In 2020, the United States experienced one of its most dangerous years in decades.
The number of murders across the country surged by nearly 30 percent between 2019 and 2020, according to FBI statistics. The overall violent crime rate, which includes murder, assault, robbery and rape, inched up around 5 percent in the same period.
But in 2023, crime in America looked very different.
“At some point in 2022 — at the end of 2022 or through 2023 — there was just a tipping point where violence started to fall and it just continued to fall,” said Jeff Asher, a crime analyst and co-founder of AH Datalytics.
…
There are some outliers to this trend — murder rates are up in Washington, D.C., Memphis and Seattle, for example — and some nonviolent crimes like car theft are up in certain cities. But the national trend on violence is clear.
You’re right, but that’s not why people think violent crime is high. They think that because the media knows that when they report on crime, they get eyes on them and eyes on them mean they can sell more advertising. So every violent crime they can report on gets reported on and in ever-increasing numbers to make it look like the amount of violent crime is at least steady, if not rising.
And, of course, that helps “tough on crime” politicians (mostly Republicans) as well.
I wonder how tough it would be to set up an “open source” style news media / investigative journal. Ideally using crowdfunding
Something without an incentive for metrics chasing
I honestly think if America isn’t consumed by its ever increasing pessimism, it will eventually come to the realization that accurate information is one of the most valuable things. I’m hoping rampant AI generated misinformation will be the catalyst for this. And people will actually start putting money towards real journalism again.
Besides public radio, Wikinews is established (albeit quite dead)! No funding for contributors to the latter, so you might be left trying BuyMeACoffee/Patreon (or a grant?).
I think you can go to NPR, or blog solo with a Patreon, or get with a few other journalists like 404 Media did - founded 5 months ago, already breaking some stories, sometimes collabing with other journalists. Wikinews is better for casual internet-journalists but it’s hard even just reading a bunch of sources and compiling a story effectively. It’s rarely updated; very few want to/can do that work for free.
Interesting observation:
Rachel Swan, a breaking news and enterprise reporter for the San Francisco Chronicle, says there are “two really visible crises” in the downtown area: homelessness and open-air drug use.
“And honestly, people conflate that with crime, with street safety,” she said. “One thing I’m starting to learn in reporting on public safety is that you can put numbers in front of people all day, and numbers just don’t speak to people the way narrative does.”
I’ve seen lots of attack ads that seek to protray homelessness as a crime issue, and not a poverty issue
I’d be curious as to know which segment of Americans are least likely to believe it - or actively professing the opposite.
People around here and Reddit get really angry when you point this out. It’s weird, it’s like people want things to suck.
its cause all they hear in their news bubbles is doom and gloom and constant violence and shooting.
and cant take a second to think about the fact that these reports are from across the entire fucking country, or even beyond its borders, They just focus on “news says things bad brrrrr”
This is a constant argument in my family, and for this exact reason. No amount of statistical or empirical evidence convinces them, and the response is “If thats true was is the news always reporting violence?!”
People have a really hard time separating their own personal anecdotal experience from fact. It takes an extremely mature mental state and trust in the data’s accuracy. There has been a rise in more extreme crimes, like mass shootings. Overall this makes a negligible impact on the murder rate. But it’s scary. The media knows that, more than anything else, gets people’s attention. Then people go online and talk about how shitty everything is, and the cycle perpetuates.
The sad part is that people with zero self-esteem often fail simply because they assume they cannot win. And I fear that will be the case for our country as a whole. If we hold onto this belief that we are the worst place on earth, we will fulfill our own prophecy.
I think part of it is that if things suck it’s an excuse to not do much, things are going to shit and I’m just trying to keep my head up nothing really matters anyway we’re all doomed… Compared to things are getting better, the future is looking positive, I’m not really doing much though.
It’s why people are so upset at every positive new development in anything and instantly start exaggerating flaws or just refusing to acknowledge it. Post an article backed by real science that mentions we’re doing well transitioning away from Carbon and you’ll get a couple of doubtful comments and a few votes then post a random guy on the street saying ‘i don’t really know anything about it but we’re probably doomed’ and it’ll be front page for days
Another example is the sheer amount of people who claim they can’t think of a single good use for natural language computing, they’ve read a hundred articles/memes about ai bad but not a single one mentioned any of the ways it could save lives, improve life style and productivity, etc…
People don’t want hope, they want an excuse
How about white collar crime? Seems like a lot of people made out pretty well with Covid relief funds.
