UKC

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/air-china-warns-tourists-against-parts-london-popu...

My jaw dropped open on reading this. What an idea to plant in people's minds, to have to beware.

In reply to Timmd:

Don't read the comments

In reply to marsbar:

I already did. Oh well.

In reply to Timmd:

Amazing what gets written when you're not gagged by political correctness.

In reply to Timmd:

Who wants Tibet this causes a bit of a row?

In reply to Timmd:

By the same yard stick, the Chinese are the tourists who tramp around with expensive cameras and gadgets on show and are (as a result) more likely to be a victim of crime in any given spot

In reply to DerwentDiluted:


They must be (prawn) crackers!

In reply to Timmd:


Whilst I can't condone the 'beware brown people' angle, there are parts of any major city that you wouldn't want to stray into as an obvious tourist.

In reply to Timmd:

Seems fair. Especially if you are not street wise/hench and don't speak good English/ Urdu. They are not areas you'd want to go bimbling into thinking we are all gonna hold hands and sing KUM-BY-AR and suck each others dicks. Nor are they tourist destinations. You'd stick out there and attract lots of attention. Oh yeah, Asians are often very racist to other groups of Asians, not only Chinese but Pakistanis and Indians.

D

In reply to Ridge:

Which is what should have been written, ' Beware of these areas as a tourist, either avoid, or don't walk around with a camera over your shoulder looking around as if everything is new to you...'

In reply to Timmd:
" Coz you'll probably be mugged by an Indian, Pakistani or more likely according to crime figures a black person (if they don't shoot you first)." ROFLMAO.

In reply to Timmd:

Clearly. But people get odd ideas - see Americans thread.

In reply to Indy:


HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA?

In reply to Indy:

Maybe you should move to China. You can be racist and they will join in. No political correctness for you to worry about.

In reply to Indy:

According to crime figures, the likelihood a white person robs you is nearly 3 times that of it being a black, and more than 6 times of it being an Asian, so you'll have to find another line to trump your racism around i'm afraid.

In reply to marsbar:


He should probably avoid comedy at any rate.

In reply to Timmd:

The thing that I don't understand is that they're Air China; why don't they just bomb the East End, if they're so concerned?

In reply to Mr Lopez:


Now I wonder why that is?!
http://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/culturalidentity/ethnici...

Just to put your 'look at me, I'm not racist' statistics into perspective.

In reply to Timmd:

Is he trying to be funny?

In reply to Lusk:

Wonder away. You are still much more likely to be mugged by a white person than by a non-white, are you not? I'm sorry if that doesn't suit a particular agenda you may have. Facts are a bitch sometimes.

In reply to Mr Lopez:


You don't understand statistics do you?

In reply to Lion Bakes:

Explain away, i'm all ears

In reply to Mr Lopez:

What if you were hitching through Africa?

In reply to Mr Lopez:

That's completely rubbish, the crime figures for robberies show the opposite, you are far more likely to be robbed by a non white in London, hence the Met searched far more blacks. Facts are a bitch...watch Gangland on Channel 5 filmed by the perpetrators of the robberies...

In reply to Jim 1003:


You know, when you make comments like "facts are a bitch" you should be ready to back those up.

Figure 4.09, more than 60% of robberies are done by white people

https://www.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/4...

P.s. Facts really are a bitch

In reply to Gone for good:


Racist!!

In reply to Mr Lopez:



So factoring in the relative percentages of white/black people in the UK, what do we find?

In reply to Timmd:


Isn't expecting foreign nations to conform the British values and mores a bit racist/white supremacist?

In reply to Mr Lopez:


Do you mean the likelihood that your are robbed by any black or white person, or the likelihood that an individual black or white person will rob you?

Two very different things.

In reply to Mr Lopez:


Not if you're in an area where most people are black.

Edit: I shouldn't have to say this, but it is UKC. I find the advice from the airline crass and racist. However it is rooted partially in fact - crime and race are connected in London.

One can twist the stats any way one wants. What I object to is you twisting them in one way to accuse another poster of having an agenda by presenting them in another way.

In reply to wintertree:



The former, clearly.

In reply to FreshSlate:


If that is the case then Lopez hasn't really thought it through. If in a region of only white people, the probability of a black person robbing you is irrelevant, and if in a region of only black people, the probability of a white person robbing you is irrelevant.

Given this rather obvious fact and the nature of the crass advice from the airline, Lopez' point about more robberies being committed by white people over all is nothing like as profound or argument winning as they think.

In reply to Mr Lopez:





You do realise that figure indicates that despite only accounting for around 12% of the population, black people make up 37% of arrests for robbery.
(The conviction table 5.05 suggests a similar conviction rate for robbery between white and black offenders)

In reply to Timmd:

I often get the impression from translations of Weibo shitstorms and other social media that there's a lot of overt casual racism in China, or perhaps more accurately xenophobia with a side of jingoism.

I can't square this with my time there where I experienced nothing but kindness, although I don't represent all the races out there. It's also odd when you consider just how ethnically diverse the "Chinese" people are.

We certainly do live in interesting times.

In reply to wintertree:

Yes...


Couldn't follow the argument to this through to this. I get the whole crime per 1,000 people of X race and the perspective that brings. Although Lopez' argument might be, 'why warn about black people (and other races, where there is even less of a statistical discrepency) when in fact you are actually slightly more likely to be robbed by a white person'.

It's like telling me to be more wary of great white sharks in Australia when it's the far more numerous jelly fish I need to look out for.*

*Illustrative purposes only.

I'm being chartiable to Lopez' argument.

In reply to Mr Lopez:


Fig III.01 - A little more than 60% of the population is white, Fig 4.09 about 60% of the robbery arrests were white.
Fig III.01 A little more than 10% of the population is black. Fig 4.09 about 20% of the robbery arrests were black.

There are a mass of other considerations but if you are going to draw a conclusion just from the robbery arrest number in Figure 4.09 without considering any other factors (e,g, possible police bias) it is that a randomly selected black person in London is about twice as likely to be a robber as a randomly selected white one. Which would make it likely that if you go to an area where most people are black you would be at more risk of robbery.

