likely to speed? Which stat are you using, young black drivers as a proportion of all black drivers? Youn black drivers as a proportion of all drivers? And assuming we can assume all young drivers, regardless of race, are more likely to speed (unless you say otherwise), are the patterns of being pulled over amongst young black drivers similar to the patterns for young white/other race drivers?

jomamaxx 10y ago
"Wait, what do you mean black people are more likely to be pulled over, not because they're black, but because they're more likely to be young and hence more likely to speed?" Speeding or not speeding - African Americans are significantly more likely to be involved in all crimes - according to arrest and conviction data. I think there is probably some bias, for sure, but bias can't quite explain it all away. Neither can income or education. Even normalizing for those, there is still more violence within African American communities. It's obviously a complex problem, god forbid I don't have the answer, but the more politically fearless research we can do the better. A study of the likelihood of being shot while interacting with police, as opposed to a study of just the likelihood of being shot given race - is really not very helpful in this situation.
- bduerst 10y ago
  > African Americans are significantly more likely to be involved in all crimes - according to arrest and conviction data. And according to studies in criminal behavior, African Americans are not any more likely to be committing crimes than other races. They're just more likely to be arrested by police and convicted for behavior than other races. If you don't believe me, you can look into marijuana use and possession arrests between the different races.
  - michaelbuddy 10y ago
    You're Wrong. And murder rates tell you that. MJ posession and murder are two different things. Per capita, blacks murder more than whites. AND in other countries, blacks also commit more than their "fair share" of crime including murders. Fortunately the United States still keeps the data on this. Canada is so bad now they purposely scrubbed racial information.
    - bduerst 10y ago
      You're wrong, and it's because you're cherry picking yet again. Murder is highly race-on-race, and because blacks have a smaller percentage of the population, they only appear to be higher per capita [1]. Of course, since your last comment seems to hint at confirmation bias, I'm sure you'll dismiss any real statistical analysis as "scrubbing". [1] http://qz.com/556988/here-are-four-charts-on-race-and-murder-in-america-to-tweet-back-at-donald-trump/ http://qz.com/556988/here-are-four-charts-on-race-and-murder...

fweespeech 10y ago

> To show racial bias you have to show that police are disproportionately targeting blacks relative to the rate of crime, if you make the false assumption that the rate of crime is equal between black people and white people then your conclusions will be wrong. > Even for something like traffic stops, you need to study whether or not black people are more likely to get pulled over because they are black or because they are more likely to be young and therefore more likely to speed. It isn't enough to just say that black people are disproportionately stopped, you have to show that the rate of speeding is the same to show bias. http://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/janfeb-2014/driving-while-black/ http://washingtonmonthly.com/magazine/janfeb-2014/driving-wh... > The key influence on who is stopped in traffic safety stops is how you drive; in investigatory stops it is who you are, and being black is the leading influence. In traffic safety stops, being black has no influence: African Americans are not significantly more likely than whites to be stopped for clear traffic safety law violations. But in investigatory stops, a black man age twenty-five or younger has a 28 percent chance of being stopped for an investigatory reason over the course of a year; a similar young white man has a 12.5 percent chance, and a similar young white woman has only a 7 percent chance. And this is after taking into account other possible influences on being stopped, like how you drive. Police focus investigatory stops on younger people, and so as people grow older they are less likely to be stopped in this way. But a black man must reach fifty—well into the graying years—before his risk of an investigatory stop drops below that of a white man under age twenty-five. Overall, black drivers are nearly three times more likely than whites to be subjected to investigatory stops. > Being black is also the leading influence on how far police officers pursue their inquisition in investigatory stops. In these stops, full-blown vehicle searches are relatively common. After taking into account other possible influences, black drivers in our survey were five times more likely than whites to be subjected to searches in investigatory stops. Searches are remarkably rare in traffic safety stops, and the driver’s race has no influence on whether the driver is searched in these stops. Fyi, investigatory stops means the cop pulls you over for reasons that don't involve a traffic violation.

timbuckley 10y ago
Could you edit your post to make it clearer where you are quoting a user and where you are quoting something else?

