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I agree that, in general, you're going to have biased training data (with a bias that's difficult to measure) and so inherently policing recommendations will be

I agree that, in general, you're going to have biased training data (with a bias that's difficult to measure) and so inherently policing recommendations will be biased. This is particularly problematic when it comes to arrests for crimes that are inherently 'selective' in their enforcement. Eg; drug-related crimes, public intoxication, loitering, trespassing. But the fact is... violent (fatal and nonfatal) crimes do happen at a much higher rate in poor neighborhoods. And black americans are calling the police at higher rates knowing full-well what that might imply [1](https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/hpnvv0812.pdf https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/hpnvv0812.pdf). Anecdotally, when I lived in south side Chicago, when speaking to residents (that did not live in a predominantly affluent area like Hyde Park) one of the key complaints was that there simply wasn't enough police to respond to violent incidents. There's a worrying trend in the conversation these days that has shifted from "there's a serious problem with racism in how police go about their job" to "we need less police". Folks in neighborhoods living with the constant threat of gang violence don't have the luxury to sit in their aeron chairs and argue about defunding the police. They face the very real threat of themselves or their loved ones being shot on the streets and statistically not by police.

r00fus 6y ago
From studies I’ve read it is noted that most of those calls could be handled by a social worker or other non-violent responder. The problem is the police budget has dwarfed and subsumed all non-violent requests as well.
- starkd 6y ago
  Not sure You can always separate out violent from non-violent events. The police are expected to deal with a whole community in a holistic way.
  - r00fus 6y ago
    It's easy - when someone wants a well-check or reports mental health or substance abuse or maybe even rape, that should go to someone other than police. Showing up with a gun to some events is guaranteed to make things worse.
    - briandear 6y ago
      A rape investigation should be done by a social worker? Are they trained criminal investigators? Is a social worker familiar with the rules of criminal evidence? The job of the police is to investigate crimes and present evidence to the DA. For welfare checks or mental illness incidents, then of course a social worker or analogue could be a better choice. For investigating criminal acts, that’s specifically what police do. If someone calls in a rape, what happens when the suspect is still there? Rape is a violent crime and showing up with a gun is absolutely appropriate. It’s ridiculous to suggest violent crimes should be investigated by people who aren’t trained in criminal investigation nor trained to deal with violent and dangerous suspects. Is the social worker going to carry handcuffs? Are they going to be trained in apprehending suspects? If so, then that means the social worker is now a cop. Let’s not throw the baby out with the bath water here.
      - nitrogen 6y ago
        It would be perfectly possible to have people who are trained to preserve evidence who are not also traditional police. E.g. a medical examiner of some kind. You want someone to work with traumatized victims delicately, and a uniformed cop with a sidearm is not the ideal presence in that case. I don't want to get into suspect present/absent/whatever; but this type of crime isn't necessarily done by a random stranger in every case.
        fastball 6y ago
        This hypothetical trained medical examiner won't be wearing a uniform? Seems like a uniform might be a good idea. As to a sidearm – if I'd just been raped, someone showing up to protect me with a sidearm sounds like just the ticket. Not sure what you are saying about a suspect not being a random stranger, that doesn't seem particularly relevant to whether or not the suspect is still there.
      - adamsea 6y ago
        The baby’s already been tossed my friend. The police actually have a terrible record when it comes to handling the crime of rape. They downplay it, deprioritize it, etc. Read about the massive backlog of rape kits. Literally - rape crimes that are reported to the police, and that they deprioritize or ignore. https://www.rainn.org/articles/addressing-rape-kit-backlog https://www.rainn.org/articles/addressing-rape-kit-backlog
  - thebradbain 6y ago
    Why does a victim of sexual assault need to report to someone who has a gun? Why does a wellness check need to be performed with a gun? Why does a standard highway patrolman or cop doing routine speed traps need a gun? Why does every cop in a school need a gun? Why is the gun the constant?
    - iamstupidsimple 6y ago
      > Why does a standard highway patrolman or cop doing routine speed traps need a gun? Because this is statistically the form of policing most likely to get cops shot. > Why does every cop in a school need a gun? A symptom of America's school shooting problem. When your child is being gunned down you'll probably wish the police there were armed.
      - zepto 6y ago
        School shootings where children are being gunned down are vanishingly rare.
        zaroth 6y ago
        In 2019, eight people were killed and 43 were injured in 25 school shooting incidents. 2018 was much worse with 37 kids killed in school shootings. This is roughly the same as the number of unarmed black people shot and killed by police in the line of duty (at least this number has been trending downward for several years).
        zepto 6y ago
        Do you have a source for the this? Reporting of school shootings is notoriously unreliable: https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/08/27/640323347/the-school-shootings-that-werent https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/08/27/640323347/the-sch...
        zaroth 6y ago
        I agree, there's no standard definition. I grabbed the 8 / 43 number for 2019 here [1]. I see they have similar numebers as what I found for 2018 as well [2]. The 2018 numbers I was referencing was from this 10 year overview [3]. [1] - https://www.edweek.org/ew/section/multimedia/school-shootings-of-2019-behind-the-numbers.html https://www.edweek.org/ew/section/multimedia/school-shooting... [2] - https://www.edweek.org/ew/section/multimedia/school-shootings-2018-how-many-where.html https://www.edweek.org/ew/section/multimedia/school-shooting... [3] - https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2019/07/us/ten-years-of-school-shootings-trnd/ https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2019/07/us/ten-years-of-scho...
  - dragonwriter 6y ago
    > No, you never can with absolutely certainty, the question is how you distribute the costs of uncertainty. Leading with paramilitary enforcers in nearly all situations has consequences that people are not happy with, hence the defund/dismantle/abolish movement. > The police are expected to deal with a whole community in a holistic way. Which they manifestly fail to do effectively, for structural reasons. A paramilitary force with minimal entry education requirements whose training disproportionately focuses on the proper use of force to secure compliance is not a good general purpose community response tool.
    - starkd 6y ago
      since when do they use paramilitary forces "in nearly all situations" ? I think you're jumping the gun a bit on that statement. The problem is that supposedly non-violent situations can turn violent or threatening very quickly. So, all officers need to be trained in use of force.
      - adamsea 6y ago