It's really bad that in Britain today if someone comes out with a statement like the one in the Chinese magazine which can be checked against data the first reaction is 'you are racist' or 'you can't say that' rather than going to the data and seeing if it is true. If it isn't true *then* you can move on to thinking about the speakers motivations, if it is true you should be thinking about why it is true and how to change things to stop it being true.

In reply to FreshSlate:


Chaining the various statistics together someone is about 3x as likely to get robbed in some parts of London with a largely black population compared to other parts of London with a more representative population.

I don't know if that's actually the case when it comes to local-on-tourist crime instead of local-on-local crime.

In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:


Isn't it interesting... People cry "racist" and it impedes attempts to tackle racially biased crime. The thing about crime concentrated in an ethnic minority area is that most victims are also of that minority. If you consider the victims, it's racist not to fully acknowledge and tackle the racial component of the problem.

I still think the airline advice is racist however - areas within which to be more cautious should be listed derived from crime statistics. If that aligns with concentrated minority populations then so be it, but I don't think it's that simple.

In reply to Mr Lopez:

'Trump' seems quite appropriate for some of the comments here, even the phrase "the wall just got 10feet taller" seems apt.......

Perhaps you are just twice as likely to get robbed if you are a naive rich Chinese tourist waving your phone, camera, expensive watch and handbag around in any part of the UK.

In reply to Indy:
Because people in China aren't gagged by any kind of political correctness?!

In reply to wintertree:

Silly question, are you black?

In reply to marsbar:


No. Not visibly so anyway, the chances are I've got one or more black relatives from the last half millennia.

In reply to Mr Lopez:

You do realise that figure indicates that despite only accounting for around 12% of the population, black people make up 37% of arrests for robbery.
(The conviction table 5.05 suggests a similar conviction rate for robbery between white and black offenders)

I think you got your facts wrong Mr Lopez....again...

In reply to wintertree:

So you wouldn't necessarily see if Chinese people were racist in the way they treated you?

In reply to Jim 1003:



Since the point that you (and others) are making is so obvious that nobody could fail to understand it, one can only assume that Mr.Lopez is making the pedantic point that nevertheless, because there are more white people than black people in London (and as a function of this more muggings by white people) one is statistically more likely to be mugged by a white person as a visitor to London.

Why he thinks this pedantic point which hinges largely on the (mis)interpretation of grammar is of relevance, I can't imagine.

In reply to marsbar:

If you mean "racist against black people" then no. I'm also obviously not Chinese however. The Weibo stuff I was referring to is pretty broad brush.

In reply to wintertree:



I think you partially address the issue here. As you write, most crime committed by black people is against black people. Chinese people are no different, and commit crimes against their own race most often than others. However, the airline could hardly write 'avoid Chinese people' could they?

Don't understand why they single out Indians either. Can anyone explain that one?

In reply to wintertree:

The impression I get from previous discussions about the washing powder ad is that the Chinese are fairly specifically racist against black people, not necessarily against anyone of a different race to themselves.

In reply to FreshSlate:

Personally I don't think Southall is a particular crime hot spot.

In reply to Postmanpat:

It doesn't, it's still a fact.

More crimes are committed by white people than black people in this country.

There's no trickery involved no more than there is pointing out a countrys total gdp rather than gdp per capita. Just that several have assumed he was talking per capita and missed the point.

In reply to FreshSlate:

>
Do you think that "statistically you are more likely to be mugged by a white person than a black person" and "statistically a black person is more likely to commit a mugging than a white person" are identical statements?


As I pointed out. Why is it relevant ?

In reply to Jim 1003:


That in itself is a statistical fallacy - known as the "prosecutors fallacy", which relies on a misunderstanding of conditional probability.

In simple terms, the probability of a black person being a criminal is not the same as the probability of a criminal being black - unless it can be shown that the two probabilities are independent.

In reply to Thread:
This thread is completely cock-eyed. The original "advice" was "precautions are needed when entering areas mainly populated by Indians, Pakistanis and black people". Whether black people account for more crime than white people (I note that none of the discussion of crime statistics centred around Indians or Pakistanis), is almost irrelevant because (1) most of the victims of crime perpetrated by black people are other black people and (2) you need to look at the overall background crime rate.

The Met's "heat map" shoes that the highest rate of crime - both in absolute numbers and per 1000 population is Westminster.

Total crimes in Westminster in the month of July: 4549
Total crimes in Tower Hamlets (number 2): 2600

Total crimes per 1000 population (Westminster): 20.76
Total crimes per 1000 population (Tower Hamlets): 12.61

Looking at Violent crimes against the person which, presumably the crime most tourist would worry about:

Westminster: 1131, 5.16 per 1000 population
Tower Hamlets: 944, 3.72 per 1000 population

The riskiest wards in Westminster? St James and The West End.

So our hapless tourist from China may well shy away from venturing down to Brixton village but get done over while taking in the view up St James's Park to Buckingham Palace.

The Air China advice is, at best, lazy and misleading.

EDIT to include link: http://maps.met.police.uk/?areacode=E09000029

In reply to Postmanpat:


No they're clearly different statements.


Why is any statistic ever relevant?

In reply to FreshSlate:


Good, we agree. And that is the (mis)interpretation of grammar on which Mr.Lopez's point depends


I assume that is some sort of rhetorical question. Why do you think Mr.Lopez's statiistic is relevant in this case?

In reply to FreshSlate:


Because they can support or cast doubt on statements and claims, obviously.

In reply to Bob Hughes:

To summarise: avoid London.

In reply to Bob Hughes:

Well said.

In reply to Timmd:

Just wondering if poverty may be a confounding factor, stay out of poor run-down areas? I remember with shock seeing American tourists straying off the tourist path in Dublin and wandering around some of the grim housing estates, all locals were white though, so nothing to fear I guess from the young male unemployed locals.

In reply to Jim 1003:
I think you have very little grasp on both facts, numbers, and comprehension.

Fact, nearly 2/3rds of robberies are done by white people. Ergo you have nearly 2 in 3 chances that when you are robbed, the perpetrator is white.

Pointing out that a single black individual is more likely to commit a crime, be taller, or have a bigger cock than a white person does nothing to disprove that fact.

