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How does this compare to the growth in the number of environmental activists overall? Edit: it was pointed out below that it's probably more influenced by an i

• bratwurst3000 5y ago
  I would like to Point out that the absolut number of environmental activists is hard to define. How would you start to count? Such a list would be a bad thing. So if there is no absolute number of all activist there is no way to compare dead and alive….but dead ones are more easy to count. And last thing…they are killed while trying to make the world a better place…the number of those people getting Killed should allways be zero.
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• cenophor 5y ago
  This is murder, not people falling off the cliff because of some accidents. There is probably nothing logically wrong with that question, and you are probably right that there is a correlation. But... seriously?
  • TeMPOraL 5y ago
    Yes, seriously. Number one failure in sensationalized reporting is base rate fallacy: they point out a high absolute number, implying something strange is going on, whereas usually the denominator - which they neglect to mention - has rose proportionally, meaning there's nothing newsworthy there. I don't mean this is the case here (I'm yet to read the article itself) - but this failure mode in reporting is so common that it's a good habit to immediately look for / question lack of base rate data.
    • kingkawn 5y ago
      Other than the increase in Murder of activists
    • krageon 5y ago
      I get that at some point murder becomes statistics, but I still feel the need to re-emphasize that this is murder. Not more folks getting the flu because there are more folks.
      • TeMPOraL 5y ago
        Fair enough, and I agree. People are being murdered, and that's the more important topic.
      • jamesrcole 5y ago
        i disagree with the implication that murder somehow shouldn't be looked at in statistical terms. I am not saying it should only be looked at in statistical terms, but it is one important way of looking at it.
      • Sebb767 5y ago
        The larger point is that some (very small) percentage of people will be murdered every year. If the number of climate activists increases, the chance of one of them being murdered increases with it - possibly just by being involved in a random shooting or family drama, completely unrelated to their activism. I agree that murder is horrible, but the article seems to try to sell that these murders are related to their activism, which is not something you can say just based on the absolute number. You need to have the ratio to compare to the last year and to the base rate in the general population to make a better statement. Without it, we can't be sure of the real cause and might try to fix this at the wrong place, leading to us to not prevent murders effectively - so yes, you need to get your statistics right, even when talking about horrible incidents.
    • bryanrasmussen 5y ago
      >whereas usually the denominator - which they neglect to mention - has rose proportionally, meaning there's nothing newsworthy there. there is not necessarily a reason to assume that the percentage of murder of activists is going to stay the same if you increase the number of activists, although it may be the case.
  • ArchieMaclean 5y ago
    Of course we should be doing all we can to prevent murder! It is just always hard to tell with statistics and having a more honest statistic (that, say, shows that murder rates have doubled while number of activists have increased 30%) would be preferable.
    • yunohn 5y ago
      I’m not sure what kind of number you’re looking for. There’s no global registry tracking the population of environmental activists - just that when people are murdered by anti-green corporations, we can figure out that the person’s activism is what caused it.
      • ArchieMaclean 5y ago
        While you won't be able to get a hard number of people, you could get a general number/trend (e.g. by counting the increase of people to rallies)
        • yunohn 5y ago
          I’m pretty sure activists are not just “people who show up to rallies”. Especially not the kind that a megacorp is trying to murder.
          • jamesrcole 5y ago
            the idea that there's no possible way to reasonably estimate the number of environmental activists seems very unlikely to me.
            • yunohn 5y ago
              Do you happen to have some sources for a reasonable estimation on the number of, say… • hackers? • crackers? • political activists?
              • 5y ago
  • IMTDb 5y ago
    Yes, seriously. The real question is : "Is environmental activism today more dangerous than it was yesterday". The typical way of computing "dangerosity" is through a ratio. Eg: number of death / kilometer for transportation systems, number of injury / game for sports, ... Why should the dangerosity of the "environmental activism" activity be computed differently, by only taking into consideration a numerator, and dismissing the denominator ?
    • coldtea 5y ago
      >The real question is : "Is environmental activism today more dangerous than it was yesterday". Why would that be the "real question"? Just because all we have is the hammer of statistical analysis? More people are getting killed, whether they are environmental activists is not that relevant. What's relevant is that there is increased willingness to kill in favor of anti-environmnet interests. >Why should the dangerosity of the "environmental activism" activity be computed differently, by only taking into consideration a numerator, and dismissing the denominator ? It shouldn't be computed at all, the concern here is not to give people some dangerocity score to help them avoid being killed. The concern is to stop the interests that kill -- that is, to stop the murders and the murderers, not to avoid them by having people not be environmental activists or be more careful about it. (Same way we would want to reduce racist crime, not e.g. tell blacks to be more careful. We might also want that, but not as a first priority, as a treatment to the symptoms, not the cause).
    • yunohn 5y ago
      Despite this weird sub-thread, the article isn’t talking about “dangerosity”. They’re reporting on the increase in evil activities by anti-environmental mega corps, who are also murdering opposing activists.
      • andriesm 5y ago
        What indication do we have that environmentalally unfriendly companies are murdering activists? I cannot imagine that being their best PR strategy, not to mention the fact that murdering your opposition attracts a lot of scrutiny, investigation, and which corp exec would want to risk going to jail for ordering a hit on an activist. Far more practical to lobby or spread counter marketing spin.
  • cies 5y ago
    > This is murder Worse, it's corporate murder. Not some "crime passionel" or a marginalized mental patient going bezerk. This is big corps silencing dissent, premeditated and usually paid for. It's hard to get justice in these cases, like in this case: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinaltrainal_v._Coca-Cola_Co https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sinaltrainal_v._Coca-Cola_Co.
