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You’re not “correcting” me. You’re swapping denominators and then accusing me of misrepresentation. The ~69% figure is not “probably based on” anything. It’s d

You’re not “correcting” me. You’re swapping denominators and then accusing me of misrepresentation. The ~69% figure is not “probably based on” anything. It’s directly from the FBI’s 2023 hate crime data as summarized by DOJ: 2,699 religion-based incidents, 1,832 anti-Jewish. That is 1,832 / 2,699 = 67.9% (call it ~68–69%). Source: https://www.justice.gov/crs/news/2023-hate-crime-statistics https://www.justice.gov/crs/news/2023-hate-crime-statistics Now you try to “debunk” that by quietly switching the denominator to all hate crimes. Fine. Do that math too: 1,832 / 11,862 total incidents = 15.4% of all reported hate crime incidents in 2023. For a ~2% population, that’s still about 7–8x disproportionate. So no, it’s not “not true.” You’re just changing the question and hoping nobody notices. You even implicitly concede the underlying statistic (“69% of religion-based hate crimes”) and then pretend it’s false by changing denominators mid-argument. Your “only if religion-based hate crimes were the only type” line is nonsense. I explicitly restricted the claim to religion-based incidents, and the DOJ/FBI table does the same. You’re arguing with a strawman you invented. As for “overreported” and “asymmetric” enforcement: that’s vibes plus two cherry-picked links about a specific incident. If you think the FBI/DOJ figures are inflated, show a dataset and a method, not anecdotes and insinuation. Also, plenty of incidents never get reported at all. I’ve personally been assaulted for being Jewish and didn’t report it. That is what undercount looks like in real life. Finally, please stop misrepresenting what I wrote. I explicitly said “religion-based hate crimes.” Your comment only makes sense if you pretend I didn’t.

jimbo808 10mo ago
Switched the denominator? So you were specifically talking about religious-based hate crimes? Why were you talking about that very specific subset, and why wouldn’t you mention that or imply it anywhere in your comment? You wouldn’t be… a liar, would you? Also, nice AI slop - I stopped reading at the first angle quotes.
- richardfeynman 10mo ago
  You’re accusing me of “not mentioning the subset” while quoting a thread where I literally wrote “religious-based hate crimes.” So either you missed it or you’re pretending you missed it. But it's here in this exact thread for anyone to see. Permalink: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46304753 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46304753 The DOJ/FBI table is explicit: 2023 had 2,699 religion-based hate crime incidents; 1,832 were anti-Jewish. That’s 67.9%. https://www.justice.gov/crs/news/2023-hate-crime-statistics https://www.justice.gov/crs/news/2023-hate-crime-statistics If you want to change the denominator to “all hate crimes,” say so up front. That gives 15.4% of all incidents, still massively disproportionate. It's common to use angle quotes on HN, but either way, you accusing me of "AI slop" because you don't like the way I quote things doesn't change the arithmetic and is not a rebuttal.
  - jimbo808 10mo ago
    I see it now, you said that in a different comment which wasn’t the one I replied to. My bad for not noticing. Still, restricting it to “religious-based” hate crimes is transparently misleading. Using a statistic from a narrow category to imply a claim about the whole is a classic substitution error. Either you are lacking in statistical literacy, or you are being intentionally misleading. And let’s not forget the massive, undeniable asymmetry here that makes the entire point meaningless. None of this is sufficient to assume that a crime against a Jew is automatically a hate crime until proven otherwise.
    - richardfeynman 10mo ago
      Thanks for the correction, I appreciate you owning it. But the rest is just another goalpost move. Quoting a clearly labeled subset is not “transparently misleading,” as you put it It’s how statistics work. I said “religious-based hate crimes” explicitly, because we were discussing hostility toward Jews. The DOJ/FBI table is explicit: 2023 had 2,699 religion-based hate crime incidents; 1,832 were anti‑Jewish. And I already gave the “whole” denominator too: those same 1,832 incidents are 15.4% of all 11,862 hate crime incidents in 2023. For a 2% population, that is still ~7–8x disproportionate, as I've mentioned. So the “substitution error” accusation doesn’t apply here, because I didn’t imply 69% of all hate crimes. I stated the subset and then did the math for the broader denominator as well. On the “asymmetry makes it meaningless” claim: I see you're asserting that, but you haven’t demonstrated it. FBI hate crime data is not “crime against a Jew = hate crime until proven otherwise.” It’s incidents agencies specifically classify as bias-motivated based on evidence. The well-known problem in this space is underreporting and incomplete reporting, not some magical inflation that conveniently zeros out anti‑Jewish bias. I can attest to the underreporting having not reported an assault where I was beat up on the NYC subway and told "they should have burned you all" while minding my own business on an NYC subway. Finally, none of this was me calling any specific crime a hate crime. I explicitly said we don’t know the motive in the professor’s case. This thread started because you challenged a statistical claim. The numbers stand. Given you opened with "liar" and "AI slop," you might want to recalibrate before accusing others of ‘statistical illiteracy'.