If you have a source that backs your 'fact' that a higher proportion of robberies are done by black people please share it with us. Comparing phallic measurements arranged by race is unfortunately not a valid argument.

In reply to Mr Lopez:


Fig 5.09 of your link suggests overall crime per 1000 is three times higher for blacks than white. I don't suppose the proportions for robbery would be much different to this.

In reply to Mr Lopez: The original post warned about parts of London ...In a section titled "Tips from Air China," passengers are then told: "London is generally a safe place to travel, however precautions are needed when entering areas mainly populated by Indians, Pakistanis and black people.

"We advise tourists not to go out alone at night, and females always to be accompanied by another person when travelling."

This appears to mean areas like Brixton are dangerous, a fair comment. You have decided to refute this by saying white people are more likely to rob you. Try a walk through brixton at night and chat with some of the locals, why don't you point out to them that they are all nice. Report back from your hospital bed.

In reply to Jim 1003:

My original post was a direct reply to Indy's post though.

P.s. I lived in brixton for 6 years in the late 90's/early 00's, followed by stints in Loughborough Junction, Peckham, and I've now been in Clapton for 7 years. I think I have a fairly good idea what locals have to say.

In reply to Mr Lopez:

>
It doesn't disprove that fact but it does make that fact less relevant in terms of advice about personal safety in London

In reply to planetmarshall:


IIRC you can work it out with Bayes theorem, so if R = robber, B = Black, W = White

Probability someone is a robber given that they are black P(R | B) = ( P(B | R) * P(R) ) / P(B)

= 0.2 * 0.002 / 0.12 = 0.003

P(R | W) = ( P(W | R) * P(R)) / P(W)

= 0.6 * 0.002 / 0.6 = 0.002

Which implies that there is a 3/1000 chance of a randomly selected black person having been arrested for robbery but a 2/1000 chance of a randomly selected white person having been arrested for robbery.

There's a figure of 2 in 1000 people being arrested in the report and I'm guessing arrests for robbery P(R) are about 1/10 of all arrests. It doesn't make a difference for the relative probabilities between black and white.

In reply to Bob Hughes:



That'll be the MP's.

In reply to Mr Lopez:


Only if you take the country as a whole. Look at the figures for the areas the Chinese were talking about and.....

In reply to Mr Lopez:

Used to known as the stabbing capital of the UK

In reply to Postmanpat:


No it doesn't though. Just because his original post said

"According to crime figures, the likelihood a white person robs you is nearly 3 times that of it being a black, and more than 6 times of it being an Asian, so you'll have to find another line to trump your racism around i'm afraid."

He's not deviated from this stance.


It's relevant to the likelyhood of being a victim of crime in the UK/London perpetrated by white person.

In reply to Bob Hughes:


Although possibly not as lazy and misleading as your misuse of the stats here. MPS areas don't match with local geographies, so both those areas include a wide mix of people, not traditionally associated with the areas' name. The same thing happens where I live and the police call areas by the wrong name because it fits in with their (randomly chosen) beat area names.

Although again it doesn't say anything about race.

I remember a few years ago the MPS got into trouble for releasing figures that showed that 80% of muggings/thefts/personal robberies on the London Underground were perpetrated by black people, so although you may tell people to avoid bad neighbourhoods, it seems the crims can easily work out that they can commute to work.

In reply to marsbar:


The washing powder ad was a good example of racism, but it was the Chinese who were the victims.

The advert itself wasn't racist at all, it wasn't saying that black people should become white.

It was insensitive to the concerns of black people but the Chinese were judged on that insensitivity by US and UK audiences. There's is a wealth of difference between just the US and the UK experience of being black (as the scepticism this side of the Atlantic towards BLM shows).

The gulf then between the slave owners and colonialists compared to the Chinese is enormous once more and if we judge the Chinese based on our guilt ridden history of race then it is the Chinese whom we make the victims.

In reply to Clauso:


They're just waiting until their nuclear capability is up and running at Hinkley.

In reply to Mr Lopez:





I disagree actually, it is entirely the point when discussing who is more likely to rob or kill you, because the likelihood they are a murderer, thief or rapist is greater. In this crazy instance that Air China has come up with it is totally relevant.

I have a black friend from Texas that has the same comprehension issues that you do. After an hour of discussing this it resulted in her deciding I was racist because I was pointing out facts. Which is not unusual these days and the racist card has been so devalued after being thrown around to silence things people don't like to hear. Being labelled racist these days only means that you have discussed crime relating to race and someone didn't like to hear it. So I'm cool with it.

In Texas, blacks are 11% of the population, but are responsible for 30% of homicide, 43% of robbery.

Hispanics are 37% of the population, but are responsible for 42% of homicide, 37% of robbery.

In relation to whites and others (others which make up 3%), even if combined together Blacks and Hisp they are still a minority, African-Americans and Hispanics are responsible for 72% of homicide, 65% of rape, 80% robbery. Which obviously makes whites and the other (3%) by far least likely to be criminals.

I spent a good hour trying to get across that blacks were more the criminal than Hispanics. I tried every way possible to get acceptance to the situation, and we discussed this initially to try to figure out where the problem lied. The whole discussion began after another black guy got shot unfairly by the police. But anyway, in the end I was a racist and we left it at that.

In reply to FreshSlate:



Where was it suggested that he deviated from his stance? The issue is whether his point is based on interpreting precise language being used by each poster.

>
Which is not the point at issue unless you want to base your interpretation on a very precise and somewhat obtuse of the grammar used.

We can all agree that there are more robberies committed by whites than blacks in London. I think that we can all agree that blacks proportionately commit more robberies than whites in London.

So the issue revolves on the language used to describe those the chances of being a victim of a robbery by each category (as encapsulated) in the two sentences that you agreed had very different meanings)

Incidentally, there was a report (Home Office I think) that argued quite persuasively that if the crime stats are adjusted for income, social background etc there is minimal difference between crime rates of black and whites ie.it is social and economic background not racial background that matters.

