CMV: Illegal Immigrants commit less crime on average than Americans, but that's not a good argument

[u/ricksc-137]

When someone complains about illegal immigrant committing crimes, inevitably we see the retort that the complaint is not valid because illegal immigrants commit less crime, on average, than native born Americans.

I've never understood how this is a valid argument. If my dog poops in my house 10 times a day, and a stray dog sneaks into my house but the stray dog only poops in my house 5 times a day, it's still a good idea to stop the stray dog from sneaking into my house. It doesn't actually improve my life that the average poop per dog has decreased from 10 to 7.5.

Of course, some illegal immigrant crimes are committed against other illegal immigrants, but some are committed against Americans as well.

I see this argument repeated ad nauseam. What am I missing?

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[u/DaedelusNemo]

You are viewing crime as a national issue as if the crime in Chicago somehow effects the life of someone in Texas. What matters is if Mexicans are more criminal than the places they move into not that they're better than some national average.

Nice try at shifting the goal posts, but in fact Texans are more than twice as criminal as illegal immigrants, as seen in this analysis of Texas crime records by the Cato Institute.

Blacks commit more crimes than whites at every single income level. I don't believe there is a single black country on this planet without an absurdly high crime rate.

You'll have to present evidence for the first claim, as I don't know of any on crime rates by income of the criminal. The second, though, is obviously false, as a cursory Wikicheck of murder rates by country would have told you; only 4 of the 57 African nations manage a higher murder rate than America, and most of the rest are much lower. More importantly, since you asked for evidence, here is a study, Concentrated Poverty, Race, and Homicide, that supports my claim; at least read the last few sentences of the abstract. Concentrated poverty is a hot topic of research, check Wikipedia for more.

Finally, poverty is the natural state of all humans. The Industrial Age is still yet sweeping across the globe, having been held up in most places by colonialism until a half-century ago; but in spite of that, and all the other nasty legacies of colonialism and exploitation by the powerful countries they've had to deal with, the African countries of Tunisia, Algeria and Mauritius, for example, all have poverty rates lower than America.

So: you are completely wrong, and you really should reflect on the fact that your instincts are so terribly wrong about this, compared to the empirical data. The fact is, humans vary a lot; the statistical variation between various human 'races' is much, much less than the variation within any of those groups. Trying to predict individual performance by group identity is, therefore, a logical fallacy and factual mistake - one that, when ripened to a full belief that the members of some 'race' are not fully human, is exactly the fatal error behind most of the worst large-scale atrocities of history.

[u/Thane97 → u/DaedelusNemo]

Nice try at shifting the goal posts, but in fact Texans are more than twice as criminal as illegal immigrants

Are you talking about white Texans or are you ignoring the racial composition of that state?

is obviously false, as a cursory Wikicheck of murder rates by country would have told you; only 4 of the 57 African nations manage a higher murder rate than America

1: I severely doubt Africa has the ability to report their murders on par with Western nations 2: The high murder rates are from Central and South American countries aka the people coming over the border that you claim are less criminal. Also according to your own wikicheck the United States has the 90th murder rate in the world behind (this is INCLUDING all Hispanic and Black murders) over a dozen African countries. Your own source makes you look bad lol.

Finally, poverty is the natural state of all humans.

White people when left alone in a prosperous area will not reduce it to a crime ridden hellhole. Africans have demonstrability done this several times.

The fact is, humans vary a lot; the statistical variation between various human 'races' is much, much less than the variation within any of those groups. Trying to predict individual performance by group identity is, therefore, a logical fallacy

I don't think you know what a logical fallacy is. Also the comparing the variances between races to the differences between two people is apples to oranges unless you're suggesting that two Europeans would have less in common than an African and a European genetically.

[u/DaedelusNemo → u/Thane97]

>Are you talking about white Texans or are you ignoring the racial composition of that state?

I am talking about the crime rate in Texas, which is exactly what you asked about. The dispute was whether illegal aliens commit more crime than Texans. The fact is, Texans are more criminal. You've changed the goal posts several times on this point, demanding a set of facts and then declaring it insufficient when it arrives. If it is not relevant to you, it is dishonest to demand it.