        > since when do they use paramilitary forces "in nearly all situations" ? I think you're jumping the gun a bit on that statement. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/06/police-academies-paramilitary/612859/ https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/06/police-aca... "The majority of law-enforcement academies in the United States are loosely modeled on military boot camps." https://www.charleskochinstitute.org/issue-areas/criminal-justice-policing-reform/militarization-of-police/ https://www.charleskochinstitute.org/issue-areas/criminal-ju... "Over 8,000 law enforcement agencies have utilized the 1033 program to access more than $6 billion worth of military equipment such as night-vision goggles, machine guns, armored vehicles, bayonets, grenade launchers, and military aircraft ... ... One study found that use of paramilitary-style teams by law enforcement increased by more than 1,400 percent since 1980." https://cjmasters.eku.edu/sites/cjmasters.eku.edu/files/21stmilitarization.pdf https://cjmasters.eku.edu/sites/cjmasters.eku.edu/files/21st... --- Or, just apply your eyes and look at the photos of St. Louis police with sniper rifles trained on crowds of people during the Ferguson protests. One is here: https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/08/14/ferguson-and-the-shocking-nature-of-us-police-militarization https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/08/14/ferguson-and...
- kebman 6y ago
  Domestic issues are often met with social workers where I'm from. They gain early detection and access, by registering and treating social issues such as poverty, health or mental related issues. A lot of people then have their lives changed for the better, so they never fall into crime. On a whole, this is good for society, since it gets the benefit of less crime and violence, and so society becomes safer. On top of that, our police is trained in peacefully settling most disputes, though they of course retain the monopoly on violence if need be.
  - pininja 6y ago
    Where is this wonderful place, and when can I move there?
    - kebman 6y ago
      It's Norway, though many European countries have similar policies. It's not cool to be met with social workers, though. It means you've basically failed at life.
snowwrestler 6y ago
If we want to stop neighborhood gang violence in the long term, we need to work on why people join gangs, and what they are fighting over. We can't do that with police, who generally don't come into the situation until after it's too late and things have gone wrong. But if most of our money is going to the police, then what resources are available to do the longer-term work on gangs and neighborhoods? In software development terms (since this is HN), it would be like spending more and more money on QA and support because your products have so many problems. At some point a wise manager is going to say "wait, we should invest in better product development instead." If you have infinite funding, you can do both. If you don't have infinite funding, you need to look at changing your allocation.
- lostlogin 6y ago
  Talking with police is interesting. I talked policing with a police officer who had worked in New Zealand, the UK and Australia. These are countries that are relatively close in culture and the differences in policing described by the officer were striking. A lot of this was in relation to what the police role was and how other services cooperated (or didn’t). It would be great to have a description of system differences from an officer who had worked in more systems.
  - NickNameNick 6y ago
    Could you expand on that? I'm really curious about what the differences were.
    - paragraft 6y ago
      One starting observation I'd venture is those countries (and Canada) base their policing on Peelian principles, which establish a basis of policing and the relationship with the public. The US police culture had different roots. Edit: for reference, the list of principles that were issued to each new police officer in London from 1829 onward. 1. The basic mission for which the police exist is to prevent crime and disorder 2. The ability of the police to perform their duties is dependent upon public approval of police actions 3. Police must secure the willing co-operation of the public in voluntary observance of the law to be able to secure and maintain the respect of the public 4. The degree of co-operation of the public that can be secured diminishes proportionately to the necessity of the use of physical force 5. Police seek and preserve public favour not by pandering to public opinion but by constantly demonstrating absolute impartial service to the law 6. Police use physical force to the extent necessary to secure observance of the law or to restore order only when the exercise of persuasion, advice and warning is found to be insufficient 7. Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence 8. Police should always direct their action strictly towards their functions and never appear to usurp the powers of the judiciary 9. The test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with it I find much wisdom there, and as I go down that list I find it hard not to think for each item of counter-anecdotes from the news about US policing in recent years.
Misdicorl 6y ago
Horseshit. Police response to violent incidents in 'problematic' neighborhoods is already extremely slow. The threat of gang violence is not mitigated by police response. The threat of gang violence is mitigated by providing much better options for people who would otherwise join gangs. Police presence is immaterial to the lack of gangs in affluent neighborhoods.
- banads 6y ago
  What is horseshit? Nothing in your response is contrary to anything the person said that you're responding to
  - Misdicorl 6y ago
    >There's a worrying trend in the conversation these days that has shifted from "there's a serious problem with racism in how police go about their job" to "we need less police". Folks in neighborhoods living with the constant threat of gang violence don't have the luxury to sit in their aeron chairs and argue about defunding the police. They face the very real threat of themselves or their loved ones being shot on the streets and statistically not by police. This is horseshit. The premise is false. The conclusion is misleading. It is FUD
    - ryankemper 6y ago
      So, you haven't provided _any_ citations or even vague references to Wikipedia articles, rather you just called their opinion FUD and left it at that. How am I, a 3rd-party observer of this thread, supposed to extract any value from such statements? The person you were quoting did not provide rock-solid proof that having police helps reduce violence, but they did provide a citation showing that: > Violence against persons in poor (51%) and low-income (50%) households was more likely to be reported to police than violence against persons in mid- (43%) and high-income (45%) households from https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/hpnvv0812.pdf https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/hpnvv0812.pdf So you could certainly argue that they are actually irrational to call the police and thus the higher rate is explained by them incorrectly thinking police would help them. But it's tricky to argue that with no data :) Cheers
vmception 6y ago
Swing and a miss, overpolicing has nothing to do with violent crime. It has to do with nonviolent infractions that marginalize people to begin with. Being actually caught with illicit substances , or caught for the unpaid ticket. These things are evenly distributed across society, but when overly targeting minorities it further marginalizes them. Exhibit A) YOU might not be able to relate to people that routinely have a bag of coke on them, but a proportionate demographics of the population do. Exhibit B) Silicon Valley openly brags about microdosing acid to perform at work at their half million $ jobs. Overpolicing would ensnare them if overpolicing existed in that demographic and then they would be ineligible for jobs the rest of their life. If you cant be subsidized by your family then you have actual crime to consider. Guess where you will live too.
- ryankemper 6y ago