In reply to Timmd:

We in Britain have been badgered into dropping our racist dogma even if we may still have private beliefs, so it comes as a shock to realise that most people in the world are still racist. A Pakistani friend of mine confirms that racism is very much alive in Pakistani and Indian communities and when I travel around Africa I'm amazed at the level of prejudice by Africans against Indians and Chinese.

In reply to Indy:


Like when? Really..... Yes, I've lived in London too all thro' the 80's and 90's

In reply to Postmanpat:

The official figures, which examine the ethnicity of those accused of violent offences in London, suggest the majority of men held responsible by police for gun crimes, robberies and street crimes are black...

The data provide a breakdown of the ethnicity of the 18,091 men and boys who police took action against for a range of violent and sexual offences in London in 2009-10.
They show that among those proceeded against for street crimes, 54 per cent were black; for robbery, 59 per cent; and for gun crimes, 67 per cent. Street crimes include muggings, assault with intent to rob and snatching property.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/7856787/Violent-inner-city-cri...

Of course it would be possible that black crims get caught quicker into their career than whites, so although fewer whites were caught, they could have committed more crime.


Same reported figures as above.

In reply to winhill:




Thanks. Funnily enough I'd started a post based on those figs and then abandoned it for some reason. Anyway they make the specious argument of Mr.Lopez even more irrelevant.

No doubt it will be argued that these are prosecutions not convictions and are a function of police bias.

In reply to winhill:


Take a look at the map I linked to. The Wards of St James or the West End are most definitely not predominantly black, Indian or Pakistani.

In reply to Jim 1003:


I did just that last Friday night and - incredibly - lived to tell the tale. My book, a brutally honest investigation into the psychology of fear, will be published early in the New Year.

In reply to Bob Hughes:

Unfortunately, the crime levels in that area mean many people don't walk through unscathed, particularly if you go into the worst areas, which I am guessing you probably avoided.

In reply to Jim 1003:

Have you actually been to Brixton?

In reply to winhill:

I don't agree. The advert implied that black skin was dirty and undesirable.

In reply to Timmd:

A apology has been issued and the magazine has been withdrawn.

In reply to Dominicandave:


The problem, I think, lies in the way you describe the situation. You can confidently say that any given crime is clearly more likely to have been committed by a black or hispanic person. Even better to say disproportionately more likely to be committed by etc

However, as soon as you say this "whites and the other (3%) by far least likely to be criminals" you are on shakier ground. Just pulling some stats of wikipedia for incarcerations in the US. 2.3% of the black population in the US is incarcerated; 0.45% of the white population is incarcerated. Let's take those numbers as a proxy for whether a given black or white person is a criminal.

Technically you are correct, a black person is about 5 times more likely to be a criminal. But that ignores the background rate of criminality. The phrase "whites are far less likely to be criminals than blacks" gives the impression that blacks are highly likely to be criminals. In the end there is still only 2.3% probability that any given black person is a criminal.

this sounds like splitting at hairs - and perhaps it is - but it is understandably a sensitive topic, not least shortly after (another) black man has been shot by the police.

In reply to Jim 1003:

have you ever left your house?

Brixton is perfectly safe. I went there as a 14 year old to go to gigs, and a decade later to go to bars. what gives yout his impression that your going to immediately going to get stabbed?

sure, if you walk up to the wrong local you might be accosted, so dont do that. same in any area.

My area of london has had 3 stabbings in recent months (i live in a REALLY shit bit of town). but, theyre all black kids stabbing each other, i dont feel unsafe because im not hanging around with kids, standing in parks or estates in the middle of the night, or trying to buy drugs. unless you are doing these things any area will be just as safe (brixton included)

In reply to Timmd:

A question, apart from being politically incorrect by our standards, is the advice correct and useful to a Chinese tourist?
Not taking sides just interested.

In reply to Dominicandave:

If you believe that, you probably are racist. Yes more blacks commit crime per person, but it is very unlikely that is because they are black. More likely they are poor and/or badly educated among other reasons. Someone above pointed out the differences varnish when such matters are controlled for.

In reply to Aztec Bar:



Strictly speaking, it is correct and slightly useful in that a Chinese tourist will reduce their chances of anything untoward happening if they take precautions (whatever that means...) in areas mainly populated by Indians, Pakistanis and black people.

However, they would reduce their chances of mishap even more if they also took precautions while taking photos of Buckingham Palace and watching a Michael Jackson impersonator in Leicester Square.

In reply to Bob Hughes:

Your heat map is interesting, but probably also misrepresents the statistics.

If the visiting population to an area (shoppers, workers, tourists, and especially drinkers) is very high relative to the residential population, then this will heavily skew the crime figures per resident.
A high proportion of commercial property versus residential property will also do this.

I would think Westminster (and any town centre) is a prime example of this.

In reply to stevieb:


which is why i also posted the absolute numbers, which tell the same story.

In reply to Bob Hughes:

again, if the footfall is far higher, then this is as expected.
the residential population of Westminster and the city of London is < 1/4 million people but the workday population is around 1 million.

In reply to marsbar:


You can of course take that reading.

But it would be somewhat belittling to the Chinese to assume they really think brown skin can be washed away like dirt. So the advert was clearly tongue-in-cheek, and like many other adverts used a visual trick to show how something that wasn't bright, shining, white, could be changed to just that. They could just as easily have put a Dalmatian dog through the wash and had it come out as a poodle.

So, I don't think they implied anything derogatory towards blacks. As someone else alluded to, the fact that we assume they did is perhaps applying our own guilt and history of racial prejudice (which makes such adverts unthinkable for us) on to a country which has no similar history. Therefore I think we may be the fools, not the Chinese, in this case.

In reply to Aztec Bar:


It possibly is. Though they'll miss out on a lot of top-notch curries or Jerk chicken establishments if they follow it.

Better advice for avoiding crime might actually be to avoid males, especially those aged between 15 and 25, black or white. Not sure how they would feel about putting that in the in-flight mag though.

In reply to Bob Hughes:


I did, that's why I could comment.

In reply to winhill:

Good, so which parts of st James are mainly populated by Indian, Pakistani or black people?

