Bag's Rants

Anti-Semitic violence has become endemic in Britain. But, has it?

There is an interesting article in the Telegraph saying Anti-Semitic violence has increased in the UK since the Lebanon crisis. Read it here.

To be honest I'm not surprised all the articles and talk about these poor terrorist organisations being attacked by a state are clearly going to have an effect on certain members of our society. And let's face it the average punter in the UK who just takes what he reads in the media at face value in this current climate ain't going to be the sharpest knife in the drawer.

One thing I was confused about was statements like “In July, when the conflict in Lebanon began, we received reports of 92 incidents, which was the third-worst month since records began in 1984.” In 2000 the monthly average was between 10 and 30 incidents.

Err, OK. Is 10, 30 or even 92 a month actually a lot? How many attacks do mosques or muslims get each month? What about Scotsmen, Welshmen, Germans, French, Americans? Alone it is pretty well left up to the writer to make comparisons. This is why I like looking at the raw data.

It also had a spike in July when the conflict began but that was still only the third highest month since records began in 1984. What were the other two due to? When were they? Plus, why pick out 2000 for special mention? Where the article had a strange view on average as it was between 10 and 30. How can an average be between 10 and 30. Surely, adding them all up and dividing by 12 gives a single number as an average. Why pick on that year and then treat each month individually?

Actually, what did that article really say? It had loads of facts without any context and yet drew conclusions to show that, yet again, we are intolerant b4$^4&ds. Maybe I'm getting too paranoid now. I'm starting to question everything I read in the MSM and wonder who it is actually writing for. To me it looks like the Israelis are getting bad press and now want to revert to their normal tactic of hiding behind predudice and the Holocaust as a method of defence. Maybe I am paranoid but I wish they would stop doing that. It belittles them and they don't need to.

posted by Bag @ 2:09 pm