  > These things are evenly distributed across society This is an unproven assertion. You should provide evidence of it, because on its face it is a completely ludicrous claim. Rates of illicit drug activity, violent crime, etc are _not_ evenly distributed in society. Not even close. > Exhibit B) Silicon Valley openly brags about microdosing acid to perform at work at their half million $ jobs. Overpolicing would ensnare them if overpolicing existed in that demographic and then they would be ineligible for jobs the rest of their life. If you cant be subsidized by your family then you have actual crime to consider. Guess where you will live too. Quite simply, the reason people that microdose are not getting thrown in jail is because they're not doing the other things that would lead to them getting discovered, i.e. engaging in crime or driving a car with significant (meaning, more than a person can safely swallow to avoid arrest) quantities of lsd. --- Just incase you try to pin a belief-set on me, I oppose the war on drugs, no-knock raids, and even speeding tickets completely and would entirely abolish them if I were the BFDL.
  - mnm1 6y ago
    Actually, black people use drugs at slightly lower rates than whites. This is common knowledge or should be. Here's 3 of the top 6 google links for "illicit drug use by race": https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2377408/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2377408/ https://www.hamiltonproject.org/charts/rates_of_drug_use_and_sales_by_race_rates_of_drug_related_criminal_justice https://www.hamiltonproject.org/charts/rates_of_drug_use_and... https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047235217301277 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004723521...
aeturnum 6y ago
I think you make a good point about the need for law enforcement in high-crime areas, though I disagree strongly that the only solution to that problem is a police force as currently constituted in the US. I think it's worth pointing out that police often has abysmal clearance rates and response times and often do not provide effective relief from the real problems you outline. However, what I wanted to raise was this: > the fact is... violent (fatal and nonfatal) crimes do happen at a much higher rate in poor neighborhoods I think this statement is worth examining. We certainly know that poor neighborhoods contact the police more often and that the police arrest more people (and record more crimes) in poor neighborhoods. As I said above, I have ever reason to believe residents of poor neighborhoods suffer crimes more often and that each crime does proportionally greater damage to their lives. I also think that, as people get access to more resources, they are reasons to believe they are less likely to contact the police in all circumstances. That, of course, is the other way to read the stats you linked about poor neighborhoods contacting police. Police clearance rates are often low and contacting the police rarely directly addresses the harm caused by a crime. Also, because we are most likely to be harmed by people in our social circles, wealthier people are more likely to be harmed by more powerful people. These are all reasons that wealthier victims of crimes might choose not to contact the police and generate statistics about them. It's difficult to point to data about what isn't recorded (of course), but I think the feminist movement has done some great work trying to document how under-reported rapes (and other sexual crimes) are. I just want to encourage skepticism about the systems through which data is collected. Structural elements strongly bias the data that's collected and, if we're serious about changing the system, I think it's advantageous to be skeptical of every element of the system.
- DuskStar 6y ago
  > > the fact is... violent (fatal and nonfatal) crimes do happen at a much higher rate in poor neighborhoods > I think this statement is worth examining. Are you trying to suggest that there are a large number of unreported, undiscovered murders in more affluent areas? Because that's one of the the kinds of violent crime that we're pretty sure happen disproportionately in poor or black communities. (you're more likely to be murdered if you're poor, and more likely to be murdered if you're black, with IIRC the richest 20% of blacks still being murdered more often than the poorest 20% of non-hispanic whites)
cptskippy 6y ago
> There's a worrying trend in the conversation these days that has shifted from "there's a serious problem with racism in how police go about their job" to "we need less police". The conversations aren't about less police, they're about defunding the police and putting that money to better use. If the police choose to reduce their numbers in order to afford riot gear, tear gas guns, armored personnel carriers, warrior training, and all the other BS well then there won't be armies of them assaulting the public. > Folks in neighborhoods living with the constant threat of gang violence don't have the luxury to sit in their aeron chairs and argue about defunding the police. They face the very real threat of themselves or their loved ones being shot on the streets and statistically not by police. Throwing police at the problem of gang violence hasn't solved it. It hasn't made the neighborhoods safer. If overwhelming violence quelled violence, why has the Taliban outlasted two first world armies back by trillions of dollars?
- momokoko 6y ago
  > Throwing police at the problem of gang violence hasn't solved it. It hasn't made the neighborhoods safer. That is not true. We have solid data from New York during the Giuliani era and more recently Camden, NJ. Whether or not we agree with how they accomplished that is another matter. For example in New York a massive increase in arrests for nonviolent crime and much more proactively policing in order to check for warrants etc. The truth is that nothing works in isolation. In New York we also saw a migration of younger professionals back into the city which reduced crime by forcing out poorer residents via gentrification. The reality is that in any nation with a high prevalence of gun ownership combined with a large portion of the population without enough to provide for themselves and often, due to criminal records, no other choice but to commit crimes to provide for themselves.
  - stx 6y ago
    Some of the reduction on crime may have come at the cost of racially biased stop and frisk. This data shows 9 out of 10 people stopped were innocent. It also heavily showed that black and latino people were stopped much more frequently. https://www.nyclu.org/en/Stop-and-Frisk-data https://www.nyclu.org/en/Stop-and-Frisk-data I am glad that stop and frisk was ruled unconstitutional. https://civilrights.org/edfund/resource/nypds-infamous-stop-and-frisk-policy-found-unconstitutional/ https://civilrights.org/edfund/resource/nypds-infamous-stop-...
longtimegoogler 6y ago
I agree, but I don't think the answer is pull the police out of predominantly black neighborhoods, which seems to be the motivation for shutting this program down. Better training, more black officers, more rules around the use of force seem like better options. Of course, I don't really know what the people in these neighborhoods want so I am open to some alternatives, but ranting about predictive policing doesn't seem to solve much unless the answer really is defund the police.
- stx 6y ago
  I think the answer is to filter police who may have tendency to violence and racism out of the police force. There have been police who violate rights and the police departments keep them on even after the department or city pays huge settlements. From my understanding police are able to leave departments and not necessarily have their complaint history follow them to new departments. So if they have racked up complaints then they could move to a new department and essentially have a clean record.
  - rootusrootus 6y ago
    In the US, I believe the majority of states license law enforcement personnel so they couldn't easily move to another department.
  - thaumasiotes 6y ago
    > I think the answer is to filter police who may have tendency to violence and racism out of the police force. If this solution ended up filtering out most black police, would racism be more or less of a problem than it is now?
- kebman 6y ago
