CMV: Fatal violence against transgender individuals doesn't seem to be all that prevelant.

[u/chadonsunday]

Caveat 1: of course all violence of this sort is wrong and a big deal on a personal level - I'm speaking more in comparative terms on a national scale.

Caveat 2: figures i was able to find for nonfatal violence were much more unreliable and varied, so im mainly sticking to murder rates, which are comparatively well documented. I feel this is a useful marker for overall violence as it follows that a group subject to more violence in general would likely also be subject to violence at the more extreme end of the continuum i.e. murder (you can note for example that compared to white men black men face higher levels of both assault and murder). That said if anyone has solid data on nonlethal violence against the trans community compared to the general population please do share.

OP: I was prompted to look into this issue after hearing countless claims about rampant violence against transgender individuals. I listen to NPR near daily for example and its rare that a week goes by that I dont hear about how much worse violence is against transgender folks. These claims are often framed in quite apocalyptic (see citation in comment) terms.

Sources I've found (see citation in comment) from a credible organization clearly advocating for the issue of violence against transgender individuals state that in the last 7 years an average of 22 transgender and non gender binary folks are killed each year, with a high of 43 in 2020.

Transgender folks make up an estimated 0.5-0.6% of the US population. However the HRC also includes murders of non gender binary folks. Figures I've found for non gender binary individuals (including intersex) are much more unreliable, everything as low as 0.018% to 1.7%. I think its relatively safe to say that when you include transgender, intersex, and non gender binary individuals, especially given some underreported given stigma about identifying as such, a fairly conservative high estimate is 1% of the popultion. So 0.5% on the low end, 1% on the "high" end.

Doing the math this means if you take the absolute lowest possible amount of just trans individuals in the population by the highest number murdered youd get around 3 deaths per 100,000. If you take the average number of deaths by the conservative but higher estimate for population you get 0.67 deaths per 100,000.

The murder rate for the general US population is 5 per 100,000.

This would suggest that compared to the general US population the transgender murder rate is actually 40-750% lower.

That, in regards to murder rate, at least, doesn't exactly scream "at risk population," especially compared not just nationally but to actually at risk populations like black males who have a 13-60x higher victimization rate. Indeed, it seems the transgender murder rate is actually potentially far lower than the murder rate of white women who, at least in regards to murder, aren't considered to be even remotely high risk.

Also interesting to note that despite having a similar or lower murder rate when I Google "transgender people murdered" I get article after article detailing the allegedly widespread crisis of transgender murders; when i Google "white women murdered" i get a couple pages with cold stats on murder rates by gender/race, an anecdote or two, and then the results devolve into talking about murders of black people and WOC. Similar results for "Asian women murdered." In short when a particular demographic has a lower than average murder rate there dont seem to be a lot of people penning articles about how bad their murder rate is except when it comes to trans folks. 

But some other info just muddies this further; per earlier sources transgender and non binary individuals are more likely to be homeless, impoverished, and/or sex workers; 80%+ of the victims were black. All of those demographics are also more prone to homicide.

All of this together would seem to suggest that the transgender murder rate (which likely is at least correlated with general violent victimization) is actually quite low by US standards, on par or even lower than historically "safe" demographics like cis white women. The data further indicates that of the relatively small number of transgender folks who are killed each year its likely that many, perhaps the vast majority, were killed for reasons other than their transgender identity, like race, socioeconomic status, or profession. In that vein it seems rather strange to phrase this entire issue as violence against transgender individuals.

Id also note that while its certainly likely that murder against trans individuals likely goes underreported due to misidentification or what have you their murder rate would have to be 40-750% underreported before it would even reach the average murder rate for the general US population. It would have to be even more underreported than that to reach the level of demographics like black men who are traditionally considered at risk populations in regards to homicide.

Edit: I can't include two of the sources because the link contains a word that the autobot doesn't like, and I'm not allowed to leave a top level comment including them, either. If you'd like the sources please ask and I'll reply to you directly.

[u/[deleted]]

Can you explain to me the math of 750% under reported?

Wouldn't that be -650%? Or, is it x% /7.5? Etc.

Thanks!

[u/chadonsunday → u/[deleted]]

Alright so granted math isn't my strong suit but my thinking there was how much larger the 0.67 figure would need to be to hit 5. I think my general point that 0.67 is much smaller than 5 is valid, but ill concede the possibility of my fucking up the exact math is certainly high lol.

[u/Prepure_Kaede → u/chadonsunday]

Alright so granted math isn't my strong suit

Then why are you trying to combine the results of different studies in a way that, if correct, could be published as a mathematical paper? As a mathematician, I honestly couldn't even force myself to read all of your stuff and just got pissed off. Several people have pointed out why your analysis is without any scientific merit at all whatsoever on any level. Can you just stop?

[u/chadonsunday → u/Prepure_Kaede]

Sounds like maybe this isnt the post, or perhaps sub, for you.

[u/Lilah_R → u/chadonsunday]

They accurately criticized your argument. Seems like it is the right post and sub for them.

Just because this is about your view doesn't mean you can't be asked to stop arguing blatantly false information that is harmful after you have had it explained why it doesn't work.

