How do you manufacture a moral panic?
Statistics are your friend.
Today, The BBC, along with several other UK news agencies, reported:
"Transgender hate crimes recorded by police go up 81%"
So you would be forgiven if you thought that transgender hate crimes had gone up 81% in a year. That's what the headline implies. Only the Huffington Post included "...in the last three years" in their headline.
And even then it's wrong.
"Data obtained by the BBC showed there were 1,944 crimes across 36 forces in the last financial year compared with 1,073 in 2016-17."
For a start the piece includes Scottish figures, which are usually logged separately but I still don't know where they get the figure of 1,073 for 2016/17 as the figure for that year in England and Wales was 1,248. The government's own hate crime figures for the last five years are here.
Of course, those champions of science based data, Stonewall are consulted to repeat the mantra that Transgender people are under attack with a mass epidemic of transgender hate (repeated twice in the article just to make sure you know there's an epidemic of transphobia around):
"The Stonewall charity said it showed the "consequences of a society where transphobia is everywhere".
Everywhere. Even at Stonewall, those transphobes.
What the data actually shows is something quite different.
Transgender hate crimes:
2013-14: 559
2014-15: 607
2015-16: 858
2016-17: 1,248
2017-18: 1,651
If the figures quoted are correct for 2018-19, 1,944, then statistically speaking trans hate crime, whilst increasingly reported* are actually on a huge downward curve (it's how statistics work, statistically the rate of world population has been in decline for years, for example).
The 81% quote is not broken down by year. So the (percentage) increases in reporting by year runs:
2016-17 a 45% increase
2017-18 a 32% increase
2018-19 an 18% increase.
We should be celebrating a downward curve in the figures if we're going to throw around statistics. That's a massive decrease in the rate of transgender hate crimes from 45% to just 18%.
Yet the BBC report completely unsubstantiated claims:
" Equal rights charity Stonewall estimated that two in five trans people had experienced a hate crime or incident in the past year."
And feed the idea that there is an epidemic of trans hate (repeated again):
"Laura Russell, from Stonewall, said: "These statistics are the real life consequences of a society where transphobia is everywhere - from the front pages of newspapers, to social media, and on our streets.
"We need people to realise how severe the situation is for trans people, and to be active in standing up as a visible ally to trans people, in whatever way they can.""
The BBC's own hopeless analysis is just plain wrong:
"Analysis by BBC LGBT Correspondent Ben Hunte
As these latest hate crime figures show, transgender people in the UK currently have it harder than most."
Most? Ah journalism. Most who? Most other minorities who have hate crimes reported against them?
If one looks at hate crime figures it shows quite the opposite:
71,251 (76%) race hate crimes;
11,638 (12%) sexual orientation hate crimes;
8,336 (9%) religious hate crimes;
7,226 (8%) disability hate crimes.
1,651 (2%) transgender hate crimes.
If you're disabled you're nearly 7 times more likely to experience a hate crime than a trans person. As a control, we can look at disability hate crimes figures to see the rate of growth in comparison to trans hate crimes (no one's thought to put in a FOI request for disability hate crimes for 2018-19). In the three years from 2015-18 disability hate crimes rose by 190%. Why aren't we screaming a disability hate crime epidemic? As far as I'm aware only Frances Ryan in The Guardian reports on the real epidemic of hate aimed at disabled people, like:
"Last week a Middlesbrough Conservative councillor apologised after describing benefit claimants as “pond life” who should be “washed and sterilised”. David Smith said: “There are so many genuine cases. But there is a large portion who are claimants that take the absolute piss. Yet they continue to breed. Rabbits, the lot of them.”"
Obviously, suggesting that other forms of hate crime are more prevalent than trans hate crimes does not mean that trans hate crimes are not real or not endemic. Figures show that minority groups across the board are either experiencing or reporting and having recorded higher rates of hate crime year on year.
Who is to blame? I am, apparently. And maybe you too if you're reading this, you transphobe. The BBC analysis suggests that people who debate transgender rights cause these hate crimes:
"While the increased rates may be somewhat due to more people coming forward about their experiences, some may find it shocking that more is not being done to protect these clearly vulnerable individuals.
Many have described the current plight of transgender people as being similar to that of the gay rights movement in the 1980s and 1990s. Restricted, ridiculed and ignored.
