The DOJ figures; and does lower black median age eliminate the black rape disparity?

My little (700 words, not even full op-ed size) article about interracial rape, the core of which consists of a couple of simple data from a Department of Justice table that is readily available to anyone with an Internet connection, seems to have set off more discussion on the Web than anything I’ve previously written. A Google search for my name and “interracial rape” turns up 498 results. A search for my name at blogs turns up many results also—the biggest response in the blogosphere to any article I’ve done. As a side note, the latest Google result in the blogosphere shows my indefatigable nemesis David Mills, the Undercover Black Man, claiming that it’s somehow damning to me that David Duke and other florid anti-Semites, one of whom calls me “jew Auster” even as he cites me, have posted my article at their respective websites. I’ll let others draw conclusions about the state of Mills’s logical thinking abilities as shown by such a remark. James Wolcott at Vanity Fair also chimes in against me, describing me as one “whose mandarin manner suggests Cardinal Richelieu peering from a window at the costumed rabble below.”

Yet for all the copying of my article and the attacks on me personally, so far I’ve seen no discussion about the meaning of the DOJ figures, no attempt to make sense of them in the context of an overall picture of interracial crime. As for my own thoughts on the matter, I must say it seems amazing to me that there were zero white-on-black rapes in the U.S. in 2005, especially when we remember that Hispanic perpetrators of crimes are counted as “whites” in federal studies. Are we really to believe that in this country in which there are over 35 million blacks and over 35 million Hispanics, there were no Hispanics (let alone no non-Hispanic whites) who raped black females in this country in 2005? Yet that’s what the DOJ figures suggest, and that’s what I reported.

Since to my knowledge no one has come forward to help clarify these questions, this evening I’m going to bone up on the subject by re-reading The Color of Crime, the 2005 study from the New Century Foundation. Yes, that’s Jared Taylor’s outfit, and let it be noted that David Horowitz, who on Mondays, Tuesdays, and Wednesdays considers me too racist to have any dealings with, and on Thursdays publishes me, and on Fridays considers me too racist to have any dealings with, considers Taylor a sound source of statistics on race and crime.

Also, for anyone who has not kept up with it, check in on the blog entry on Horowitz’s expulsion of me, where many interesting comments have been posted today.

- end of initial entry -

Nicholas Martin writes:

Mr. Auster: In your article about black sexual crimes, why did you ignore the issue of age? Something like 60 percent of sex crimes are committed by males under thirty, and a much greater percent of black men than white men are under 30. I think the median age for whites is about 10 years higher than for blacks. Due to homicide deaths, the discrepancy is probably even higher between white and black men.

How can you discuss the issue without accounting for this? How much of the black-white sex crime discrepancy is attributable to age?

Nicolas Martin

LA replies:

The multiple of rape by blacks over rape by whites is about seven. Meaning an individual black is seven more times likely to commit rape than an individual white. (Actually the figure is much higher because “white” in the above statement includes Hispanics.) This huge difference has been true one generation after another. So I don’t know if the current difference of median age has any overall significance in this lasting difference between blacks and whites. If you’re suggesting that the entire racial differential is “explained” by this age difference, that’s obviously not the case.

Also, it’s really not a good idea to start a query by saying, “Why did you ignore—?” My article was a little article making one point. It was not an article on the totality of comparisons between rape by whites and blacks. The question, “why did you ignore the issue of age,” implies that among all the issues that I did not deal with in this 700 word article, I should have dealt with your issue, and the fact that I didn’t indicates that I was deliberately ignoring it.

So, to make your point, you should have said, “I think that age is a factor that ought to be addressed,” instead of accusing me of ignoring something. See my point?

Nicholas Martin replies:

Why, thank you for the lesson in email etiquette. As the director of an organization that deals with controversial issues, I get a lot of mail, I’ve yet to think of telling those who write how they should do so. But, then, I’m not trying to manipulate sentiment at the expense of relevant facts.

Of course you dealt with one issue at the exclusion of another that might have altered your conclusion. That’s what propagandists do. I see your point, all right.

LA replies:

What an ass.

