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Or, as is far more often the case, they find someone of colour (usually Black) driving a car that fits some racially biased‡ preconceived notion (e.g., the only

Or, as is far more often the case, they find someone of colour (usually Black) driving a car that fits some racially biased‡ preconceived notion (e.g., the only way a Black man could be driving this car is either (a) they are a drug dealer because they’ve got lots of cash or (b) they’ve stolen it). ‡ While an unfortunately large number of police officers in the U.S. (and elsewhere) are outright racist, not all are. However, most do pattern matching according to what they’ve been trained as "indicators of criminality", and most of those patterns have their basis in systemic racism that have no connection to real criminality. As I pointed out on a wholly separate discussion the other day, the most common and largest form of theft — and the one least prosecuted — is wage theft by white collar workers.

ceejayoz 3y ago
This is provably the case. https://news.stanford.edu/press-releases/2020/05/05/veil-darkness-reas-traffic-stops/ https://news.stanford.edu/press-releases/2020/05/05/veil-dar... Daytime, black drivers get disproportionately pulled over. Nighttime, same rate as others. Daylight savings time switch used to eliminate other variables in a really elegant way.
- pauldenton 3y ago
  New Jersey Turnpike seems to suggest the opposite. That different groups break traffic rules at different rates, and given the amount of speeding the police under enforced black speeding tickets
  - ceejayoz 3y ago
    Got a cite you'd like to share? The only one I can see is a 20 year study that the DOJ asked not be released due to methodology problems.
    - pauldenton 3y ago
      https://www.city-journal.org/article/the-racial-profiling-myth-debunked-2 https://www.city-journal.org/article/the-racial-profiling-my... It is a two decade old article. Heather MacDonald has been harping on it for that long
- wahnfrieden 3y ago
  This data suggests traffic stops are more often pretext stops rather than in response to dangerous driving
concordDance 3y ago
> However, most do pattern matching according to what they’ve been trained as "indicators of criminality", and most of those patterns have their basis in systemic racism that have no connection to real criminality. Somewhat going off topic here but I'm curious: do you think in the USA African Americans have the same real rate of serious criminality (such as murder, not speeding) as other groups once you adjust for poverty?
- halostatue 3y ago
  I don’t have time to search to show my work (nor do I care to do so), but my understanding of the data is that suggests the same or lower. The real incidence rate is hard to tease out because of the presumption of criminality baked into the American system — we know, for example, that Blacks in America are on average charged more frequently, convicted more frequently, and imprisoned for longer than any other group. White defendants are more likely to be offered diversion programs or be offered leniency, even if they are from the same economic circumstances. In Canada, that presumption of criminality is placed on Indigenous peoples and the imbalances between groups on charges, convictions, and imprisons are similarly lopsided as those for Black Americans.
  - overrun11 3y ago
    > The real incidence rate is hard to tease out because of the presumption of criminality baked into the American system I don't think it's as hard as you make it out to be. We have multiple independent sources collecting this data. The FBI collects racial data on perpetrators and victims, and multiple national surveys ask victims of crimes about the demographics of the perpetrator. The numbers from all these independent sources are fairly consistent. Murders are especially easy to get reliable numbers on because there's a body. We know black people are murdered at dramatically higher rates than any other race and that most murder is intraracial. The reported racial crime statistics are accurate unless we believe that white people are sneaking into inner city majority black areas to murder black people undetected in massive numbers and the FBI is conspiring with multiple independent data collection groups to cover it up.

ceejayoz 3y ago

This is provably the case. https://news.stanford.edu/press-releases/2020/05/05/veil-darkness-reas-traffic-stops/ https://news.stanford.edu/press-releases/2020/05/05/veil-dar... Daytime, black drivers get disproportionately pulled over. Nighttime, same rate as others. Daylight savings time switch used to eliminate other variables in a really elegant way.

pauldenton 3y ago
New Jersey Turnpike seems to suggest the opposite. That different groups break traffic rules at different rates, and given the amount of speeding the police under enforced black speeding tickets
- ceejayoz 3y ago
  Got a cite you'd like to share? The only one I can see is a 20 year study that the DOJ asked not be released due to methodology problems.
  - pauldenton 3y ago
    https://www.city-journal.org/article/the-racial-profiling-myth-debunked-2 https://www.city-journal.org/article/the-racial-profiling-my... It is a two decade old article. Heather MacDonald has been harping on it for that long
wahnfrieden 3y ago
This data suggests traffic stops are more often pretext stops rather than in response to dangerous driving

concordDance 3y ago

> However, most do pattern matching according to what they’ve been trained as "indicators of criminality", and most of those patterns have their basis in systemic racism that have no connection to real criminality. Somewhat going off topic here but I'm curious: do you think in the USA African Americans have the same real rate of serious criminality (such as murder, not speeding) as other groups once you adjust for poverty?

halostatue 3y ago
I don’t have time to search to show my work (nor do I care to do so), but my understanding of the data is that suggests the same or lower. The real incidence rate is hard to tease out because of the presumption of criminality baked into the American system — we know, for example, that Blacks in America are on average charged more frequently, convicted more frequently, and imprisoned for longer than any other group. White defendants are more likely to be offered diversion programs or be offered leniency, even if they are from the same economic circumstances. In Canada, that presumption of criminality is placed on Indigenous peoples and the imbalances between groups on charges, convictions, and imprisons are similarly lopsided as those for Black Americans.
- overrun11 3y ago
  > The real incidence rate is hard to tease out because of the presumption of criminality baked into the American system I don't think it's as hard as you make it out to be. We have multiple independent sources collecting this data. The FBI collects racial data on perpetrators and victims, and multiple national surveys ask victims of crimes about the demographics of the perpetrator. The numbers from all these independent sources are fairly consistent. Murders are especially easy to get reliable numbers on because there's a body. We know black people are murdered at dramatically higher rates than any other race and that most murder is intraracial. The reported racial crime statistics are accurate unless we believe that white people are sneaking into inner city majority black areas to murder black people undetected in massive numbers and the FBI is conspiring with multiple independent data collection groups to cover it up.