The latest was just now. Their home page headline screams in large type, bright red in color:
The article tells of the really awful statistic that 160 law enforcement officers were killed in the line of duty in 2010 (and a few days to go). As you read, your mind starts trying to relate it to . . . . . what?"Police Fatalities Jump 37% in 2010."
Easy availability of guns? It did say there was also an increase of shootings. Or the economy? The writer favored this explanation -- in that police forces have been cut back in some places due to budget shortages, and officers are being asked to do more with less.
Not until the 7th paragraph, however, does this interesting fact come out: The reason there was a 37% jump in 2010 is that last year's total of 117 was a 50 year low. It was 2009 that was the anomaly, not 2010. Nor does 160 represent a real long-range increase -- It has topped 160 five times in the past ten years, including 240 in 2001. It routinely topped 200 in the 1970s.
To be perfectly clear: I am not condoning police deaths. Even one is too many.
That headline was not wrong: it did rise 37% over 2009. But that's not the real story and it creates a false sense of fear and despair. The real story is that there has been a long-range decline in police deaths, with a sudden drop in 2009 that has now returned to the more expected rate.
Why wasn't the article written from that angle? Obviously, this is a more attention-grabbing headline. And it's all about competition for readers, I guess. Didn't journalism used to be about reporting the news honestly?
Again, I'll plug Michael Blastland and Andrew Dilnot's book, The Numbers Game: The Commonsense Guide to Understanding Numbers in the News, in Politics, and in Life." It's all about exposing just such misleading use of numbers and statistics. And highly readable.
Ralph
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