Transgender people have their existence debated on a near daily basis across UK media, and several activists believe this negative attention reinforces the poor treatment they receive on our streets.
Whilst the gender debate rages on, many of those at the heart of it will have to continue living in fear."
Clearly implying with no evidence that transgender rights is like gay rights (sigh), that "debating" transgender rights creates the atmosphere of hate and that as long as those who debate it continue to do so, hate crimes will continue without giving any cause and effect for this.
There.
It's my fault you get assaulted because you look like a woman in a suit.
This clearly goes against the BBC impartiality remit:
"Impartiality lies at the heart of public service and is the core of the BBC's commitment to its audiences. It applies to all our output and services - television, radio, online, and in our international services and commercial magazines. We must be inclusive, considering the broad perspective and ensuring the existence of a range of views is appropriately reflected."
I was so Mr Angry that I wrote to the BBC. I'm sure that'll sort that out.
It's important to note that the government data report acknowledges that "It is possible for a hate crime offence to have more than one motivating factor" and that's particularly important in four of the five areas (not disability).
Race and religious hate crimes are often conflated, specifically hate crimes aimed at Muslims, are they racist or religious hate crimes?
It's also important when factoring in the conflation of gender identity and sexuality (the other two areas of hate crime data). It's not clear what constitutes a hate crime based on sexuality and one on gender identity. After all, the conflation is there with the trans and queer lobby themselves, lumped together in LGBT+ and, of course, by those committing hate crimes quite possibly conflating gender identity with sexuality. Or to put it simpler, those who commit hate crimes, abuse or violence, are probably not likely to have a clear understanding of the difference between transgender and homosexuality. That, in itself, you might suggest, could hide much transgender abuse as homophobia. However, logically, it's far more likely that a trans person is gay than a gay person is trans (statistically speaking) so it's actually more likely that trans abuse is about sexuality.
Reporting on trends is also ironic. After all, *there are far more people coming out as transgender now as compared to five years ago when transgender people were a tiny fringe grouping who actually were transgender and not lots of tmbler kids with teenage angst or ROGD or some internet contagion. The figures for children reporting gender dysphoria has skyrocketed according to the Tavistock clinic (200 in 2012 to 2016 in 2017, a 1000% increase in five years) so you would then assume that hate crimes would exponentially increase with the supposed massive increase in gender dysphoria, wouldn't you?
However, there were 600 reported trans hate crimes in 2014 (first year of recording). In 2018 it was just over 1600, or just over a two and half fold increase. But the nearest to it in scope, disability, has seen a jump in that time from 2000, to 7,226. A three and half fold increase.
It's also important to ask what constitutes a hate crime when it comes to transgender. There's the case of Caroline Farrow (reported on The BBC so it must be true) who was to be interviewed by Surrey police in a recorded interview for allegedly "misgendering" the daughter of Mermaids founder Susie 'woo woo' Green. Susie 'woo woo' Green pointed to a tweet by Farrow stating "What she [Green] did to her own son is illegal. She mutilated him by having him castrated and rendered sterile while he was still a child.”
Green famously took her son to Thailand to get him castrated, mutilated and rendered sterile at the age of 16, because it's illegal in the UK to carry out that surgery before the age of 18 because we don't think children know their own mind until they're an adult.
It's a moot point but Farrow is technically correct in what she says. The intention might have been different in context, who knows?
Green dropped the charges though a piece in The Guardian by Amelia Hill suggested:
"Green and other activists for transgender rights view it as deeply offensive to deliberately use the wrong pronoun for a trans person. Doing so could be an offence under the Malicious Communications Act, which makes it a crime to send messages that are indecent or grossly offensive, threatening, or contain information which is false or believed to be false, if the purpose for sending it is to cause distress or anxiety."
As Stonewall define transgender as "using one or more of a wide variety of terms, including (but not limited to) transgender, transsexual, gender-queer (GQ), gender-fluid, non-binary, gender-variant, crossdresser, genderless, agender, nongender, third gender, bi-gender, trans man, trans woman,trans masculine, trans feminine and neutrois," there's a wide variety (but not limited) of misgendering possibilities for us to get arrested for. Oh brave new world.
There is no epidemic of trans hate crimes. There may be an epidemic of hate generally driven by a fractured, nationalistic political agenda and the anonymity of social media. But singling out trans people feeds a transphobic paranoia that figures simply do not back up.
