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My only exposure to local news is via YouTube. And whenever I see a video about a human being shooting another human being, the local news talking head never explicitly blames the shooter. He or she invariable couches the story behind the term “gun violence,” as if the gun were the problem and not the person who picked up the gun and used it to commit a heinous act. Here are some examples of what I mean.
But Is It Gun Violence?
When someone is stabbed to death, do our vaunted journalists frame this type of crime as “knife violence?” When someone uses a car to run over and kill people, do our vaunted journalists frame this type of crime as “car violence?” So when it comes to shooting crimes, why do our vaunted journalists act as if the guns involved are as culpable as the shooters?
I’ve had a handgun for a few years now. Not once has it loaded itself, leaped into my hand, and compelled me to shoot someone. As far as I can tell, guns aren’t the driver of violence. They’re a very effective tool for meting out violence, to be sure, but they’re not the cause of violence. The cause of violence has been, and always will be, human beings who either can’t control their impulses, enjoy hurting others, or are clinically psychotic.
But maybe I’m nuts. Our vaunted journalists in the woke media tell us that guns are the problem—and that all we need to effect the most peaceful nirvana the world has ever known is repeal the Second Amendment and outlaw guns. And that’s gotta be right, right? Our vaunted journalists would never spread misinformation, right?
To test the received wisdom we are fed by our woke overlords, I went to New York City’s Open Data and fetched the data on “gun violence” for 2021. I surmised that if guns really were the problem, “gun violence” would more or less affect every demographic group equally. After all, New Yorkers are all governed by the same laws and have the same access to guns. “Gun violence” therefore shouldn’t have a preference for some communities and not others.
Now, before we delve into the data, we need some demographic context. Here is the demographic breakdown of New York City’s major racial and ethnic groups:
| Race/Ethnicity | Percent of New York City Population |
|---|---|
| Black | 24.3% |
| Black Hispanic* | 3.5% |
| White Hispanic* | 25.5% |
| White | 32.1% |
| Asian-Pacific Islander | 14.2% |
| American Indian-Alaskan Native | 0.4% |
New York City Shooting Data
Okay, now the shooting data. There were 2,011 shooting incidents in New York City in 2021. Here’s the shooter count by race and ethnicity:
| Race/Ethnicity | Count |
|---|---|
| Unknown | 1049 |
| Black | 643 |
| White Hispanic | 176 |
| Black Hispanic | 107 |
| Asian/Pacific Islander | 19 |
| White | 17 |
And here’s the victim count by race and ethnicity:
| Race/Ethnicity | Count |
|---|---|
| Black | 1412 |
| White Hispanic | 292 |
| Black Hispanic | 240 |
| White | 40 |
| Asian/Pacific Islander | 27 |
When it comes to shooters, some groups are way overrepresented, and some groups are way underrepresented. Blacks, for example, make up 24.3 percent of NYC’s population but were nearly 67 percent of the known shooters. Whites, on the other hand, make up 32.1 percent of NYC’s population but were less than two percent of the known shooters.