In reply to stevieb:



That's a good point. It would probably also apply - to a lesser extent maybe - to the higher crime areas of brixton like coldhabour road. And I doubt very much that the original article in Air China's light magazine was takin this level of analysis into account.

But, yes, point taken.

In reply to Postmanpat:

Exactly, therefore begging the question as to why we even bother talking about crime statistics in terms of ethnicity, it serves no purpose whatsoever other than making absurd racists arguments. It's as idiotic as discussing whether people with long toes commit more crimes than people with short toes.

In reply to Bob Hughes:


No he isn't. He's techinically very wrong, and reasoning along these lines put Sally Clark in prison for 4 years for a crime she did not commit ( and probably contributed to her eventual tragic death ).

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prosecutor%27s_fallacy

The stats quoted suggest that a criminal is 5 times more likely to be a black person, *not* that a black person is 5 times more likely to be a criminal, which is a very different statement.

In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:


What's unhelpful is making the link between skin colour and crime rather that looking at the underlying drivers of that crime which have nothing to do with colour and much to do with entrenched social deprivation exacerbated by decades of overt racism and prejudice. Using headline statistics on colour and crime to inform how you feel about an individual or a particular community is pretty much the definition of racism.

jk

In reply to David Martin:

No similar history of class, ethnic racial superiority and colonial brutality? Think again.

D

In reply to MG:


The 'controlled for' thing doesn't prove anything: it is just the mathematical consequence of a political assumption that poverty is an independent variable influencing criminality.

The converse is probably true, poverty is not an independent variable, because the anti-social behaviors that result in criminal convictions (violence, drug use etc) and the criminal convictions and jail time themselves are going to make it hard to hold down a job and therefore result in poverty.

In reply to tom_in_edinburgh:


Yes I agree its very complicated set of relationships. However, claiming people are more criminal because they are black is pretty much a definition of racism, even if it did happen to be the case.

In reply to MG:


Are they not still black? Yes, so that makes me racist for reading stats from a website? Interesting. If the stats show me something you would prefer I ignored them just to be PC, haha. What a society we live in today.
And the racist card doesn't bother me at all, the likes of you have devalued it so much that it is just a part of the process of discussing crime and race with idiots.

Once we can accept that there is a problem here, once everyone has accepted that something is not working, only then can we start to look at the whys. Why are black men more likely to be criminals? social background, schooling, poverty etc. When we can discuss this like adults without idiots throwing the race card out there at every chance to kill off all discussions, maybe then we can start understand what needs to be done to improve the situation and address the underlying issues behind black men being criminals.
Unfortunately people are too busy pointing fingers to be concerned with the actual issue at hand, and so the circus surrounding race and crime never plays out in full.

In reply to MG:


I don't think you will find many people with a brain arguing that "people are more criminal because they are black".
(although funnily enough I have read that there is a return in some academic circles to correlating specific physical characteristics with behavioural characteristics-kind of "eyes too close together" stuff).

But if there is a greater propensity amongst one racial group to a certain behaviour, albeit maybe as a function of social background (although as Tom points out, the social background may be a function of the behaviour), is it "racist" to acknowledge this truth?

In reply to MG:


Do you have any idea how ridiculous that sounds to me. All I see there is someone saying 'oh no, don't say it'. Racism isn't a voice, racism is an intent, a mentality. You can't be racist for reading from a stats graph. I'm sorry I think this kind of thinking is pathetic.

In reply to RomTheBear:


When RTB enters a thread on Race or Immigration it's usually a signal that it's time to leave but just to point and laugh at the Stupid, no-one who looks this seriously thinks this is the answer, whether it people who blame the Empire or people who blame colour. The rate of deprivation is significantly higher for several other ethnic groups in London, Bangladeshis, Pakistanis, South East Asians, yet the crime rates are significantly lower.

The 2 stand out reasons given are usually (a) that afro-caribbean families are 60% single mums and (b) a sub-culture that encourages the life style (again viewed either as Resistance to the downpressor Whitey or gangsta fashion depending on your POV).

In reply to Postmanpat:


It depends rather on your definition of racism. Generally I think it is taken to mean regarding genetic make, particularly skin colour, affecting mental or physical ability and behaviour, in which case no. Expand the meaning a little, then yes.

In reply to Dominicandave:

I don't know why you see that.



How do you define racism? To take a hypothetical extreme, if all blacks were proven murderers and all whites proven angels, surely pointing that out would be racist but true?

In reply to jkarran:


For me the test is, would a computer make the same correlation. If the correlation is there in the data and would be found by a mathematical algorithm with no social biases or prejudices then it is legitimate to use it. Everyone has the right to use logic and mathematics to make better decisions.

In reply to MG:
>
I disagree. "Racism" is regarded as something negative. I don't believe that stating a truth can be regarded as negative (as opposed to inconvenient).

So either "racism" has to reappraised as a neutral term, or has to be more narrowly defined along the lines of "the FALSE attribution of characteristics to racial groups".

In reply to MG:


Because it is exactly what you are saying. 'here is a fact but don't dare say it', it's stupid.


No wonder we do not see eye to eye and the racist card is thrown around so cheaply if this is your interpretation of racism.
Regarding your hypothetical scenario above. It would not be racist to say that blacks are committing the most murders, it is a fact. It might however be racist to state they are murderers because they are black.

We are not responsible for others actions. We are just acknowledging the situation, how can that ever be considered racist.

In reply to Postmanpat:

OK, take your point there. Not sure which way I would jump. The non-neutral definition quickly becomes simply a term of abuse or means of shutting down discussion, which isn't very helpful.

In reply to Dominicandave:


You are just making stuff up. I have never said that.. Putting it in quotes doesn't help you case - anyone can search the thread to see I never said it.

In reply to MG:


Not nice is it.

In reply to Dominicandave:


You might note the difference between quoting as RtB did things you actually wrote, and you quoting things I never wrote. One is dishonest; one isn't. Think hard and you might work things out.