Statistics are your friend.
Today, The BBC, along with several other UK news agencies, reported:
"Transgender hate crimes recorded by police go up 81%"
So you would be forgiven if you thought that transgender hate crimes had gone up 81% in a year. That's what the headline implies. Only the Huffington Post included "...in the last three years" in their headline.
And even then it's wrong.
"Data obtained by the BBC showed there were 1,944 crimes across 36 forces in the last financial year compared with 1,073 in 2016-17."
For a start the piece includes Scottish figures, which are usually logged separately but I still don't know where they get the figure of 1,073 for 2016/17 as the figure for that year in England and Wales was 1,248. The government's own hate crime figures for the last five years are here.
Of course, those champions of science based data, Stonewall are consulted to repeat the mantra that Transgender people are under attack with a mass epidemic of transgender hate (repeated twice in the article just to make sure you know there's an epidemic of transphobia around):
"The Stonewall charity said it showed the "consequences of a society where transphobia is everywhere".
Everywhere. Even at Stonewall, those transphobes.
What the data actually shows is something quite different.
Transgender hate crimes:
2013-14: 559
2014-15: 607
2015-16: 858
2016-17: 1,248
2017-18: 1,651
If the figures quoted are correct for 2018-19, 1,944, then statistically speaking trans hate crime, whilst increasingly reported* are actually on a huge downward curve (it's how statistics work, statistically the rate of world population has been in decline for years, for example).
The 81% quote is not broken down by year. So the (percentage) increases in reporting by year runs:
2016-17 a 45% increase
2017-18 a 32% increase
2018-19 an 18% increase.
We should be celebrating a downward curve in the figures if we're going to throw around statistics. That's a massive decrease in the rate of transgender hate crimes from 45% to just 18%.
Yet the BBC report completely unsubstantiated claims:
" Equal rights charity Stonewall estimated that two in five trans people had experienced a hate crime or incident in the past year."
And feed the idea that there is an epidemic of trans hate (repeated again):
"Laura Russell, from Stonewall, said: "These statistics are the real life consequences of a society where transphobia is everywhere - from the front pages of newspapers, to social media, and on our streets.
"We need people to realise how severe the situation is for trans people, and to be active in standing up as a visible ally to trans people, in whatever way they can.""
The BBC's own hopeless analysis is just plain wrong:
"Analysis by BBC LGBT Correspondent Ben Hunte
As these latest hate crime figures show, transgender people in the UK currently have it harder than most."
Most? Ah journalism. Most who? Most other minorities who have hate crimes reported against them?
If one looks at hate crime figures it shows quite the opposite:
71,251 (76%) race hate crimes;
11,638 (12%) sexual orientation hate crimes;
8,336 (9%) religious hate crimes;
7,226 (8%) disability hate crimes.
1,651 (2%) transgender hate crimes.
If you're disabled you're nearly 7 times more likely to experience a hate crime than a trans person. As a control, we can look at disability hate crimes figures to see the rate of growth in comparison to trans hate crimes (no one's thought to put in a FOI request for disability hate crimes for 2018-19). In the three years from 2015-18 disability hate crimes rose by 190%. Why aren't we screaming a disability hate crime epidemic? As far as I'm aware only Frances Ryan in The Guardian reports on the real epidemic of hate aimed at disabled people, like:
"Last week a Middlesbrough Conservative councillor apologised after describing benefit claimants as “pond life” who should be “washed and sterilised”. David Smith said: “There are so many genuine cases. But there is a large portion who are claimants that take the absolute piss. Yet they continue to breed. Rabbits, the lot of them.”"
Obviously, suggesting that other forms of hate crime are more prevalent than trans hate crimes does not mean that trans hate crimes are not real or not endemic. Figures show that minority groups across the board are either experiencing or reporting and having recorded higher rates of hate crime year on year.
Who is to blame? I am, apparently. And maybe you too if you're reading this, you transphobe. The BBC analysis suggests that people who debate transgender rights cause these hate crimes:
"While the increased rates may be somewhat due to more people coming forward about their experiences, some may find it shocking that more is not being done to protect these clearly vulnerable individuals.
Many have described the current plight of transgender people as being similar to that of the gay rights movement in the 1980s and 1990s. Restricted, ridiculed and ignored.