  I believe in positive reinforcement. As far as I know there are already more black people in the police squads in black neighbourhoods, but it can't hurt to get more in, especially in exposed areas. I don't believe in responding to higher crime rates with less police, however. The only alternative to that, is vigilantism. That will only lead to people buying weapons for personal protection, which will again only lead to more violence... On top of that, the violence due to "self protection" often takes the form of pure vengeance, and thus it is far more often illegitimate. People claim that more guns make people more polite, but why are there also more violence in gang neighbourhoods then? From my own culture, blood vengeance was for a time a necessary part of life due to the complete lack of law enforcement. It doesn't mean that life was "better" in any shape or form in the viking age, however. Far from it! Nay, it was with the advent of well organized local militias and police forces that my society became safe.
threatofrain 6y ago
Isn’t Chicago also where they discovered a police black site that had been operating for years? What’s the story here? https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/24/chicago-police-detain-americans-black-site https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/24/chicago-poli...
- monksy 6y ago
  It got shut down. It sounds bad but you have to remember how violent some of the areas get on the West and South side (Garflied Park W+E, and Engelwood are all within the top 5)
  - stallmanite 6y ago
    So the black site is somehow justified by the fact that there is crime in the area? This makes no sense. The black site is itself illegal and an example of lawlessness. How is an Abu Gharib clone helping solve the gamg problem? Did Abu Gharib really help out the efforts in Iraq?
    - monksy 6y ago
      Not justifying it. I'm suggesting that it came to be over a lack of resources and people tried to adapt to what they could do to solve the problem.
dragonwriter 6y ago
> This is particularly problematic when it comes to arrests for crimes that are inherently 'selective' in their enforcement All crimes are selective in enforcement; reporting, police response, and prosecution all, for all crimes, have both unintentional biases and deliberate prioritization and acts of discretion involved. > There's a worrying trend in the conversation these days that has shifted from "there's a serious problem with racism in how police go about their job" to "we need less police". Well, worrying to people who are invested in the biases of the present law enforcement structure, and who perceive it as working well for their interests. > Folks in neighborhoods living with the constant threat of gang violence don't have the luxury to sit in their aeron chairs and argue about defunding the police. And yet they are where the movement is strongest. > They face the very real threat of themselves or their loved ones being shot on the streets and statistically not by police. And, even then, the police don't care, don't help, further traumatize the victims when thet get involved in crime in those neighborhoods at all, and still drain resources that could be used to deal with the problems producing crime out of the community via their voracious appetite for funding.
- zaroth 6y ago
  It seems like you’re just making sweeping generalizations in an effort to do ideological battle. I think people in crime-ridden areas are generally very interested in seeing greater police presence, not less. [1] Studies have shown a larger police presence results in lower arrest rates and lower use of force. And in the vast majority of cases where police are called to a scene they do in fact care deeply, and help effectively. I think it’s easy to get caught up in tempest and start blaming a large group for the actions of a small minority. I’m no expert, but my understanding is we’ve done decades of studies and had decades of progress toward reducing violent crime, and increased funding for police has been a main pillar of that effort. Obama’s efforts to provide billions of dollars of police funding, for example, saw decreases in crime rates for cities that received the funding versus increases in cities that missed out. [1] - https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/2/13/18193661/hire-police-officers-crime-criminal-justice-reform-booker-harris https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/2/13/18193661/h...
adamsea 6y ago
I question your assertion that police are necessary to reduce violent crime. I’m sharing one reason below. Another is that the police have an atrocious record when it comes to dealing with one of the most violent crimes short of murder, which is rape. “The Crisis Management System: this network deploys teams of credible messengers who mediate conflicts on the street and connect high-risk individuals to services that can reduce the long-term risk of violence. In the last three years, the Crisis Management System has contributed to a 15 percent decline in shootings in the 17 highest violence precincts in New York City.” https://www1.nyc.gov/site/peacenyc/interventions/crisis-management.page https://www1.nyc.gov/site/peacenyc/interventions/crisis-mana... I found the above cited in: https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-the-police-could-be-defunded https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-the-police-coul...
bhntr3 6y ago
I don't know enough to advocate a solution in the "defund the police" debate and I agree that I don't have enough personal experience from my aeron chair (which, as you know, I was actually born in.) But, excluding the less police argument, how is the prevalence of violent crime in low income African American neighborhoods a justification for predictive policing? Given the risk of propagating bias and a history of racist policing messing up the data, wouldn't it just be better to keep humans in charge? They've been disappointing recently but I still think they have potential. Maybe it would be helpful if I put better links here. I didn't expect this comment to get so many responses and my link was a bit flippant. This research probably does a better job of explaining the position than I do. Here's a Stanford survey from 2016 in Oakland that showed that African Americans are ~4.5x as likely to be stopped as whites despite representing a smaller percentage of the population, that they are 4x as likely to be handcuffed in a stop, 4x as likely to be searched in a stop and 2.5x as likely to be arrested in a stop (which is, as mentioned, 4.5x as likely to happen.): https://news.stanford.edu/2016/06/15/stanford-big-data-study-finds-racial-disparities-oakland-calif-police-behavior-offers-solutions/ https://news.stanford.edu/2016/06/15/stanford-big-data-study... I got interested in racist inference due to this Harvard paper that showed that google search ads were much more likely to suggest arrest records for African American names than white names: https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1301/1301.6822.pdf https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1301/1301.6822.pdf I accepted that implicit bias is intrinsic and difficult to weed out when I heard about studies showing that resumes with African American names received much lower response rates than white names: https://cos.gatech.edu/facultyres/Diversity_Studies/Bertrand_LakishaJamal.pdf https://cos.gatech.edu/facultyres/Diversity_Studies/Bertrand... I remember reading somewhere that this effect even persisted with African American studies professors selecting grad students. I can't find that paper but this HBS article describes the phenomenon and discusses how the response rate effect is even present when the company claims to promote diversity within the application: https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/minorities-who-whiten-job-resumes-get-more-interviews https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/minorities-who-whiten-job-resumes... I also advocate for learned epistemic helplessness (https://scienceforsustainability.org/wiki/Epistemic_Learned_Helplessness https://scienceforsustainability.org/wiki/Epistemic_Learned_...) even if I don't always practice it well. I'm only claiming to have knowledge in the small area of predicting bad behavior using machine learning. It's probably best to find a person of color with personal experience and a better knowledge of the literature for anything else. Of course, you already know that. I hope you're doing well!