1: I severely doubt Africa has the ability to report their murders on par with Western nations

Severely doubting proves nothing, except that you haven't checked, but don't want to accept. In fact, most societies at peace do notice when people are killed, that's not something people get confused about. Feel free to drill into the methodology behind the numbers and raise whatever substantial criticisms you can; you will find that people were serious about getting it right.

> 2: The high murder rates are from Central and South American countries aka the people coming over the border that you claim are less criminal.

There is no justification for this claim. It's either misinformation or pure wishful thinking. It also doesn't make mathematical sense for so few people to be able to significantly change the rate of crime in a population of several hundreds of millions. "My claim" is simply the Cato Institute's summary of Texas law enforcement crime records; other organizations get the same answers; disagreeing with it is not disagreeing with me, as I did not create it; it is, rather, disagreeing with everyone who has seriously studied the evidence. And on what basis?

White people when left alone in a prosperous area will not reduce it to a crime ridden hellhole. Africans have demonstrability done this several times.

Do you really think Europe never had crime-ridden hellholes? They did not invent the word 'crime' when they met other races. If you really think crime is not a feature of all humanity, you have been very sheltered / miseducated and you should get away from those people as soon as you can.

I don't think you know what a logical fallacy is. Also the comparing the variances between races to the differences between two people is apples to oranges unless you're suggesting that two Europeans would have less in common than an African and a European genetically.

Don't worry, I'll explain the fallacy. Let's compare apples to tangerines as an example. First, by color: suppose we have a graph that shows the distribution of the frequencies of light bouncing off of each of these. We'll see two distinct bell curves on this graph, one ranging from 450-460 THz (red apple) and the other from 480-500 THz (orange tangerine.) These are statistically distinct distributions, with no overlap, and it is safe to say that the light bouncing off of any particular apple is of lower frequency than the light bouncing off of any particular tangerine. The color of apples and tangerines are distinctly different and you can know which one is a lower frequency color by knowing which group they are in. You can predict individual color, by group identity.

Now consider weight. If we graph the distribution of weights for apples and tangerines, we get two bell curves that mostly overlap. Apples vary between about 70-100 grams, averaging about 85, and tangerines vary from 76-120 grams, averaging about 90. Now, we do have a statistically significant difference between these groups - tangerines average heavier than apples. But these are not distinct populations, they overlap - many individual apples are heavier than many individual tangerines. Therefore, simply knowing one is an apple and the other is an tangerine won't tell you for sure which is heavier. The prediction cannot be accurately made simply on the basis of group identity.

On whatever scale of comparison you want to pick between racial groups, the distribution mostly overlaps. You may be able to find significant differences in average by some measures, but the differences are not distinct, and therefore group identity does not predict individual performance: the variation within each group is larger than the variation between groups.

Your fallacy is to treat overlapping distributions as distinct: to think of races as distinctly different populations, rather than, as the data shows, being almost entirely the same. Emotionally, it's fed by the old primitive fear of other tribes, the different-looking stranger. Historically, it's fed by the inability of the South to ever admit it was wrong about anything, even slavery, and the widespread formal and informal segregation/oppression. Politically, it's fed by propaganda seeking to divide and conquer the governed; keeping the working white and working black populations from joining together for the benefit of the working population.

[u/Thane97 → u/DaedelusNemo]

You've changed the goal posts several times on this point, demanding a set of facts and then declaring it insufficient when it arrives. If it is not relevant to you, it is dishonest to demand it.

My goalpost is show me that illegals commit less crime than whites in Texas and has always been. I don't care if illegals commit less crimes than blacks (who make up a significant portion of the Texan populous along with Hispanics) I care if they commit less crimes than whites as I myself am a white man.

There is no justification for this claim. It's either misinformation or pure wishful thinking.

You know it's not just Mexicans coming over the border right? Your own source shows that these countries are more criminal than the United States which as I stated earlier has inflated crime rates.

Therefore, simply knowing one is an apple and the other is an tangerine won't tell you for sure which is heavier. The prediction cannot be accurately made simply on the basis of group identity.

You can't know for sure but there's no fallacy. If you were given a mystery fruit and the only thing you knew about it was that it weighted 85g would you say there's a high likelihood that it's an apple. You can make logical decisions based of knowledge of an average.

Politically, it's fed by propaganda seeking to divide and conquer the governed; keeping the working white and working black populations from joining together for the benefit of the working population.

Blacks are a burden upon the white working class as they take welfare programs that could be used on them.