• Shacklz 5y ago
  Are climate activists expected to "take some loss" or what exactly are you implying with this question? If people die because they engage in non-violent activism it's just wrong, plain and simple, there's no gray area (at least I have a very hard time thinking of one). The overall number of activists or the growth thereof has absolutely nothing to do with that.
  • _dain_ 5y ago
    it has everything to do with it. if the murder rate remains constant and a group doubles in size, then on average twice as many people in that group will get murdered.
    • spuz 5y ago
      Why would you expect the murder rate to be constant? It's plausible the opposite is true that the more murders there are, the more publicity they get overall and the more cautious would-be murderers become.
      • TeMPOraL 5y ago
        Perhaps. Maybe it's constant, maybe it's rising, or maybe it's falling. To be able to tell, you need the denominator - that's why it's important.
      • jamesrcole 5y ago
        > Why would you expect the murder rate to be constant? they didn't expect it to be, they said if it remains constant. You seem to be the one making the assumption -- that it wouldn't remain constant -- otherwise why would you have made that comment?
        • spuz 5y ago
          The commenter I replied to said "It (the number of activists) has everything to do with it". That is pretty strong language to me. I infer from that the commenter wanted to suggest that the number of activists is the only factor that matters because we can assume that murder-rate would remain constant. If I am making the wrong inference here then I put it down to the strong and yet imprecise language of "it has everything to do with it".
• cutemonster 5y ago
  Seems this'd rather be proportional to the number of new logging and mining projects etc, from the article: > Almost a third of the murders were reportedly linked to resource exploitation - logging, mining, large-scale agribusiness, hydroelectric dams and other infrastructure.
  • ArchieMaclean 5y ago
    Ah, that makes a lot of sense.
• deleted 5y ago
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• paganel 5y ago
  > in environmentally damaging activities such as logging. That's most probably the case, yes. I live in a country (Romania) where a lot of illegal (or borderline-illegal) logging activities happen and a few environmental activists have been physically harmed while one or two foresters have actually been killed. The issue is that many mountain communities (where the logging happens) are dependent on that activity for their actual survival, because honestly there's not that much one can do in a mountain village to gain your daily bread, and of course when outside forces (like the central administration that employs said foresters, or the environmental activists whose income does not depend on those trees being cut down) come in and threaten that survival the inevitable happens, i.e. physical violence.
  • rocgf 5y ago
    Not sure if that's quite right? The ones targeted by the law and activists for illegal logging are usually companies connected to politicians. They are indeed violent, but they don't get to benefit from any excuses like the one you presented.
    • paganel 5y ago
      Those companies are not using robots to cut those trees down and transport them, they're using local people who get paid for that. If you stop those logging activities then the locals don't get paid anymore. Another thing is that a lot of people living in those mountain villages were dependent on those forrest trees for their winter heating and small things to do around the house, it was an unwritten rule centuries old, i.e. the forrest belonged to everyone from the village. In Western Europe the powers that be got rid of this custom some time ago, the French around 200 years ago thanks to Napoleon, the English I think even before that. Now, you have those foresters accompanied in some cases by the police who can send you to prison if you're carrying some undocumented wood, the same as your dad or your grand-dad or your ancestors used to do for centuries. Of course that will create havoc.
  • krasi0 5y ago
    Quite similar is the situation in neighbouring Bulgaria and I am sure the rest of the Balkan countries as well.
• zimbatm 5y ago
  Wouldn't you expect the number of murders to go down if there are more activists united in one region? To paint a clearer picture you would have to look at the distribution of both murders and new activists. I bet there are more online activists now, but it doesn't necessarily translate to having more helpers in poor areas. Which are where the natural resources are.
  • ArchieMaclean 5y ago
    That's a good point. I'm not sure about murders going down with united activists - it seems the people targeted are generally the ones organising activists into groups, so if there were more they might be of greater focus. It's complicated though.
• rendall 5y ago
  > How does this compare to the growth in the number of environmental activists overall? It's a legitimate question. Any answer other than environmental activists have increased/decreased by x is not an answer to the question. If it's an emotionally loaded response (e.g. Seriously? People are murdered while you quibble!), it's a non-sequitur.
  • markenqualitaet 5y ago
    No, it's a cynical question, which derails the conversation into an arbitrary technical debate. It implies/hints at/suggests there is methological issue. Murder is not some statistical event you have to expect, account for. Language/communication doesn't work the way you argue here. There is context. OP's question would be valid and common for science on e.g. the connection of total brain cancers and smartphone usage.
    • rendall 5y ago
      > No, it's a cynical question No. The cynicism is the insistence that it doesn't matter. > ...which derails the conversation If the answer were "There has been a decrease in the total number of activists, therefore the record is worse that the absolute numbers imply" would you make this accusation? No. No you would not. You would insist, correctly, that it was very relevant. You would rightly look with suspicion upon people who insist that the question "derails the conversation" The "derails the conversation" accusation is itself a cynical attempt to control the conversation
      • markenqualitaet 5y ago
        No I would not make the argument in reverse as you suggested. Not in this context. This is atypical murder. The proliferation of murder is the only metric that matters. This is not your average crime context. It's more or less legitimate businesses/corporations stepping out of legitimate methods. Any murder in this context is noteworthy, an increase points at a catastrophic development of uncontained corporate power. A junkie killig someone in a robbery does not damage the foundations of our current society, where coca cola killing a union worker does. No amount of murder is to be expected, or assumed here, regardless of the activism extend. It's categorically different to "common murder". Likewise you wouldn't discuss a rise in Al Qaeda terrorist attacks in relation to US population growth, or cartel excutions in relation to Mexico's birth rate. What you are interested in is the number of organized, state-like, violent offenders only, not the pool of their victims. I hope my point gets across. Not a native speaker.