r00fus 6y ago

From studies I’ve read it is noted that most of those calls could be handled by a social worker or other non-violent responder. The problem is the police budget has dwarfed and subsumed all non-violent requests as well.

starkd 6y ago
Not sure You can always separate out violent from non-violent events. The police are expected to deal with a whole community in a holistic way.
- r00fus 6y ago
  It's easy - when someone wants a well-check or reports mental health or substance abuse or maybe even rape, that should go to someone other than police. Showing up with a gun to some events is guaranteed to make things worse.
  - briandear 6y ago
    A rape investigation should be done by a social worker? Are they trained criminal investigators? Is a social worker familiar with the rules of criminal evidence? The job of the police is to investigate crimes and present evidence to the DA. For welfare checks or mental illness incidents, then of course a social worker or analogue could be a better choice. For investigating criminal acts, that’s specifically what police do. If someone calls in a rape, what happens when the suspect is still there? Rape is a violent crime and showing up with a gun is absolutely appropriate. It’s ridiculous to suggest violent crimes should be investigated by people who aren’t trained in criminal investigation nor trained to deal with violent and dangerous suspects. Is the social worker going to carry handcuffs? Are they going to be trained in apprehending suspects? If so, then that means the social worker is now a cop. Let’s not throw the baby out with the bath water here.
    - nitrogen 6y ago
      It would be perfectly possible to have people who are trained to preserve evidence who are not also traditional police. E.g. a medical examiner of some kind. You want someone to work with traumatized victims delicately, and a uniformed cop with a sidearm is not the ideal presence in that case. I don't want to get into suspect present/absent/whatever; but this type of crime isn't necessarily done by a random stranger in every case.
      - fastball 6y ago
        This hypothetical trained medical examiner won't be wearing a uniform? Seems like a uniform might be a good idea. As to a sidearm – if I'd just been raped, someone showing up to protect me with a sidearm sounds like just the ticket. Not sure what you are saying about a suspect not being a random stranger, that doesn't seem particularly relevant to whether or not the suspect is still there.
    - adamsea 6y ago
      The baby’s already been tossed my friend. The police actually have a terrible record when it comes to handling the crime of rape. They downplay it, deprioritize it, etc. Read about the massive backlog of rape kits. Literally - rape crimes that are reported to the police, and that they deprioritize or ignore. https://www.rainn.org/articles/addressing-rape-kit-backlog https://www.rainn.org/articles/addressing-rape-kit-backlog
- thebradbain 6y ago
  Why does a victim of sexual assault need to report to someone who has a gun? Why does a wellness check need to be performed with a gun? Why does a standard highway patrolman or cop doing routine speed traps need a gun? Why does every cop in a school need a gun? Why is the gun the constant?
  - iamstupidsimple 6y ago
    > Why does a standard highway patrolman or cop doing routine speed traps need a gun? Because this is statistically the form of policing most likely to get cops shot. > Why does every cop in a school need a gun? A symptom of America's school shooting problem. When your child is being gunned down you'll probably wish the police there were armed.
    - zepto 6y ago
      School shootings where children are being gunned down are vanishingly rare.
      - zaroth 6y ago
        In 2019, eight people were killed and 43 were injured in 25 school shooting incidents. 2018 was much worse with 37 kids killed in school shootings. This is roughly the same as the number of unarmed black people shot and killed by police in the line of duty (at least this number has been trending downward for several years).
        zepto 6y ago
        Do you have a source for the this? Reporting of school shootings is notoriously unreliable: https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/08/27/640323347/the-school-shootings-that-werent https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2018/08/27/640323347/the-sch...
        zaroth 6y ago
        I agree, there's no standard definition. I grabbed the 8 / 43 number for 2019 here [1]. I see they have similar numebers as what I found for 2018 as well [2]. The 2018 numbers I was referencing was from this 10 year overview [3]. [1] - https://www.edweek.org/ew/section/multimedia/school-shootings-of-2019-behind-the-numbers.html https://www.edweek.org/ew/section/multimedia/school-shooting... [2] - https://www.edweek.org/ew/section/multimedia/school-shootings-2018-how-many-where.html https://www.edweek.org/ew/section/multimedia/school-shooting... [3] - https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2019/07/us/ten-years-of-school-shootings-trnd/ https://www.cnn.com/interactive/2019/07/us/ten-years-of-scho...
- dragonwriter 6y ago
  > No, you never can with absolutely certainty, the question is how you distribute the costs of uncertainty. Leading with paramilitary enforcers in nearly all situations has consequences that people are not happy with, hence the defund/dismantle/abolish movement. > The police are expected to deal with a whole community in a holistic way. Which they manifestly fail to do effectively, for structural reasons. A paramilitary force with minimal entry education requirements whose training disproportionately focuses on the proper use of force to secure compliance is not a good general purpose community response tool.
  - starkd 6y ago
    since when do they use paramilitary forces "in nearly all situations" ? I think you're jumping the gun a bit on that statement. The problem is that supposedly non-violent situations can turn violent or threatening very quickly. So, all officers need to be trained in use of force.
    - adamsea 6y ago
      > since when do they use paramilitary forces "in nearly all situations" ? I think you're jumping the gun a bit on that statement. https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/06/police-academies-paramilitary/612859/ https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2020/06/police-aca... "The majority of law-enforcement academies in the United States are loosely modeled on military boot camps." https://www.charleskochinstitute.org/issue-areas/criminal-justice-policing-reform/militarization-of-police/ https://www.charleskochinstitute.org/issue-areas/criminal-ju... "Over 8,000 law enforcement agencies have utilized the 1033 program to access more than $6 billion worth of military equipment such as night-vision goggles, machine guns, armored vehicles, bayonets, grenade launchers, and military aircraft ... ... One study found that use of paramilitary-style teams by law enforcement increased by more than 1,400 percent since 1980." https://cjmasters.eku.edu/sites/cjmasters.eku.edu/files/21stmilitarization.pdf https://cjmasters.eku.edu/sites/cjmasters.eku.edu/files/21st... --- Or, just apply your eyes and look at the photos of St. Louis police with sniper rifles trained on crowds of people during the Ferguson protests. One is here: https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/08/14/ferguson-and-the-shocking-nature-of-us-police-militarization https://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/08/14/ferguson-and...
kebman 6y ago
Domestic issues are often met with social workers where I'm from. They gain early detection and access, by registering and treating social issues such as poverty, health or mental related issues. A lot of people then have their lives changed for the better, so they never fall into crime. On a whole, this is good for society, since it gets the benefit of less crime and violence, and so society becomes safer. On top of that, our police is trained in peacefully settling most disputes, though they of course retain the monopoly on violence if need be.
- pininja 6y ago
  Where is this wonderful place, and when can I move there?
  - kebman 6y ago
    It's Norway, though many European countries have similar policies. It's not cool to be met with social workers, though. It means you've basically failed at life.

