The Problem with Extrapolation

 

There is a natural tendency of people – well documented by social science - to extrapolate events seen on TV as being representative of the same even in numbers much greater than reality.

As an example, media coverage of homosexuals in various guises has resulted in public opinion that gays constitute 10% of the general population.  Surveys place the actual number at less than half of that.

Thus, when the media broadcasts seemingly incessantly  the video of the Memphis assault as a motorist pulled over ostensibly for a traffic violation, the impression is created that the conduct shown is engaged in by police more generally.

The consequences flowing from this perception can be deadly.  Think of the widespread rioting and deaths following the killing (determined by a jury) of George Floyd.  That there was no evidence that the Minnesota police officer was truly representative of police across the nation didn’t seem to matter.  Extrapolation took place and apparently motivated “protests” from Philadelphia to Atlanta.

The lesson for the media is that without balance or caution the press can be implicated (intentionally or not) in promoting extrapolation and attendant violence.

This is not to suggest that news of such a negative sort should not be reported.  But it should be aired in context to counteract the tendency to extrapolate unless such is unnecessary  

For example, ISIS terrorists are sworn to kill infidels.  Thus, reporting that an ISIS member killed an “infidel” need not be qualified.  Extrapolation is appropriate since the conduct is consistent with ISIS policy.  ISIS members carried out its objective.

Back to the assaults committed by five members of the Memphis Police Department.  Extrapolation should be discouraged by any responsible news organization.  Fox News in particular has provided balance by showing the video and featuring law enforcement authorities emphasizing   that the misconduct shown is not typical of police in general and is certainly contrary to their training.

Alas, there seems to be a strong anti-police attitude among certain left-wing elements in our nation, including some media “stars” featured on MSNBC and elsewhere.  They want to inflame, not provide balance.

 

Are We Responsible for the Past Sins of Others?

 

Periodically, America is confronted with demands that we atone for the past sins committed by its government or citizens.  Reparations are demanded for descendants of slaves, the children of Japanese Americas interred during World War II or the heirs of Native Americans driven from their homeland by U.S. soldiers.  Only affirmative action for blacks has actually been implemented – and relatively briefly – as a remedy for America’s perceived sins.  Even the late and highly esteemed conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer wrote that a nation, the people, can be collectively guilty, and thus saddled with collective responsibility for wrongful conduct in their name.

The demands, thus far, for compensation are largely unmet.  That is not because they lack merit.  They don’t.  But, apart from the expense, determining who is entitled to receive what is a legislative nightmare.  How far down the hereditary line do we go and how do we calculate the entitlement of a person whose family tree is mixed?  Some of those on it will not qualify as descendants of the “favored” class.

But there is a far more important reason to oppose placing a burden on a nation of people for the sins of their ancestors’ individual responsibility.

Western liberal classical tradition focus is not only on the group but on the individual.  Both rights and responsibilities reside there.

Other traditions are different.  The Eastern world, as a general concept, values the group over the individual in many respects.  Thus, a person from a social perspective is not independent.  What he does reflects on the group and all its members. In a simplified sense, members of the group derive their identity from it.  The tribe is foremost.

In practice, that means that conduct of a member is attributed to all.  Misdeeds, therefore, can be avenged – and are – by retribution against any member since culpability is not restricted to the individual wrong-doer. Collective guilt thereby warrants collective responsibility.

That is not the American way.