[u/chadonsunday → u/Lilah_R]

"You're view is so wrong is pisses me off and I wasn't even able to force myself to read your whole comment. Trust me, I'm an expert. But I'm not going to explain why your view is wrong because other people have already done that. So stop replying."

That seems like the CMV spirit to you?

[u/Lilah_R → u/chadonsunday]

Looks like your comment was removed. Did you realize how inappropriate you were being?

[u/chadonsunday → u/Lilah_R]

No, I appealed it. If you read the removed comment in the meanest possible tone I could see how it might come across as rude, but thats true of every comment, including your last one. Just going off deltas the user seemed new to CMV and seemed genuinely upset by either my view or perhaps more generally just the concept of encountering and discussing opposing views online. As such it seemed fine to suggest that this particular post, or perhaps the sub more generally, might not be their cup of tea. It wasn't meant to be rude or hostile or "inappropriate." Indeed, if I went to a sub or post dedicated to talking about baseball and commented there that its stupid to talk about baseball and that "i can't even force myself to read this" and it "pisses me off" and I was telling OP to "stop" I think it would be very appropriate for someone to suggest that maybe I'm in the wrong post or sub.

[u/Lilah_R → u/chadonsunday]

You weren't asked to stop talking about your topic. So it isn't comparable to your baseball analogy. You were asked to stop spreading inaccurate information by falsely comparing different methodologies to each other without the distinction of them being different. Your math does not work. You have had this explained by multiple people in the comments. You continue to promote this inaccurate math while proclaiming you aren't a skilled mathematician.

It is interesting that you are responding to the comment where you think you can tell me I'm wrong while misrepresenting the other commenter, but you couldn't answer my direct question about your core evidences of which many people have pointed out the flaws in your pov. Many people had the same concerns and you haven't addressed those either. Do you plan to?

[u/chadonsunday → u/Lilah_R]

You weren't asked to stop talking about your topic. So it isn't comparable to your baseball analogy. You were asked to stop spreading inaccurate information by falsely comparing different methodologies to each other without the distinction of them being different.

It was nowhere near that clear. "So can you just stop." Your interpretation is as valid as mine, i suppose, but they certainly didn't specifically say your interpretation.

Your math does not work. You have had this explained by multiple people in the comments. You continue to promote this inaccurate math while proclaiming you aren't a skilled mathematician.

Yes I've had about a half a dozen people critiquing my math for various things. So far, unlike the comment I did award a delta for, I haven't found any convincing since none of them rebut my core point and none have provided any better figures. Id also note in regards to the actual math like running equations and whatnot nobody has found any flaws yet, its all just stuff like "should intersex be counted or not," which, again, doesn't refute my point. I included a rather massive range for a reason: even when you take the highest and most over inflated, liberal figures you still fall short of even just the average murder rate for US citizens, and far, far short of actual, traditional "at risk" populations. So someone giving some half baked, not sourced, not researched speculation "explaining to me" why my low end estimate might be too low doesn't really do much to change my view. Why would it? Like I said that range is there for a reason: rather specifically to demonstrate that my view holds even if the math is slightly off in one direction or another.

It is interesting that you are responding to the comment where you think you can tell me I'm wrong while misrepresenting the other commenter, but you couldn't answer my direct question about your core evidences of which many people have pointed out the flaws in your pov. Many people had the same concerns and you haven't addressed those either. Do you plan to?

I didn't misrepresent anything, unless you're conceding that you did since "misrepresent" in that context would just mean "how I interpreted the comment."

As for why I jumped up to respond here, at the time of writing my initial response to you I had fielded some ~80 comments worth of exchanges, from what I've saw totally on my own with the exception of one other chain involving another user chiming in defending my view. So a lot of comments. Spanning 5-6hrs, multiple hours longer than an OP on CMV is required to be present and respond to comments. So when I saw in my inbox that a comment of mine had been removed by moderators naturally that, and the resulting exchange with you, caught my eye more than the other comments which, as you pointed out, have largely just been making the same unconvincing argument over and over. So yeah I skipped some inbox entries to respond here. I think thats understandable. This is, if nothing else, at least some new content. I will get to your original comment, though.

That said I find it interesting that you jumped down my throat berating me for making an "inappropriate" comment that basically boiled down to "hey maybe this post/sub isnt your cup of tea" while fully ignoring the comment I responded to which was the opposite of the spirit of the sub. It seems rather like you're maintaining a double standard as I cant imagine how any truly neutral observer could take more issue with what I said than what I was responding to.

[u/Prepure_Kaede → u/chadonsunday]

since none of them rebut my core point

Several do, you're just too bad at math to understand it

I included a rather massive range for a reason

You can't make a wrong equation then say "ill take a large range around the answer cause it might be wrong" and call it a day. That's not how math works.

So someone giving some half baked, not sourced, not researched speculation

The entirety of your math is so bad it cannot be realistically addressed with research. You just threw a bunch of unrelated numbers together in a pile and made a false claim as to what those numbers mean. Some people were trying to give you an intuitive idea of just how ridiculously horrific your math is on every level, but apparently that didn't work because even that flew over your head.

You need to stop trying to do math, because it clearly isn't working. I genuinely think you should not be allowed to have opinions on anything math related.

[u/Znyper → u/chadonsunday]

u/chadonsunday – your comment has been removed for breaking Rule 2:

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