snowwrestler 6y ago

If we want to stop neighborhood gang violence in the long term, we need to work on why people join gangs, and what they are fighting over. We can't do that with police, who generally don't come into the situation until after it's too late and things have gone wrong. But if most of our money is going to the police, then what resources are available to do the longer-term work on gangs and neighborhoods? In software development terms (since this is HN), it would be like spending more and more money on QA and support because your products have so many problems. At some point a wise manager is going to say "wait, we should invest in better product development instead." If you have infinite funding, you can do both. If you don't have infinite funding, you need to look at changing your allocation.

lostlogin 6y ago
Talking with police is interesting. I talked policing with a police officer who had worked in New Zealand, the UK and Australia. These are countries that are relatively close in culture and the differences in policing described by the officer were striking. A lot of this was in relation to what the police role was and how other services cooperated (or didn’t). It would be great to have a description of system differences from an officer who had worked in more systems.
- NickNameNick 6y ago
  Could you expand on that? I'm really curious about what the differences were.
  - paragraft 6y ago
    One starting observation I'd venture is those countries (and Canada) base their policing on Peelian principles, which establish a basis of policing and the relationship with the public. The US police culture had different roots. Edit: for reference, the list of principles that were issued to each new police officer in London from 1829 onward. 1. The basic mission for which the police exist is to prevent crime and disorder 2. The ability of the police to perform their duties is dependent upon public approval of police actions 3. Police must secure the willing co-operation of the public in voluntary observance of the law to be able to secure and maintain the respect of the public 4. The degree of co-operation of the public that can be secured diminishes proportionately to the necessity of the use of physical force 5. Police seek and preserve public favour not by pandering to public opinion but by constantly demonstrating absolute impartial service to the law 6. Police use physical force to the extent necessary to secure observance of the law or to restore order only when the exercise of persuasion, advice and warning is found to be insufficient 7. Police, at all times, should maintain a relationship with the public that gives reality to the historic tradition that the police are the public and the public are the police; the police being only members of the public who are paid to give full-time attention to duties which are incumbent on every citizen in the interests of community welfare and existence 8. Police should always direct their action strictly towards their functions and never appear to usurp the powers of the judiciary 9. The test of police efficiency is the absence of crime and disorder not the visible evidence of police action in dealing with it I find much wisdom there, and as I go down that list I find it hard not to think for each item of counter-anecdotes from the news about US policing in recent years.

Misdicorl 6y ago

Horseshit. Police response to violent incidents in 'problematic' neighborhoods is already extremely slow. The threat of gang violence is not mitigated by police response. The threat of gang violence is mitigated by providing much better options for people who would otherwise join gangs. Police presence is immaterial to the lack of gangs in affluent neighborhoods.

banads 6y ago
What is horseshit? Nothing in your response is contrary to anything the person said that you're responding to
- Misdicorl 6y ago
  >There's a worrying trend in the conversation these days that has shifted from "there's a serious problem with racism in how police go about their job" to "we need less police". Folks in neighborhoods living with the constant threat of gang violence don't have the luxury to sit in their aeron chairs and argue about defunding the police. They face the very real threat of themselves or their loved ones being shot on the streets and statistically not by police. This is horseshit. The premise is false. The conclusion is misleading. It is FUD
  - ryankemper 6y ago
    So, you haven't provided _any_ citations or even vague references to Wikipedia articles, rather you just called their opinion FUD and left it at that. How am I, a 3rd-party observer of this thread, supposed to extract any value from such statements? The person you were quoting did not provide rock-solid proof that having police helps reduce violence, but they did provide a citation showing that: > Violence against persons in poor (51%) and low-income (50%) households was more likely to be reported to police than violence against persons in mid- (43%) and high-income (45%) households from https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/hpnvv0812.pdf https://www.bjs.gov/content/pub/pdf/hpnvv0812.pdf So you could certainly argue that they are actually irrational to call the police and thus the higher rate is explained by them incorrectly thinking police would help them. But it's tricky to argue that with no data :) Cheers

vmception 6y ago

Swing and a miss, overpolicing has nothing to do with violent crime. It has to do with nonviolent infractions that marginalize people to begin with. Being actually caught with illicit substances , or caught for the unpaid ticket. These things are evenly distributed across society, but when overly targeting minorities it further marginalizes them. Exhibit A) YOU might not be able to relate to people that routinely have a bag of coke on them, but a proportionate demographics of the population do. Exhibit B) Silicon Valley openly brags about microdosing acid to perform at work at their half million $ jobs. Overpolicing would ensnare them if overpolicing existed in that demographic and then they would be ineligible for jobs the rest of their life. If you cant be subsidized by your family then you have actual crime to consider. Guess where you will live too.

