Stupid Statistics

With great fanfare and a slavishly uncritical media, outgoing Attorney General, Eric Holder, tried to make up for his department's lack of prosecuting that Ferguson, Missouri police officer, Darren Wilson, by making the case that the whole Ferguson police department was a bunch of racists. One particular he stated was that although Ferguson is 63% black, 86% of all traffic stops there were of black people ... ergo the police force is singling out blacks ... exhibiting their inherent racism ... see: New York Times Story. This kind of statistic proves absolutely nothing ... other than it might be that blacks disproportionally break Ferguson's traffic laws. Conveniently, A.G. Holder does not look into this possibility.

If Holder had instead stated that 39% of all Ferguson residents were under the age of 30, yet 56% of all traffic stops were people in this age group ... would this mean that the police there were discriminating against young people? Of course not ... so why are we subjected to his racist statistical extrapolation? Clearly the American public has had the drum-beat of these type of racist accusations for many years without any serious rebuttal ... and thus, we now accept such media tripe as gospel.

Yes, Holder's quoting of some racists e-mails does indicate that there are some bad apples in the Ferguson police department ... but the entire organization? I am more than certain that there is an undercurrent of anti-white police officer rhetoric circulating among Ferguson's young black community. Does this make the entire black community there racists? Of course not ... as was proven during the grand jury testimony when many blacks came forward with testimony which went against the "Hands up, don't shoot" perpetuated myth.

Also the Ferguson police department is faulted for not having proportional representation of the town's races. If this type of statistical syllogism has any merit, then why cannot one say that since 78% of NBA players are black whereas blacks represent only 12.3% of the U.S. population ... that this basketball association is exhibiting reverse racism? Can it not be that black players just tend to be better at this sport?

Why don't we look at such statistical misdirection in the face and conclude that Al Sharpton, Eric Holder and much of the media are also exhibiting as much or more racist tendencies than the Ferguson police department?

One might also read Paul Mirengoff's analysis of this statistical silliness in Powerline Part I . Watch for Part II.