MaysonL 10y ago

Ask any well-compensated black person who drives a reasonably expensive car how often they've been pulled over. The answer won't surprise me, but it might surprise you.

micahbright 10y ago
I'm a reasonably well compensated white person, and you might be surprised at how often I get pulled over. I don't get shot because I keep my hands on the steering wheel and I don't make any sudden movements.
- bduerst 10y ago
  If we're going to go with anecdotal data here, I had an A/B test experience in St. Louis some years ago. As a white intern, I was pulled over for a speeding ticket on the commute to work and just given a ticket. That same morning a cop pulls over a black intern for speeding on the same route, but before giving him the ticket he pulls the intern out of the car and pats him down on the side of the car. In hindsight we should have compared the tickets to see if it was the same officer, but we were both wearing boring business casual attire.
  - micahbright 10y ago
    Yeah, but when you show me a video of a man getting shot by the police and you want me to show some sympathy, he better not be obviously resisting arrest. It's the "clean hands" principle. I feel bad, but I feel bad that nobody's there teaching these guys how to deal with cops in a civil manner that keeps you alive. Instead, we're just stirring the pot.
    - bduerst 10y ago
      > nobody's there teaching these guys how to deal with cops in a civil manner that keeps you alive Blaming the victim? Really? That's what the protest in Dallas was about. That Philando Castile, an African american, was politely complying with police and was still shot and killed in his car with his fiance and her daughter.

ryanmonroe 10y ago

>The unfortunate truth is that black people are more likely to commit violent crime in the US. It doesn't make much sense to cite the proportion of black people convicted of a crime by US law enforcement as evidence refuting the claim that the US law enforcement's interaction with people changes according to their race. The proportion of black people convicted of [category] crimes could be high for many reasons, including actually higher incidence of such crimes among blacks, racial prejudices at various points along the legal path of alleged criminals, and any combination of those or other factors.

micahbright 10y ago
You're right - it could be. But we don't like to make assumptions since we're having a rational scientific discussion. BTW, since the proportion of convictions is so high, it is going to require some pretty good explaining. Not some, off the cuff, hand-wavy, un-falsifiable, muh prejudice. Since our justice system is built on principles like "It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer", you better have a whole pile of evidence that people are getting convicted erroneously here.
- cloudjacker 10y ago
  hm, but it isn't built on those principles and not practiced in any consistency throughout the myriad of jurisdictions in the united states the district attorneys and prosecutors have discretion on what facts [of the case] are relevant, have discretion on what crime to levy which influences the burden of proof, have discretion on what recommended sentence to pursue, and the judges have discretion on pursuing that sentence or not
  - micahbright 10y ago
    That's all interesting, except you have to realize that DA are motivated by convictions. Convictions are hard because it requires a unanimous vote from a jury of your peers. So, yes, they exercise their discretion on what facts are relevant and which cases to pursue. But they do not drop cases because its a white guy and keep them because its a black guy as you are insinuating. At most, race is going to be a minor factor when compared with the gravity of the crime and the likelihood of conviction.

sp332 10y ago

why do you assume this is do to racial bias Because this is America and there is a continuous history of racial bias since the country was founded. Or did you think that all went away with the 13th amendment? Or the 14th? Or maybe the 15th? The Department of Justice has reports detailing racist enforcement in Ferguson http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/04/us/justice-department-finds-pattern-of-police-bias-and-excessive-force-in-ferguson.html http://www.nytimes.com/2015/03/04/us/justice-department-find... and Newark http://time.com/3020180/newark-police/ http://time.com/3020180/newark-police/ and the New York Bar Association had a report on stop-and-frisk being a racist policy in NYC http://www2.nycbar.org/pdf/report/uploads/20072495-StopFriskReport.pdf http://www2.nycbar.org/pdf/report/uploads/20072495-StopFrisk... [PDF] and a St. Louis police union is calling out racism in the department http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/king-black-union-st-louis-slams-department-article-1.2702852 http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/king-black-union-st...

bduerst 10y ago

There is already evidence of bias with arrests for other crimes. Marijuana possession accounts for 46% of all drug arrests. In terms of marijuana use, 14% of blacks and 12% of whites have used marijuana in the last year, yet blacks are 373% more likely to be arrested for possession. In some areas of the U.S., like Cook, IL, the bias gets as high as 720%. [1] If police are racially biased with arrests for one set of criminal behavior, isn't it likely there is some bias towards other types of behavior too? Like in stopping cars? [1] https://www.aclu.org/files/assets/aclu-thewaronmarijuana-rel2.pdf https://www.aclu.org/files/assets/aclu-thewaronmarijuana-rel...