ryankemper 6y ago
> These things are evenly distributed across society This is an unproven assertion. You should provide evidence of it, because on its face it is a completely ludicrous claim. Rates of illicit drug activity, violent crime, etc are _not_ evenly distributed in society. Not even close. > Exhibit B) Silicon Valley openly brags about microdosing acid to perform at work at their half million $ jobs. Overpolicing would ensnare them if overpolicing existed in that demographic and then they would be ineligible for jobs the rest of their life. If you cant be subsidized by your family then you have actual crime to consider. Guess where you will live too. Quite simply, the reason people that microdose are not getting thrown in jail is because they're not doing the other things that would lead to them getting discovered, i.e. engaging in crime or driving a car with significant (meaning, more than a person can safely swallow to avoid arrest) quantities of lsd. --- Just incase you try to pin a belief-set on me, I oppose the war on drugs, no-knock raids, and even speeding tickets completely and would entirely abolish them if I were the BFDL.
- mnm1 6y ago
  Actually, black people use drugs at slightly lower rates than whites. This is common knowledge or should be. Here's 3 of the top 6 google links for "illicit drug use by race": https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2377408/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2377408/ https://www.hamiltonproject.org/charts/rates_of_drug_use_and_sales_by_race_rates_of_drug_related_criminal_justice https://www.hamiltonproject.org/charts/rates_of_drug_use_and... https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0047235217301277 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004723521...

aeturnum 6y ago

I think you make a good point about the need for law enforcement in high-crime areas, though I disagree strongly that the only solution to that problem is a police force as currently constituted in the US. I think it's worth pointing out that police often has abysmal clearance rates and response times and often do not provide effective relief from the real problems you outline. However, what I wanted to raise was this: > the fact is... violent (fatal and nonfatal) crimes do happen at a much higher rate in poor neighborhoods I think this statement is worth examining. We certainly know that poor neighborhoods contact the police more often and that the police arrest more people (and record more crimes) in poor neighborhoods. As I said above, I have ever reason to believe residents of poor neighborhoods suffer crimes more often and that each crime does proportionally greater damage to their lives. I also think that, as people get access to more resources, they are reasons to believe they are less likely to contact the police in all circumstances. That, of course, is the other way to read the stats you linked about poor neighborhoods contacting police. Police clearance rates are often low and contacting the police rarely directly addresses the harm caused by a crime. Also, because we are most likely to be harmed by people in our social circles, wealthier people are more likely to be harmed by more powerful people. These are all reasons that wealthier victims of crimes might choose not to contact the police and generate statistics about them. It's difficult to point to data about what isn't recorded (of course), but I think the feminist movement has done some great work trying to document how under-reported rapes (and other sexual crimes) are. I just want to encourage skepticism about the systems through which data is collected. Structural elements strongly bias the data that's collected and, if we're serious about changing the system, I think it's advantageous to be skeptical of every element of the system.

DuskStar 6y ago
> > the fact is... violent (fatal and nonfatal) crimes do happen at a much higher rate in poor neighborhoods > I think this statement is worth examining. Are you trying to suggest that there are a large number of unreported, undiscovered murders in more affluent areas? Because that's one of the the kinds of violent crime that we're pretty sure happen disproportionately in poor or black communities. (you're more likely to be murdered if you're poor, and more likely to be murdered if you're black, with IIRC the richest 20% of blacks still being murdered more often than the poorest 20% of non-hispanic whites)

cptskippy 6y ago

> There's a worrying trend in the conversation these days that has shifted from "there's a serious problem with racism in how police go about their job" to "we need less police". The conversations aren't about less police, they're about defunding the police and putting that money to better use. If the police choose to reduce their numbers in order to afford riot gear, tear gas guns, armored personnel carriers, warrior training, and all the other BS well then there won't be armies of them assaulting the public. > Folks in neighborhoods living with the constant threat of gang violence don't have the luxury to sit in their aeron chairs and argue about defunding the police. They face the very real threat of themselves or their loved ones being shot on the streets and statistically not by police. Throwing police at the problem of gang violence hasn't solved it. It hasn't made the neighborhoods safer. If overwhelming violence quelled violence, why has the Taliban outlasted two first world armies back by trillions of dollars?

momokoko 6y ago
> Throwing police at the problem of gang violence hasn't solved it. It hasn't made the neighborhoods safer. That is not true. We have solid data from New York during the Giuliani era and more recently Camden, NJ. Whether or not we agree with how they accomplished that is another matter. For example in New York a massive increase in arrests for nonviolent crime and much more proactively policing in order to check for warrants etc. The truth is that nothing works in isolation. In New York we also saw a migration of younger professionals back into the city which reduced crime by forcing out poorer residents via gentrification. The reality is that in any nation with a high prevalence of gun ownership combined with a large portion of the population without enough to provide for themselves and often, due to criminal records, no other choice but to commit crimes to provide for themselves.
- stx 6y ago
  Some of the reduction on crime may have come at the cost of racially biased stop and frisk. This data shows 9 out of 10 people stopped were innocent. It also heavily showed that black and latino people were stopped much more frequently. https://www.nyclu.org/en/Stop-and-Frisk-data https://www.nyclu.org/en/Stop-and-Frisk-data I am glad that stop and frisk was ruled unconstitutional. https://civilrights.org/edfund/resource/nypds-infamous-stop-and-frisk-policy-found-unconstitutional/ https://civilrights.org/edfund/resource/nypds-infamous-stop-...

longtimegoogler 6y ago

I agree, but I don't think the answer is pull the police out of predominantly black neighborhoods, which seems to be the motivation for shutting this program down. Better training, more black officers, more rules around the use of force seem like better options. Of course, I don't really know what the people in these neighborhoods want so I am open to some alternatives, but ranting about predictive policing doesn't seem to solve much unless the answer really is defund the police.

stx 6y ago
I think the answer is to filter police who may have tendency to violence and racism out of the police force. There have been police who violate rights and the police departments keep them on even after the department or city pays huge settlements. From my understanding police are able to leave departments and not necessarily have their complaint history follow them to new departments. So if they have racked up complaints then they could move to a new department and essentially have a clean record.
- rootusrootus 6y ago
  In the US, I believe the majority of states license law enforcement personnel so they couldn't easily move to another department.
- thaumasiotes 6y ago
  > I think the answer is to filter police who may have tendency to violence and racism out of the police force. If this solution ended up filtering out most black police, would racism be more or less of a problem than it is now?
kebman 6y ago
I believe in positive reinforcement. As far as I know there are already more black people in the police squads in black neighbourhoods, but it can't hurt to get more in, especially in exposed areas. I don't believe in responding to higher crime rates with less police, however. The only alternative to that, is vigilantism. That will only lead to people buying weapons for personal protection, which will again only lead to more violence... On top of that, the violence due to "self protection" often takes the form of pure vengeance, and thus it is far more often illegitimate. People claim that more guns make people more polite, but why are there also more violence in gang neighbourhoods then? From my own culture, blood vengeance was for a time a necessary part of life due to the complete lack of law enforcement. It doesn't mean that life was "better" in any shape or form in the viking age, however. Far from it! Nay, it was with the advent of well organized local militias and police forces that my society became safe.