In reply to Dominicandave:
Depends on the definition of criminality and the context. Many, many, many black people were considered criminals in apartheid South Africa for fighting for their freedom and kicking against oppression. In a case such as that, stats would probably show that black people did commit more crimes - but not because of some inherent characteristic of 'blackness', it was because they lived in a society that abused and oppressed people based on the color of their skin. Extreme racism, oppression, poverty and social/political/economic exclusion, as well as lack of access to decent education undoubtedly led individuals to commit what we would agree are 'standard' criminal acts, e.g., robbery or assault. But oppressive regimes can turn speech into a crime in order to achieve its malevolent ends.

You are denying that structural or institutional racism exists. We have ample qualitative - as well as quantitative - evidence that it does.

In reply to RomTheBear:


If there was a movement called "short toes matter", or of there was alleged/actual "toe-ism" on the basis of toe length, then stats about toe length and the criminal justice system would matter.
I'm surprised, as someone who appears to readily go to stats to support your position on a wide range of race-related issues, these stats appear somehow unpalatable / unacceptable.

In reply to Postmanpat:

The problem is that it's not really "truth" in the way they are used and interpreted.
It's the equivalent of cropping a small part of a large photograph, and frame it as if it was the big picture. Sure what you see in that frame is a genuine photograph, but our brains are hardwired to fill the gaps to make sense of it, and more often that not, we get it badly wrong.

So when you see article with statistics such as "blacks are more likely to rob you in London", it may be a perfectly correct statistic, but the context is carefully taken out to let the unaware reader's mind fill the gaps with a racist argument.

In reply to Dauphin:

The Chinese had a massive program of enslaving Africans, shipping them to China and not granting them equal rights until the 1960s? Not that that I'm aware of.

To think that Chinese should mind their language to avoid offending American or English sensitivities over acts we committed in Africa would be a bit like expecting the Chinese to be particularly vigilant towards pedophiles in their entertainment industry because we allowed Jimmy Saville to get away with it for so long.

In reply to off-duty:


Actually, no , I don't really see why it would matter.


I'm curious to hear when I did that. I may have used them to show why they were meaningless, possibly.

In reply to RomTheBear:


Well if someone was to say "Long toes are all criminals" - it would useful to know if that was true. Or if they were to say "short toes are persecuted within the criminal justice system because they are short toes" then we need to find out if there is any persecution in the stats from arrest to conviction.
Obviously your analogy is strained unless we are in a nation of open toed sandal wearers with a world history of disputes between people due to the length of their toes....



For starters - several threads with stats regarding the economics of Scottish independence and stats regarding the productivity and economic contribution of migrants/immigrants.

In reply to David Martin:


You are disappearing into the event horizon of your own arsehole by trying to pretend the Chinese haven't got a history of brutal colonialism and ethnic repression as horrible as our own. Yeah sure not in Africa, no need for them to feel bad about laughing at inferior black skins.

I wasnt offended by the airlines poor attempt at racially sensitive safety advice, it was the OPs virtue signalling (endless I know, I shouldn't of bitten) that gripped my shit.

D

In reply to off-duty:

Actually, no it's quite useless, it's like saying "most yellow cats kill mice". although true, it makes it sounds as if there was a relationship between the cat's colour and the fact that they kill mice, but the true picture is that most cats of all colours kill mice.
So not only it's utterly useless, but it encourages the unaware reader to make false conclusions.

The only place where ethnic stats are justified, imo, is where there is a scientific basis for it, such as some ethnicity being more prone to some medical conditions
(Well I don't know much about it, but apparently it's a thing)


I'm not sure what the "economics of Scottish independence" and "economic contribution of immigrants" has to do with ethnicity stats whatsoever.

In reply to RomTheBear:
But if yellow cats had a self perpetuating culture of anti mice, anti police, pro crime, pro drugs, domestic abuse, gun/knife violence, gang mentality and the affirmation that only yellow cats lives matter?


And you say science, and facts? Could there be a correlation between amount of people in a group and the percentage of people within that group that commit crime, and the connection between culture and behaviour?

100 ginger cats kill 6 mice a year
30 Yellow cats kill 12 mice a year

In reply to David Martin:

Africa had an extensive and established slave trade long before Europeans arrived...

In reply to Bootrock:

Yes, it's quite obvious that there is a connection between culture and behaviour. I don't think there is any scientific evidence that there is a link between race and behaviour though.
So why not have stats based on culture instead of ethnicity ? That sounds more useful.


Good illustration of my point.
Now suppose that you know with scientific certainty that the colour of the cat is not what drives the difference between the two groups. For example, yellow cats kill more mice, because people dislike yellow and blue cats and don't feed them as much.
By taking this context out, not only you've made a useless point about the colour the cat, but you've made it look as if the coulor of the cat was driving the difference between the two groups, when it isn't true.

So you would have been better of presenting the statistic in the following manner : cats who are not fed by their owners kill more mice.

In reply to RomTheBear:



You are aware that racism exists and its effects are thought by some to have an impact on the treatment of ethnic minorities in the criminal judicial system?
Pretty hard to even consider this without looking at some numbers.



How would you explain the disproportionate stats then? Or are you just dismissing them all on the basis of an attributed undated reference to an unnamed home office study adjusted for seemingly "everything" that it apparently indicates that there is no disproportion, and thus seemingly no bias in the CJS system at all.


If you want to understand the problem it's worth knowing if it exists or not. You introduced statistics to argue, for example, that anti-immigrant sentiment and arguments were not founded on reality. Seems pretty similar to discuss the statistics on race in the criminal justice system to discuss whether there is bias or racism within the CJS or whether there is a problem of crime (as victims or offenders) within a specific community, be that blacks, whites, immigrants or long toes.

In reply to RomTheBear:

Race and behaviour is culture and behaviour.

If there is a self perpetuating culture of glorifying violence and crime, then the yellow cats are going to go out and kill more mice.
And not only are yellow cats killing more mice, they are killing more yellow cats in record numbers than any other cats. But instead of blaming other yellow cats, and yellow cat culture, they blame the other cats.

You can lead a yellow cat to food, but you can't make it eat.

In reply to Dauphin:


Well, not yet... There's a lot of Chinese state money flowing in to Africa and it's pretty much a forgone conclusion that they're not doing it out of the kindness of their hearts.