jimbo808 10mo ago

Switched the denominator? So you were specifically talking about religious-based hate crimes? Why were you talking about that very specific subset, and why wouldn’t you mention that or imply it anywhere in your comment? You wouldn’t be… a liar, would you? Also, nice AI slop - I stopped reading at the first angle quotes.

richardfeynman 10mo ago
You’re accusing me of “not mentioning the subset” while quoting a thread where I literally wrote “religious-based hate crimes.” So either you missed it or you’re pretending you missed it. But it's here in this exact thread for anyone to see. Permalink: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46304753 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46304753 The DOJ/FBI table is explicit: 2023 had 2,699 religion-based hate crime incidents; 1,832 were anti-Jewish. That’s 67.9%. https://www.justice.gov/crs/news/2023-hate-crime-statistics https://www.justice.gov/crs/news/2023-hate-crime-statistics If you want to change the denominator to “all hate crimes,” say so up front. That gives 15.4% of all incidents, still massively disproportionate. It's common to use angle quotes on HN, but either way, you accusing me of "AI slop" because you don't like the way I quote things doesn't change the arithmetic and is not a rebuttal.
- jimbo808 10mo ago
  I see it now, you said that in a different comment which wasn’t the one I replied to. My bad for not noticing. Still, restricting it to “religious-based” hate crimes is transparently misleading. Using a statistic from a narrow category to imply a claim about the whole is a classic substitution error. Either you are lacking in statistical literacy, or you are being intentionally misleading. And let’s not forget the massive, undeniable asymmetry here that makes the entire point meaningless. None of this is sufficient to assume that a crime against a Jew is automatically a hate crime until proven otherwise.
  - richardfeynman 10mo ago
    Thanks for the correction, I appreciate you owning it. But the rest is just another goalpost move. Quoting a clearly labeled subset is not “transparently misleading,” as you put it It’s how statistics work. I said “religious-based hate crimes” explicitly, because we were discussing hostility toward Jews. The DOJ/FBI table is explicit: 2023 had 2,699 religion-based hate crime incidents; 1,832 were anti‑Jewish. And I already gave the “whole” denominator too: those same 1,832 incidents are 15.4% of all 11,862 hate crime incidents in 2023. For a 2% population, that is still ~7–8x disproportionate, as I've mentioned. So the “substitution error” accusation doesn’t apply here, because I didn’t imply 69% of all hate crimes. I stated the subset and then did the math for the broader denominator as well. On the “asymmetry makes it meaningless” claim: I see you're asserting that, but you haven’t demonstrated it. FBI hate crime data is not “crime against a Jew = hate crime until proven otherwise.” It’s incidents agencies specifically classify as bias-motivated based on evidence. The well-known problem in this space is underreporting and incomplete reporting, not some magical inflation that conveniently zeros out anti‑Jewish bias. I can attest to the underreporting having not reported an assault where I was beat up on the NYC subway and told "they should have burned you all" while minding my own business on an NYC subway. Finally, none of this was me calling any specific crime a hate crime. I explicitly said we don’t know the motive in the professor’s case. This thread started because you challenged a statistical claim. The numbers stand. Given you opened with "liar" and "AI slop," you might want to recalibrate before accusing others of ‘statistical illiteracy'.