Harvard Economist: Police Don't Shoot Black People More Often Than White People

[Chance]

From The New York Times:

A new study confirms that black men and women are treated differently in the hands of law enforcement. They are more likely to be touched, handcuffed, pushed to the ground or pepper-sprayed by a police officer, even after accounting for how, where and when they encounter the police.

But when it comes to the most lethal form of force — police shootings — the study finds no racial bias.

“It is the most surprising result of my career,” said Roland G. Fryer Jr., the author of the study and a professor of economics at Harvard. The study examined more than 1,000 shootings in 10 major police departments, in Texas, Florida and California.

I don't tend to trust economists, even when I agree with them. But for this guy to come out, acknowledge his own bias, and confirm that he was incorrect, warrants a lot respect.

[Eyesquared]

Definitely can respect the sentiment Fryer expressed with this quote:

"'You know, protesting is not my thing,' he said. 'But data is my thing. So I decided that I was going to collect a bunch of data and try to understand what really is going on when it comes to racial differences in police use of force.'"

[Chance]

Cops have been saying this for years:

Mr. Fryer found that in such situations, officers in Houston were about 20 percent less likely to shoot if the suspects were black.

Think this'll change anything? This is The New York Times, bastion of illogical liberalism if there ever was one.

[Hambo]

Emotion, not rational thought, drives the argument about police shootings. As I see it there are two issues. First is that apparently police don't shoot blacks more often, although police would have to accept that they do generally treat blacks differently than whites. This won't be popular on either side. The second is that eventually we all have to accept what the justice system dishes out. If white officers aren't criminally charged for what is either a good or out of policy shooting, that's probably because they can't be charged criminally.

The main issue is this: how do we get people to think rationally instead of reacting emotionally? This is not exclusive to black people. Frankly, it seems to be the default mode of operation for the majority of people.

[41magfan]

"Surprising New Evidence Shows Bias in Police Use of Force but Not in Shootings" ...... what an inopportune time for an inconvenient truth. However, I'm confident no amount of "evidence" will divert them from their contentious agenda. This is just a little blip on the radar of political correctness.

[voodoo_man]

....so nothing new?

[OnionsAndDragons]

Emotion, not rational thought, drives the argument about police shootings. As I see it there are two issues. First is that apparently police don't shoot blacks more often, although police would have to accept that they do generally treat blacks differently than whites. This won't be popular on either side.

It would be nice if both sides could just agree to the factual basis for treating blacks differently in many of these situations: the black male, especially young, demographic perpetrates a disproportionate amount of violent crime.

I'm not making any sort of judgment on that, either. There are lots of awful cultural and external forces that contribute to why that happens. It's still fact. I'm pretty sure it's also accurate that officers of black or Hispanic ethnicity are more likely to escalate force on black suspects than white officers. There must be a reason for that.

[AMC]

The issue of emotion driving this is key, I think. From what I've observed first hand, demagogue leaders of this movement have successfully attached the rage and grief associated with black-on-black murder to the phenomenon of police shootings. Its classic transference, but in this case its also manipulated for a political agenda. Its very similar in my opinion to what the PLO and for the PA have been doing to their population for decades. With now similar results. This explains the completely irrational claims of "They're slaughtering us in the streets! It's open season on black men!" No one is noticing anymore that "they" are members of their own group.

[Kanye Wyoming]

Harvard professor says ‘all hell broke loose’ when his study found no racial bias in police shootings
Roland Fryer said he lived under police protection during the fallout of his study

During a sit-down conversation with Bari Weiss of The Free Press, Harvard Economics Professor Roland Fryer discussed the fallout from a 2016 study he published on racial bias in Houston policing.

The study found that police were more than twice as likely to manhandle, beat or use some other kind of nonfatal force against blacks and Hispanics than against people of other races. However, the data also determined that officers were 23.8 percent less likely to shoot at blacks and 8.5 percent less likely to shoot at Hispanics than they were to shoot at whites.
****
Fryer received the first of many complaints and threats four minutes after publication.

"You're full of s—t," the sender said.

Fryer said people quickly "lost their minds" and some of his colleagues refused to believe the results after months of asking him not to print the data.

"I had colleagues take me to the side and say, 'Don't publish this. You'll ruin your career,'" Fryer revealed.

The world-renowned economist knew from comments by faculty that he was likely to garner backlash. Fryer admitted that he anticipated the results of the study would be different and would confirm suspicions of racial bias against minorities. When the results found no racial bias, Fryer hired eight new assistants and redid the study. The data came back the same.
****
Fryer, who became the youngest tenured Black professor at Harvard at age 30, was suspended for two years from the university in 2019 after he allegedly engaged in "unwelcome conduct of a sexual nature. He continues to deny the allegations.
****

Weiss, referencing Gay in her conversation with Fryer, asked him if he believes in karma.

"I hear it's a motherf---er," he replied.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/ha...gs/ar-BB1ioWoA

[Lex Luthier]

Mr Fryer was interviewed by Bari Weiss at the University Of Austin a couple of weeks back; part of the interview is quoted in the article posted by @Kanye Wyoming.
It’s worth your time, and as a bonus, Roland Fryer has a wicked sense of humor.

https://www.honestlypod.com/podcast/...ing-to-conform