In reply to Bootrock:


No it's not ! race and culture are obviously two very different thing, race is genetic and culture is acquired.
Take yellow cats at birth and put them in a blue cats' environment, chances they'll end up behaving the same as the blue cats.
By focusing on the cat's colour instead of it's environment you're making a rather irrelevant statement about the cat's colour, it was the difference between the two culture that was the matter, not the colour of the fur.

In reply to RomTheBear:

Different aspects of identity which are inseparably intertwined as cultural influences usually include genetic parents and the relevance of race is more about relations within a culture than genetics.

In reply to Bootrock:




Wow, it's all black people's fault? It's not only 'yellow cats' that have a gun or a crime culture and there is no scientific link between being 'yellow' and having a particular culture. You pay all yellow cats £30k a year and give them decent education and the problem goes away overnight.

The problem is, it's much harder for these black people to attain a working class status so they've invented their own hierarchy where it's easier to be black. There's more work to be done by everyone to improve the education and chances for black people in impoverished areas.

In reply to elsewhere:

But the premise of you argument is wrong, it's a logical fallacy to assume that differences between groups have the same cause as differences within groups.

Take a bunch of cats of all colours and put them in a place where they are well fed, so they don't need to kill mice. Then take another bunch of exclusively yellow cats and put them in a place where they are badly fed, so that they have to kill mice.

Now if you start counting for all the cats in the experiment how many mice they kill per year, and classify by cat colour, you'll inevitably find that overall yellow cats kill more mice than any other colour of cats.

To the external unaware observer, presented with this statistic, and not made aware of the context in which the cats were place in the experiment, it looks as if the colour of the cat is what drives the difference between the cats that kill mice and those who don't. So the statistic is technically correct, but it's misleading, and useless.

In reply to FreshSlate:

No it's not.

You can't automatically give people 30k jobs and solve an issue. You have to earn it. The rest of us do.

You can lead a yellow cat to a book, but you can't make it read.

You're right, it's a racial problem when there's Black Officers shooting black suspects, in a black neighbourhood with a white minority police force, with a black mayor, with a black state representative with a black President. 3 out of the 6 Officers that caused the "Ferguson Riots" we're black btw.
And to solve this issue, is to smash up black neighbourhoods and black businesses, to loot, to steal, violence and crime, destroy your own communities?

How can you try and educate people who's culture is anti-police, anti-establishment, pro-gang violence, crime and and drug abuse? The very culture is anti-education. What are black role models/celebrities doing? They aren't exactly promoting education and unity, they preach knee jerk reactions on cases they know nothing about to further divide and segregate and only care about their pay packet.


I saw a picture the other day, 3 black men. 1 was a judge looking at a Criminal, with a police officer next to him.
We all have choices in life, stop making excuses for your poor life choices. You can't expect other people to pave your path. Either sit around and blame others, or take hold of your balls and get something about you.

Watch Coach Carter. All of those lads ended up indebted to him, ended up with a good education because a black man had the balls to stand up and stand against said culture and try and make a difference in young kids lives.

In reply to RomTheBear:


But what about the amount of yellow cats killed by other yellow cats? Higher proportion than the rest of the other cats. Due to yellow cat culture. Yellow cats think it's acceptable to kill other cats because they stray into their "territory".


I am getting pissed off with this analogy though. We can't correlate cats that need fed and humans that can go out and feed themselves.

In reply to Bootrock:


Sorry to say but you seem to have misunderstood the analogy at the most basic level. I'm not trying to draw a parallel between cats and people I'm illustrating a rather well known logical fallacy, that you shouldn't assume the case of difference between groups is the same as the cause of differences within groups.

Another example, black american kids, from a very young age, systematically score lower on IQ test than their white counterparts, and Asian kids score higher. Would you deduce from this statistic that black kids are genetically programmed to have lower IQ than whites and Asians to have higher IQs than whites ?

In reply to RomTheBear:



Unfortunately on the basis that :-
"why we even bother talking about crime statistics [replace with education statistics] in terms of ethnicity, it serves no purpose whatsoever other than making absurd racists arguments."

then we shouldn't have even measured them to identify a problem....

In reply to Bootrock:


I think most cats are substantially better at going out and feeding themselves without the help of others than most humans.

Don't let me intrude into another pointless argument with Rom however...

Back on topic, I don't think anyone is arguing that race is the causal factor in all this in a genetic sense. Clearly race is a causal factor in a historic sense, in that differential treatment of people based on race over a significant number of generations has led us to where we are now.

In reply to RomTheBear:

You missed my point. I know it's not about cats and people.

It would appear so.

But then if the black community keeps blaming such low scores on external entities rather than an internal problem, then it will never get solved. I refer you to the picture I described of 3 black men, in different positions of society.

watch coach carter. All it took was a role model and some tough love, telling them to take actions themselves rather than palming it off as someone else's fault and turning them into another statistic.


You can lead a horse to water but you can't make it drink. Especially if the rest of the herd are kicking off.

In reply to wintertree:

Exactly, hence the argument that presenting statistics that imply race as the causal factor in a genetic sense is misleading at best.


So, it would make more sense, and would be less misleading and prone to misinterpretation, to have statistics split by socio-cultural background, instead of race.

In reply to off-duty:




But that's the thing, it didn't help identifying the problem, it led to the wrong conclusions.

In reply to RomTheBear:


The stats don't suggest or imply that genetics have got anything to do with crime.

They do suggest that race is a factor. Why that's the case is the problem that needs to be addressed.

In reply to RomTheBear:


It led to conclusions that you don't agree with perhaps.
Is it internal problems - poverty, lack of aspiration, deprivation, culture..
Or external problems - discrimination within education system, lack of provision of services...

There are very strong lobbies that indicate the latter have an impact.

Thats when studies of similar areas highlighting differences between black/white results can help pick apart the effects of internal and external factors and determine how we can ensure that everyone has an equal opportunity.

In reply to off-duty:


Your second statement is a total contradiction of the first one so I'm not too sure how to understand this.

In reply to off-duty:
It led to the conclusion that genetic factors were responsible for black pupil having lower IQ than whites.
I wouldn't disagree with it if it was true, but further studies concluded it was not the necessary conclusion because of the logical fallacy that I explained above.


