4 ms·

The trend is global and not limited to the US. For example, violent crime has dropped dramatically in Sweden since the mid 90s. Of course you would never believ

The trend is global and not limited to the US. For example, violent crime has dropped dramatically in Sweden since the mid 90s. Of course you would never believe that by only reading the headlines! One of the causes pointed out by criminologists is the decrease in alcohol consumption. Among the general population it has decreased slightly, but enormously among youths. For example, the average alcohol consumption in liters per year for 16 year old boys has decreased from 7.4 l in 2004 to 3.0 l in 2018. When young males aren't drinking there are much fewer incidents of unnecessary violence. Less of these "misunderstandings" in nightclubs and pubs that always caused fights in the decades prior. RE: Clearly, people high on cannabis doesn't get nearly as violent as some people get when they are drunk. However, the Swedish statistics doesn't indicate that young people are switching from alcohol to cannabis. Cannabis use remains fairly low as it has always been. The kids are just partying less it seems.

easymodex 8y ago
Pure speculation but increased marihuana usage and acceptance could have been a contributing factor as well. A lot of young adults switching from binge drinking to chilling out while smoking with friends.
ZeroFries 8y ago
Less drugs, less sex, less rock-and-roll.
- drilldrive 8y ago
  I wonder if the in-house reason for liberating military recruitment protocols is the same reason for liberation of sexual standards: there is a smaller pool of interested applicants/mates, so we make do with what we can.
WillPostForFood 8y ago
This chart suggest Rapes/Sexual assaults are way up, Assaults are up, Murder/Robbery are the same or up a tiny bit. The only number in decline from the 90s looks like burglary. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Sweden#/media/File:Number_of_crimes_reported_per_100,000_population_in_Sweden,_1993-2013.svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Sweden#/media/File:Nu... And if you go back earlier than the 90s, crime looks like it has broadly gotten much worse: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a0/Sweden-crime-1976-2016-robbery-sex-murder.svg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a0/Sweden-c...
- m0zg 8y ago
  This could have something to do with changing Swedish definition of what constitutes "rape". The definition was dramatically expanded in recent years.
- bjourne 8y ago
  First of, we're discussing violent crime here. Rape and/or sexual assault is often non-violent and hence a different type of crime. Second, Wikipedia is an incredibly unreliable source for anything controversial and since the Orange Man decided make an example of the country ("Last night in Sweden..."), it's crime statistics became incredibly controversial! It is correct that the number of reported crimes has increased, which is not the same thing as an increase in the actual crime rate. If we instead look at homicide and manslaughter (dödligt våld) per 100 000 inhabitants, it paints a different picture: https://www.reddit.com/r/sweden/comments/5lr3u6/mord_per_capita_per_%C3%A5r_i_sverige/ https://www.reddit.com/r/sweden/comments/5lr3u6/mord_per_cap... Note that the y-axis begins at 0.5 so it looks like the increase and decrease was larger than it was. We can also look at victim surveys. The number of people who claims to have been the victim of violent crime: https://www.bra.se/images/18.221265bc145ae05f27a1831/1400769979758/BU2014-Andel-utsatta-f%C3%B6r-n%C3%A5got-v%C3%A5ld.png https://www.bra.se/images/18.221265bc145ae05f27a1831/1400769... Blue line is for young people 16+, purple line for the adult population (16-79) and green line also for the adult population (16-84). In reality, violent crime has decreased much more than what those graphs indicates. The reason is that the threshold for what constitutes violent "crime" has lowered. For example, 30 years ago someone who "lost a streetfight" likely wouldn't have considered himself a victim, nor would a woman who was slapped by her husband. But today they would because attitudes change. Therefore, counter-intuitively, the number of crime reports increases as crime decreases.

easymodex 8y ago

Pure speculation but increased marihuana usage and acceptance could have been a contributing factor as well. A lot of young adults switching from binge drinking to chilling out while smoking with friends.

ZeroFries 8y ago

Less drugs, less sex, less rock-and-roll.

drilldrive 8y ago
I wonder if the in-house reason for liberating military recruitment protocols is the same reason for liberation of sexual standards: there is a smaller pool of interested applicants/mates, so we make do with what we can.

WillPostForFood 8y ago

This chart suggest Rapes/Sexual assaults are way up, Assaults are up, Murder/Robbery are the same or up a tiny bit. The only number in decline from the 90s looks like burglary. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Sweden#/media/File:Number_of_crimes_reported_per_100,000_population_in_Sweden,_1993-2013.svg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crime_in_Sweden#/media/File:Nu... And if you go back earlier than the 90s, crime looks like it has broadly gotten much worse: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a0/Sweden-crime-1976-2016-robbery-sex-murder.svg https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a0/Sweden-c...

m0zg 8y ago
This could have something to do with changing Swedish definition of what constitutes "rape". The definition was dramatically expanded in recent years.
bjourne 8y ago
First of, we're discussing violent crime here. Rape and/or sexual assault is often non-violent and hence a different type of crime. Second, Wikipedia is an incredibly unreliable source for anything controversial and since the Orange Man decided make an example of the country ("Last night in Sweden..."), it's crime statistics became incredibly controversial! It is correct that the number of reported crimes has increased, which is not the same thing as an increase in the actual crime rate. If we instead look at homicide and manslaughter (dödligt våld) per 100 000 inhabitants, it paints a different picture: https://www.reddit.com/r/sweden/comments/5lr3u6/mord_per_capita_per_%C3%A5r_i_sverige/ https://www.reddit.com/r/sweden/comments/5lr3u6/mord_per_cap... Note that the y-axis begins at 0.5 so it looks like the increase and decrease was larger than it was. We can also look at victim surveys. The number of people who claims to have been the victim of violent crime: https://www.bra.se/images/18.221265bc145ae05f27a1831/1400769979758/BU2014-Andel-utsatta-f%C3%B6r-n%C3%A5got-v%C3%A5ld.png https://www.bra.se/images/18.221265bc145ae05f27a1831/1400769... Blue line is for young people 16+, purple line for the adult population (16-79) and green line also for the adult population (16-84). In reality, violent crime has decreased much more than what those graphs indicates. The reason is that the threshold for what constitutes violent "crime" has lowered. For example, 30 years ago someone who "lost a streetfight" likely wouldn't have considered himself a victim, nor would a woman who was slapped by her husband. But today they would because attitudes change. Therefore, counter-intuitively, the number of crime reports increases as crime decreases.