Seattle's 'Hate Crime Epidemic That Never Was' | Trending

Seattle's 'Hate Crime Epidemic That Never Was' | Trending
"Wilfred Reilly, author of the book Hate Crime Hoax: How the Left is Selling a Fake Race War, has investigated the extraordinary and frightening claims by the Seattle Times that hate crimes and "incidents" in that city were up an astonishing 400% since 2012.

In the immortal words of Defense Secretary Albert Nimziiki from Independence Day, "That's not entirely accurate."

An examination of the Seattle data indicates that fewer than 40 actual criminal cases resulting from real, serious hate incidents were successfully prosecuted between 2012 and 2017. This provides an excellent case study of how media coverage of flash-point issues such as hate crime can—whether intentionally or not—sensationalize and exaggerate the urgency of social problems.

"Sensationalize and exaggerate"? 

Sounds familiar.

A look through the data that has been made available from Seattle’s office of the City Auditor reveals that there is little basis for panic. First, most of the situations contained in the 500-plus documented incidents for 2018 turned out not to be hate crimes at all. Out of 521 confrontations or other incidents reported to the police at some point during the year, 181 (35 percent) were deemed insufficiently serious to qualify as crimes of any kind. Another 215 (41 percent) turned out to involve some minor element of bias (i.e., an ethnic slur used during a fight), but did not rise to the definition of hate crime. Only 125, or 24 percent, qualified as  potential hate crimes—i.e., alleged “criminal incidents directly motivated by bias.” For purposes of comparison: There are 745,000 people living in Seattle, and 3.5-million in the metro area.

"Hate crime" is a politically charged term. 
But the Seattle Times uses it in a scare headline to describe interactions between people that, while mean and nasty, are in no way, shape, or form to be considered a "crime" much less a "hate crime."

The deeper you look at these stats, the more ridiculous it gets.

Indeed, if there is a single archetypal Seattle hate incident that emerges from this data, it would seem to involve a mentally ill homeless man yelling slurs at someone. According to the City Auditor, 22 percent of hate perps were “living unsheltered” at the time of their crime, 20 percent were mentally ill, and 20 percent were severely intoxicated.

Accusing a homeless, crazy person of a "hate crime" is ludicrous. 

But when you're a liberal newspaper trying to gin up fear and outrage, it's considered "good reporting."

The exaggeration of "hate crimes" isn't confined to Seattle..."
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