But that's exactly what they don't do, to pick apart the effect of internal and external factor you need to have them in your statistical analysis in the first place, instead of irrelevant biological factors such as skin colour.
But I think I see what you mean, It may be useful to measure racial bias, because in this particular case, this is the racial bias itself which is being studied, so the use of it would be logical in this case.

In reply to RomTheBear:


Race is a factor.

Why are black kids doing worse than white kids in the same situation?

Most sane people (backed up with studies) would agree it's not some innate genetic issue, though that is an area that requires addressing - if only so that it can be refuted - so is it some cause within black families or is it something external that is impacting on black families more than white families.

In reply to RomTheBear:


It may have led to "a" conclusion that it was genetics.


So it served a useful purpose in that specific example. It identified an issue, an explanation was put forward, that explanation was refuted.
There is now an identified problem and one cause has been ruled out - so other explanations can be looked at to improve things.


If you don't have the stats in the first place you can't even identify the problem, let alone address the causes.
You are left with unsupported opinion as to a problem that might not exist, and even more poorly supported opinion into what causes it.

In reply to off-duty:


But the question is crooked from the start, because it is based on the unproven assumption that black kids are doing worse than white kids in the same situation.
The question should be "Why are some kids doing worse than others in the same situation", and then all the factors have to be considered, not only race.

That's kind of the issue with racial statistics, the simple fact of collecting them creates a bias. Some countries ban their collection and I think it's a good thing.
However I do agree they are useful when studying racial bias, because then race is the actual topic investigated, not the possible cause.

In reply to RomTheBear:



Equally - it is entirely reasonable to consider that race might be a factor, as racism is a well recognised factor in society - particularly some elements of US society.
How much of a factor it is is questionable, but in answering the question "why do some kids do worse than others" one factor appears to be race.
Causative ? Correlation ? Need to work it out.
Problem ? - Yes.

The question isnt based on an "unproven assumption" - it's based on an " unproven hypothesis " = is race a factor?
I would bet that there is research to examine poverty, and to evaluate effects of poverty and race.
(An example being UK stats that indicate it is now white poor kids that are underperforming in UK schools.)

In reply to off-duty:


But you're confusing the two concepts. In that case, the underlying factor is not race, it's racism.

In reply to RomTheBear:


But without examining the effect on race we can't even see that racism (if it is a factor) even exists.

In reply to RomTheBear:


Racism is a two way street.

In reply to off-duty:

Why ? It seems the opposite, you'd get more accurate and complete results for example if you were studying outcomes based on different types/amount of racial prejudice instead of by race.

But I think we agree, basically I have nothing against using racial statistics if race is specifically the topic of the study, but why include race for example in crime stats, when we know with scientific certainty that the genetic of being born a certain race does not make you more likely to commit crimes, unless you are trying to make it "appear" as if it mattered and deliberately make the study missing the point ?

In reply to Bootrock:


Sure we do - everyone earns exactly the same for the effort we put in... No one has ever been turned down for a promotion or job based on gender or race. They just aren't working hard enough.


Black people can and will read of their own accord. What the actual f*ck?

That's what you get when your opinion is based on tweets from Kanye West and the movie Coach Carter! Wow.

In reply to FreshSlate:

Oh quiet you, you waffling smear test.


coach carter was the simplest way of putting it to you bunch of regressive, left wing, liberal, wet lettuce, limp wristed, special snow flake, hipster, apologist, virtue signalling f*ck nuggets.

And I don't have Twitter.

In reply to Bootrock:


And we thank you for that.

In reply to Bootrock:


I think this speaks for itself. I'm sure you surround yourself with people of similar views, looking down on those 'yellow cats' who only make things worse for themselves. Do you meet in secret?

In reply to FreshSlate:

Indeed I do not, quite the opposite in fact my dear boy! I don't look down on people for their skin, I do look down on people for their actions.
I surround myself with a plethora of different people. And have worked with a range of people from around the world.
And can you tell the colour of my skin from an Internet screen?

Is this going to turn into one of those "I have more black friends so I am nice and liberal" threads?


See this is why we can't talk about racism and race, because suddenly if you don't buy into the regressive left wing knee jerk reactions, it makes you a racist.

In reply to RomTheBear:

There is far too many meandering cock donkeys on that place for me.

Milo has that area covered though

In reply to Bootrock:




I feel I should remind you that you are on a uk climbing forum. The only non "liberal scum broccoli munchers" here are the contrary folk that thought it'd be funny to wind people up, got carried away and can't back down and are having to run with it.

"Do you even climb, bro?" (see what I did there? )

Am I doing this "painting everyone with same brush" thing right?

In reply to ultrabumbly:


Trollololol.


Broccoli Lives Matter.

In reply to Dauphin:


Not so sure I'm saying that. Just pointing out that our (over)sensitivities to certain behaviours or language shouldn't necessarily be extended to those who don't share our history or social arrangements. So I'm struggling to find mortal offence in an advert for washing powder, especially when the Chinese might have far bigger concerns they haven't even come close to acknowledging yet (Cultural Revolution anyone?).

None of that is to say the Airline wasn't well out of line and that this isn't in any way a symptom of a failing in Chinese society. But just because slavery is our black blot in history, and as a result we make it a national sport to find offence and racism in everyday actions, going hunting for, and declaring what we identify as racism in foreign cultures can be thin ice.

In reply to David Martin:

I'm right there with you David. Difficulty I'm comprehension in the forum format, for me at least. Have a good day.

D

In reply to David Martin:


Isn't it racist to expect the Chinese to conform to white western moral values?

In reply to Big Ger:


Plenty of moral relativists would agree with that statement. To my mind that's a weasily way of thinking.

I'd say it is not racist to expect all people's of the planet to conform to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

Also, "do as you would be done by". I'm pretty sure most Chinese people don't want to be labelled and pigeon holed because of the colour of their skin; if one accepts that then it's entirely reasonable to expect them to treat others as they wish to be treated.

In reply to wintertree:

Great reply mate. Though I do have reservations on imposing Western values on other nations. next we'll be banning Burkas.

In reply to Big Ger:


Sooner the better...