Transgender people have their existence debated on a near daily basis across UK media, and several activists believe this negative attention reinforces the poor treatment they receive on our streets.
Whilst the gender debate rages on, many of those at the heart of it will have to continue living in fear."
Clearly implying with no evidence that transgender rights is like gay rights (sigh), that "debating" transgender rights creates the atmosphere of hate and that as long as those who debate it continue to do so, hate crimes will continue without giving any cause and effect for this.
There.
It's my fault you get assaulted because you look like a woman in a suit.
This clearly goes against the BBC impartiality remit:
"Impartiality lies at the heart of public service and is the core of the BBC's commitment to its audiences. It applies to all our output and services - television, radio, online, and in our international services and commercial magazines. We must be inclusive, considering the broad perspective and ensuring the existence of a range of views is appropriately reflected."
I was so Mr Angry that I wrote to the BBC. I'm sure that'll sort that out.
It's important to note that the government data report acknowledges that "It is possible for a hate crime offence to have more than one motivating factor" and that's particularly important in four of the five areas (not disability).
Race and religious hate crimes are often conflated, specifically hate crimes aimed at Muslims, are they racist or religious hate crimes?
It's also important when factoring in the conflation of gender identity and sexuality (the other two areas of hate crime data). It's not clear what constitutes a hate crime based on sexuality and one on gender identity. After all, the conflation is there with the trans and queer lobby themselves, lumped together in LGBT+ and, of course, by those committing hate crimes quite possibly conflating gender identity with sexuality. Or to put it simpler, those who commit hate crimes, abuse or violence, are probably not likely to have a clear understanding of the difference between transgender and homosexuality. That, in itself, you might suggest, could hide much transgender abuse as homophobia. However, logically, it's far more likely that a trans person is gay than a gay person is trans (statistically speaking) so it's actually more likely that trans abuse is about sexuality.
Reporting on trends is also ironic. After all, *there are far more people coming out as transgender now as compared to five years ago when transgender people were a tiny fringe grouping who actually were transgender and not lots of tmbler kids with teenage angst or ROGD or some internet contagion. The figures for children reporting gender dysphoria has skyrocketed according to the Tavistock clinic (200 in 2012 to 2016 in 2017, a 1000% increase in five years) so you would then assume that hate crimes would exponentially increase with the supposed massive increase in gender dysphoria, wouldn't you?
However, there were 600 reported trans hate crimes in 2014 (first year of recording). In 2018 it was just over 1600, or just over a two and half fold increase. But the nearest to it in scope, disability, has seen a jump in that time from 2000, to 7,226. A three and half fold increase.
It's also important to ask what constitutes a hate crime when it comes to transgender. There's the case of Caroline Farrow (reported on The BBC so it must be true) who was to be interviewed by Surrey police in a recorded interview for allegedly "misgendering" the daughter of Mermaids founder Susie 'woo woo' Green. Susie 'woo woo' Green pointed to a tweet by Farrow stating "What she [Green] did to her own son is illegal. She mutilated him by having him castrated and rendered sterile while he was still a child.”
Green famously took her son to Thailand to get him castrated, mutilated and rendered sterile at the age of 16, because it's illegal in the UK to carry out that surgery before the age of 18 because we don't think children know their own mind until they're an adult.
It's a moot point but Farrow is technically correct in what she says. The intention might have been different in context, who knows?
Green dropped the charges though a piece in The Guardian by Amelia Hill suggested:
"Green and other activists for transgender rights view it as deeply offensive to deliberately use the wrong pronoun for a trans person. Doing so could be an offence under the Malicious Communications Act, which makes it a crime to send messages that are indecent or grossly offensive, threatening, or contain information which is false or believed to be false, if the purpose for sending it is to cause distress or anxiety."
As Stonewall define transgender as "using one or more of a wide variety of terms, including (but not limited to) transgender, transsexual, gender-queer (GQ), gender-fluid, non-binary, gender-variant, crossdresser, genderless, agender, nongender, third gender, bi-gender, trans man, trans woman,trans masculine, trans feminine and neutrois," there's a wide variety (but not limited) of misgendering possibilities for us to get arrested for. Oh brave new world.
There is no epidemic of trans hate crimes. There may be an epidemic of hate generally driven by a fractured, nationalistic political agenda and the anonymity of social media. But singling out trans people feeds a transphobic paranoia that figures simply do not back up.
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