Okay, so before you read any further, I'm going to need you to play a game for me (insert scary Jigsaw voice: "I'd like to play a game"):
The rules are easy:
1. The scene will change a few times, then a potential assailant will pop up on your screen.
2. You have less than a second to decide whether to shoot them or not.
3. If the person on your screen is holding a gun, press J to shoot them, if they are holding an nonthreatening object (cell phone, wallet, Slurpee), press F to not shoot them.
After you've submitted your data to science, we can start talking about why I put this in the debate section...
Done? Ok, let's start this conversation with a quote from the article that linked to this test on Cracked.com
Spoiler
Joshua Correll, a researcher at the University of Colorado Boulder, developed a web-based game that puts the player in the role of a police officer who randomly encounters a series of black and white men -- some armed and some holding objects like wallets, cellphones, and Slurpees (but holding them aggressively). The player is then given a short amount of time to decide whether or not to shoot (which must be strange, because shooting in most games is a foregone conclusion -- it's just a question of where to aim).
You already can guess the result. When presented with a black subject, players had a much itchier trigger finger -- even if the object held by said subject was something decidedly nonlethal, like a Slurpee (which, to be fair, is apparently something you can hijack a plane with, according to the TSA). By contrast, they took much longer to decide whether the white subjects presented an immediate danger, even when the subject was obviously holding a handgun. Now, here's the kicker: results were similar across the board, regardless of whether the player was white, black, young, or old enough to be Marge Schott's bridge partner.
In case you're thinking, "Man, what kind of asshole brigade did they round up in order to end up with those results," go ahead and give the game a try for yourself. What you may find is what science already knows: being open-minded and tolerant takes effort and consideration. When put under stress and made to make a split-second decision, we tend to fall back on old knee-jerk impulses implanted by years of bullshit conditioning.
So, as it relates to all of the police on black violence, while this can all be construed a systemic problem that is specific to the police, it would seem that the police are just the ones with the guns who get to make this decision.
Preliminary academic results can be found here if you want to do some academic lifting.
I want to talk about this more, but I'm at work right now, so this is the best I can do until I get off... soooooo...
What are we debating? How long someone will sit there and press F and J waiting on their results? Or do you ever actually find out? I played for like 10 minutes eager to see how I performed, and then I gave up. I didn't shoot based on color. I shot based on my inability to actually see what they were holding. The objects were small and sometimes blended in too well with the background.
Racial stereotypes of statistical chance? Young black men are more likely to be involved in robberies, violent crime, drug offences and shootings than many other social groups.
Racial stereotypes of statistical chance? Young black men are more likely to be involved in robberies, violent crime, drug offences and shootings than many other social groups.
Now I could argue the point that at least when it comes to drug offenses, white people are using at a rate equal to or higher than the black population (and if you want, I can take the time to look up the numbers), but this test was designed to take out the real world variances and let a computer decide whether the test subject was going to be presented with a white person/black person and criminal/non-criminal.
The results of this test have indicated that regardless of the race of the test subject, they were more likely to pull the trigger on a black person than a white person.
The debate is about the preliminary results, which can be found here (and I'll edit into OP for clarity).
I figured there was a large collection of the results somewhere. It would be cool if it asked things like age, sex, race, etc. before you started playing the game, just to have that data as well.
Now I could argue the point that at least when it comes to drug offenses, white people are using at a rate equal to or higher than the black population (and if you want, I can take the time to look up the numbers), but this test was designed to take out the real world variances and let a computer decide whether the test subject was going to be presented with a white person/black person and criminal/non-criminal.
The results of this test have indicated that regardless of the race of the test subject, they were more likely to pull the trigger on a black person than a white person.
How can you take out real world variances? That's all down to the user.
I gave up before getting to the end. However, during the "practice" part of it, everyone was killing me. The objects in their hands were too small to discern anyway. So hell, I became the problem and started shooting everyone.
How can you take out real world variances? That's all down to the user.
You're being characteristically obstinate.
Taking out real world variances in this case means situational changes. Whether or not you're in front of a subway tunnel, the season or weather, the type of clothes they're wearing.
It's an attempt to simplify the issue to exclude variables like income and location and just focus on the race. Of course it comes down to the user - that's why the results are posted in aggregate. If we went by Napi's results alone, everyone is racist against everyone in a uniform fashion. Statistical data is only useful if the sample size is large enough to account for outliers like Napi.
I gave up too (by closing the window, not shooting everyone).
I got tired of not being able to tell if it was a cell phone or a gun. Plus, I kept getting annoyed at the fact I lost 40 points for not shooting. For some reason you only lose 10 if you shoot someone without a gun.
I find that odd. You lose more points for dying, than you do if you shoot an innocent person. I feel like the loss of points should be the same. With the 10 point loss compared to a 40 point loss, it feels like shooting an innocent person in the game really isn't that bad.
I'm not saying it's not bad, but a 30 point difference between dying and killing someone who didn't deserve it? In my option, that's a pretty big difference. If it were just 5-10 points in difference, I'd be fine, but 30 points seems excessive.