threatofrain 6y ago

Isn’t Chicago also where they discovered a police black site that had been operating for years? What’s the story here? https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/24/chicago-police-detain-americans-black-site https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/feb/24/chicago-poli...

monksy 6y ago
It got shut down. It sounds bad but you have to remember how violent some of the areas get on the West and South side (Garflied Park W+E, and Engelwood are all within the top 5)
- stallmanite 6y ago
  So the black site is somehow justified by the fact that there is crime in the area? This makes no sense. The black site is itself illegal and an example of lawlessness. How is an Abu Gharib clone helping solve the gamg problem? Did Abu Gharib really help out the efforts in Iraq?
  - monksy 6y ago
    Not justifying it. I'm suggesting that it came to be over a lack of resources and people tried to adapt to what they could do to solve the problem.

dragonwriter 6y ago

> This is particularly problematic when it comes to arrests for crimes that are inherently 'selective' in their enforcement All crimes are selective in enforcement; reporting, police response, and prosecution all, for all crimes, have both unintentional biases and deliberate prioritization and acts of discretion involved. > There's a worrying trend in the conversation these days that has shifted from "there's a serious problem with racism in how police go about their job" to "we need less police". Well, worrying to people who are invested in the biases of the present law enforcement structure, and who perceive it as working well for their interests. > Folks in neighborhoods living with the constant threat of gang violence don't have the luxury to sit in their aeron chairs and argue about defunding the police. And yet they are where the movement is strongest. > They face the very real threat of themselves or their loved ones being shot on the streets and statistically not by police. And, even then, the police don't care, don't help, further traumatize the victims when thet get involved in crime in those neighborhoods at all, and still drain resources that could be used to deal with the problems producing crime out of the community via their voracious appetite for funding.

zaroth 6y ago
It seems like you’re just making sweeping generalizations in an effort to do ideological battle. I think people in crime-ridden areas are generally very interested in seeing greater police presence, not less. [1] Studies have shown a larger police presence results in lower arrest rates and lower use of force. And in the vast majority of cases where police are called to a scene they do in fact care deeply, and help effectively. I think it’s easy to get caught up in tempest and start blaming a large group for the actions of a small minority. I’m no expert, but my understanding is we’ve done decades of studies and had decades of progress toward reducing violent crime, and increased funding for police has been a main pillar of that effort. Obama’s efforts to provide billions of dollars of police funding, for example, saw decreases in crime rates for cities that received the funding versus increases in cities that missed out. [1] - https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/2/13/18193661/hire-police-officers-crime-criminal-justice-reform-booker-harris https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/2/13/18193661/h...

adamsea 6y ago

I question your assertion that police are necessary to reduce violent crime. I’m sharing one reason below. Another is that the police have an atrocious record when it comes to dealing with one of the most violent crimes short of murder, which is rape. “The Crisis Management System: this network deploys teams of credible messengers who mediate conflicts on the street and connect high-risk individuals to services that can reduce the long-term risk of violence. In the last three years, the Crisis Management System has contributed to a 15 percent decline in shootings in the 17 highest violence precincts in New York City.” https://www1.nyc.gov/site/peacenyc/interventions/crisis-management.page https://www1.nyc.gov/site/peacenyc/interventions/crisis-mana... I found the above cited in: https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-the-police-could-be-defunded https://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/how-the-police-coul...

bhntr3 6y ago

I don't know enough to advocate a solution in the "defund the police" debate and I agree that I don't have enough personal experience from my aeron chair (which, as you know, I was actually born in.) But, excluding the less police argument, how is the prevalence of violent crime in low income African American neighborhoods a justification for predictive policing? Given the risk of propagating bias and a history of racist policing messing up the data, wouldn't it just be better to keep humans in charge? They've been disappointing recently but I still think they have potential. Maybe it would be helpful if I put better links here. I didn't expect this comment to get so many responses and my link was a bit flippant. This research probably does a better job of explaining the position than I do. Here's a Stanford survey from 2016 in Oakland that showed that African Americans are ~4.5x as likely to be stopped as whites despite representing a smaller percentage of the population, that they are 4x as likely to be handcuffed in a stop, 4x as likely to be searched in a stop and 2.5x as likely to be arrested in a stop (which is, as mentioned, 4.5x as likely to happen.): https://news.stanford.edu/2016/06/15/stanford-big-data-study-finds-racial-disparities-oakland-calif-police-behavior-offers-solutions/ https://news.stanford.edu/2016/06/15/stanford-big-data-study... I got interested in racist inference due to this Harvard paper that showed that google search ads were much more likely to suggest arrest records for African American names than white names: https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1301/1301.6822.pdf https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/1301/1301.6822.pdf I accepted that implicit bias is intrinsic and difficult to weed out when I heard about studies showing that resumes with African American names received much lower response rates than white names: https://cos.gatech.edu/facultyres/Diversity_Studies/Bertrand_LakishaJamal.pdf https://cos.gatech.edu/facultyres/Diversity_Studies/Bertrand... I remember reading somewhere that this effect even persisted with African American studies professors selecting grad students. I can't find that paper but this HBS article describes the phenomenon and discusses how the response rate effect is even present when the company claims to promote diversity within the application: https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/minorities-who-whiten-job-resumes-get-more-interviews https://hbswk.hbs.edu/item/minorities-who-whiten-job-resumes... I also advocate for learned epistemic helplessness (https://scienceforsustainability.org/wiki/Epistemic_Learned_Helplessness https://scienceforsustainability.org/wiki/Epistemic_Learned_...) even if I don't always practice it well. I'm only claiming to have knowledge in the small area of predicting bad behavior using machine learning. It's probably best to find a person of color with personal experience and a better knowledge of the literature for anything else. Of course, you already know that. I hope you're doing well!