Huffington Post's Easy Fumble
A story at Huffington Post tied to the second mass shooting at Fort Hood makes a bad case (veterans bring the war home with them), and does a very bad job making it. Some analysis.
- Huffington Post's breakthrough revelation that crimes happen where people live and sometimes people are veterans http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/07/map-veteran-murder_n_5092548.html?utm_hp_ref=tw …
//twitter.com/AthertonKD/status/453543829191548929
— Kelsey D. Atherton (@AthertonKD)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:44:09 - A conversation between
a veteran and the authortwo veterans about the piece. - .@mileskathleen's exhaustive research: U.S. troops are Americans, and sometimes Americans kill other Americans http://huff.to/1mVlSqs
//twitter.com/AlexHortonTX/status/453538125235884032
— Alex Horton (@AlexHortonTX)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:21:30 - @AlexHortonTX TBF, I raised concerns about this piece with eds and they were very responsive, made edits to reflect lack of PTSD links
//twitter.com/maxjrosenthal/status/453538782361694208
— Max J. Rosenthal (@maxjrosenthal)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:24:06 - @maxjrosenthal How about the graph that links murder with more deadly tours? Is that a correlation, or was it a larger population of troops?
//twitter.com/AlexHortonTX/status/453539187237855233
— Alex Horton (@AlexHortonTX)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:25:43 - @maxjrosenthal Wouldn't that theory prove a delayed reaction? Hard to be deployed in Sunni Triangle in 2006 and them kill at home in 2006.
//twitter.com/AlexHortonTX/status/453539500065841153
— Alex Horton (@AlexHortonTX)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:26:57 - @AlexHortonTX Talked w/ them about lack of analysis re: causes/circumstances. I agree re: the graph but they're honestly trying.
//twitter.com/maxjrosenthal/status/453540039654666240
— Max J. Rosenthal (@maxjrosenthal)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:29:06 - @maxjrosenthal And the violence clustered around bases. Jesus, man. Fear mongering sensationalism is not a good look. @mileskathleen
//twitter.com/AlexHortonTX/status/453540052078178304
— Alex Horton (@AlexHortonTX)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:29:09 - @AlexHortonTX I don't think the next story we run on this topic will look similar to this one, I'll put it that way.
//twitter.com/maxjrosenthal/status/453541579056492544
— Max J. Rosenthal (@maxjrosenthal)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:35:13 - @maxjrosenthal Really glad they're trying. But why was it even run when the fourth graf negates the entire idea of the graph/weak data?
//twitter.com/AlexHortonTX/status/453541662808358912
— Alex Horton (@AlexHortonTX)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:35:33 - @AlexHortonTX The 4th graf was a suggestion of mine that they took. They believed the data was presented neutrally when they ran it...
//twitter.com/maxjrosenthal/status/453543129703284736
— Max J. Rosenthal (@maxjrosenthal)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:41:23 - @AlexHortonTX Obviously we have a different take and they very were open to it, that's all I'm trying to say. They want to get better.
//twitter.com/maxjrosenthal/status/453543219159375872
— Max J. Rosenthal (@maxjrosenthal)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:41:44 - An analysis of the bad social science practices in the story
- Wow, somebody get @HuffingtonPost a social scientist if they're going to run alarmist pieces such as this: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/07/map-veteran-murder_n_5092548.html?utm_hp_ref=tw …
//twitter.com/stcolumbia/status/453541176906231808
— Dan Trombly (@stcolumbia)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:33:37 - Also, note the huge discontinuity between the text of the article and the fearmongering "war comes home" infographic.
//twitter.com/stcolumbia/status/453541517030735873
— Dan Trombly (@stcolumbia)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:34:58 - @stcolumbia @HuffingtonPost so 194 homicides out of 2.5 million deployed men and women?
//twitter.com/NeilBhatiya/status/453541581778591744
— Neil Bhatiya (@NeilBhatiya)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:35:14 - @stcolumbia @HuffingtonPost so 194 homicides out of 2.5 million deployed men and women?
//twitter.com/NeilBhatiya/status/453541581778591744
— Neil Bhatiya (@NeilBhatiya)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:35:14 - @stcolumbia @HuffingtonPost and the numbers of decreased as those wars have wound down? Someone call Eliot Ness
//twitter.com/NeilBhatiya/status/453541831570391040
— Neil Bhatiya (@NeilBhatiya)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:36:13 - @NeilBhatiya @HuffingtonPost Wow, the killers mainly targeted people close to them? How unlike all other homicide patterns!
//twitter.com/stcolumbia/status/453542329643589632
— Dan Trombly (@stcolumbia)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:38:12 - @stcolumbia @HuffingtonPost and they occurred near military bases? like, where soldiers live?
//twitter.com/NeilBhatiya/status/453542471101059072
— Neil Bhatiya (@NeilBhatiya)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:38:46 - If you're going to make a bad infographic with huge stats issues, at least try not to stigmatize people who deserve support.
//twitter.com/stcolumbia/status/453542819714449408
— Dan Trombly (@stcolumbia)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:40:09 - @stcolumbia Fourth graf alone describing no link between PTSD and violence is enough to kill the piece.
//twitter.com/AlexHortonTX/status/453543596546084864
— Alex Horton (@AlexHortonTX)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:43:14 - @stcolumbia Based on back of envelope math, the homicide rate for Iraq/Af veterans is 7.76 per 100K; its 12 per 100K for the U.S. as a whole
//twitter.com/NeilBhatiya/status/453545475493605376
— Neil Bhatiya (@NeilBhatiya)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:50:42 - @stcolumbia @AthertonKD actually it would be even less because that 194 # is cumulative over a decade or so
//twitter.com/NeilBhatiya/status/453545940545445888
— Neil Bhatiya (@NeilBhatiya)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:52:33 - @stcolumbia @AthertonKD damn my liberal arts degree
//twitter.com/NeilBhatiya/status/453546010590326784
— Neil Bhatiya (@NeilBhatiya)Tue, Apr 08 2014 14:52:50