To get a true measure of the unequal distribution of shooters, I extrapolated the known shooter percentages to the unknown shooter percentages for each demographic group. For instance, of 1,412 blacks shot in 2021, the shooter was known in 617 incidents and unknown in 795 incidents. And of the 617 known shooters, 496 shooters were black. This works out to 80.39 percent. I then multiplied the 795 unknown shooters by this percentage and added the result (639) to the total black shooter count. After doing this extrapolation exercise for each demographic group and thus making an educated guess on the racial and ethnic makeup of the unknown shooters, I calculated the number of shooters per 100,000 for each demographic group. Here are the results:
| Race/Ethnicity | Un-Extrapolated Count | Extrapolated Count | Total Count | Percent of Shooters | Shooters Per 100,000 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Black | 643 | 744 | 1387 | 68.97% | 64.83 |
| White Hispanic | 176 | 172 | 348 | 17.30% | 15.50 |
| Black Hispanic | 107 | 99 | 206 | 10.24% | 66.85 |
| Asian/Pacific Islander | 19 | 21 | 40 | 2.00% | 3.20 |
| White | 17 | 13 | 30 | 1.49% | 1.06 |
| Total | 962 | 1049 | 2011 | 100 | 22.84 |
When we turn to gunshot victims, we see the same unequal dynamic. Some groups are overrepresented, and some groups are underrepresented. The nice thing about victim data is that no extrapolation was necessary. New York City had the race and ethnicity data for every victim. Here are the gunshot victims per 100,000 for each demographic group:
| Race/Ethnicity | Count | Percent of Gunshot Victims | Gunshot Victims Per 100,000 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Black | 1412 | 70.21% | 66.00 |
| White Hispanic | 292 | 14.52% | 13.01 |
| Black Hispanic | 240 | 11.93% | 77.88 |
| White | 40 | 2.00% | 1.42 |
| Asian/Pacific Islander | 27 | 1.34% | 2.16 |
| Total | 2011 | 100% | 22.84 |
Finally, we see the same unequal dynamic when it comes to gunshot victims under the age of 18. Here’s the sickening racial and ethnic breakdown of children shot in 2021:
| Race/Ethnicity | Gunshot Victims | Percentage of All Gunshot Victims | Victim Survived | Victim Died | Percentage of All Victim Deaths |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Black | 120 | 76.92% | 99 | 21 | 72.41% |
| Black Hispanic | 20 | 12.82% | 15 | 5 | 17.24% |
| White Hispanic | 15 | 9.62% | 12 | 3 | 10.35% |
| White | 1 | 0.64% | 1 | 0 | 0.00% |
| Total | 156 | 100% | 127 | 29 | 100% |
Final Thoughts
New York City isn’t America. It’s just one city. So just because New York City’s data shows that shootings are more of a black community problem than a generic “gun violence” problem doesn’t mean we can assume that that result applies to the rest of America.
But then again, if you go to the National Gun Violence Memorial website and search your nearest city, you will likely see that most of the victims cataloged are black Americans (the screenshot below shows the latest entries for my nearest city, Raleigh, North Carolina). And since most crime is intra-group rather than inter-group, it’s not a big leap to suppose that black Americans aren’t just grossly overrepresented in shooting crimes in New York City. They’re grossly overrepresented in shooting crimes all across America.*
* Quick aside: Black Americans are roughly 13.5 percent of America’s population but accounted for 55.84 percent of America’s murder victims in 2020.
What to Make of the Above Data
The first conclusion that I draw from the above data is that our news media, both locally and nationally, suck the big one. What I did above was real journalism. I didn’t couch the truth. I didn’t hide the news behind a smokescreen of “gun violence,” or “income inequality,” or “Covid fatigue.” I didn’t push an approved narrative. I just dug into the data to see who was shooting whom.
The second conclusion that I draw from the above data is that we will never get a handle on violent crime until we have the courage to confront the main driver of violent crime in America today: black Americans.
This doesn’t mean, of course, that black Americans are bad people. Most black Americans are wonderful people. It just means that there’s an egregious problem in the black community.
Consider this analogy.
Most white Americans during our Jim Crow Era were also wonderful people. But a lot weren’t. Far too many white Americans believed that it was morally acceptable to treat black Americans as second-class citizens. Likewise, as already pointed out, most black Americans today are wonderful people. But a lot aren’t. Far too many black Americans believe that it is morally acceptable to engage in crime and shoot people.
Now another analogy.
We didn’t bury the Jim Crow Era by worrying about white feelings. Nor did we bury the Jim Crow Era by worrying about name-calling. Our leaders challenged the egregious racism in the white community, and their assault on white self-esteem wasn’t deterred by the prospect of being called “Dixiephobes.” The end result of that leadership was that white Americans got better morally, black Americans gained full citizenship, and America became a more just society.
Well, we’re not going to bury our High-Crime Era by worrying about black feelings. Nor are we going to bury our High-Crime Era by worrying about name-calling. We need the courage to challenge the egregious violence in the black community, and our assault on black self-esteem can’t be deterred by the prospect of being called “racists.” And until we find this courage, the horrific carnage we see unfolding on America’s streets will continue unabated.
Okay, groovy freedomist, that’s all I got. Let me know what you think when you get a chance. Peace.
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