An Indian living in the West writes:

Ass is correct. Even if there is a 10 year age difference between median ages, whites outnumber blacks 6 to 1 in the US. Therefore, even though there is a difference in median age, the number of whites under 30 is much higher than the number of blacks under 30. Yet, the rape of white women by black men is several thousand fold higher than the rapes of black women by white men. This cannot be explained by median age.

ILW continues:

“I must say it seems amazing to me that there were zero white-on-black rapes in the U.S. in 2005, especially when we remember that Hispanic perpetrators of crimes are counted as ‘whites’ in federal studies. Are we really to believe that in this country in which there are over 35 million blacks and over 35 million Hispanics, there were no Hispanics (let alone no non-Hispanic whites) who raped black females in this country in 2005? Yet that’s what the DOJ figures suggest, and that’s what I reported.”

This makes the median age argument look even more dubious. Hispanics in America are disproportionately young and now probably outnumber blacks (although obviously actual figures are hard to obtain because a large number among them are in America illegally). So when one adds the number of Hispanic males and white males under 30, the figure becomes even more lopsided.

Nicholas Martin writes:

I haven’t been a FrontPage subscriber for years, and I wasn’t aware that you had been banished due to this piece when I wrote to you about it. I can see why you are dyspeptic, but that still doesn’t explain why you would chose to ignore a very important factor influencing the incidence of rape.

Discussing black rape incidence without referring to age is like discussing lung cancer incidence without referring to smoking.

LA replies:

It doesn’t seem to have occurred to you that the issue of age differences is something I did not know about until you brought it to my attention, so how could I have ignored it? For you to describe my simply not knowing something as deliberately ignoring something is a rather stunning lapse on the part of someone who evidently prides himself on his clear thinking.

Further, I would point out that you are the one who introduced the insulting tone into this exchange. If you intend to continue the insulting tone, don’t bother writing to me again as I won’t reply. If however you have an argument to make, make it. As I’ve said over and over since this began (see my most recent blog entry), I do not present myself as an expert with a total view of the subject of interracial crime and rape; I simply reported a couple of facts from the DOJ study and underscored their significance. So I am interested in a more informative discussion of the issue of race and rape.

However, based on your tendentiousness so far, I doubt that you are capable of being a partner in such a discussion.

NM replies:

You are right. It never occurred to me that an educated person writing about crime incidence would not consider the age factor. Many years ago George Gilder noted that 90 percent of violent crime is committed by single men. Single men are mostly young men.

On your blog, right after you call me an ass, why don’t you acknowledge that you never thought of age as a factor that influence the incidence of rape?

LA replies:

Even if I had been aware of the age factor at the time I wrote my article and had agreed with you on its significance, how would that have altered the simple, basic fact I presented that there is massive black on white rape and virtually no (or extremely low) white on black rape, something which, as I also pointed out, the liberal media truly DOES ignore, meaning that it is something that is evident and known to everyone yet is never openly discussed and in fact is deliberately concealed? Since you are so eager to criticize me, a writer with no power or influence in American life, for “ignoring” things, I wonder if you have ever pointed out how the U.S. news media, the most powerful opinion-shaping apparatus in the history of the world, systematically ignores the vast phenomenon of black on white rape in this country?

Further, as the Indian living in the West points out, since Hispanic perpetrators are conflated with whites in federal statistics, and since Hispanics have a much lower median age than whites (and, I believe Hispanics also have lower median age than blacks), and since there are more Hispanics than blacks in the U.S., all these factors would tend to reduce the lower black median age factor—that factor which, according to you, refutes the idea that blacks per capita commit far more rape than other groups.

Nicholas Martin wrote:

I haven’t been a FrontPage subscriber for years, and I wasn’t aware that you had been banished due to this piece when I wrote to you about it. I can see why you are dyspeptic, but that still doesn’t explain why you would chose to ignore a very important factor influencing the incidence of rape.

LA replies:

You like many others keep getting the basic facts wrong on this. Horowitz told Undercover Black Man a year ago that he intended not to publish me any more, without telling me about this, even as I continued submitting occasional articles to him that kept being rejected. Horowitz then apparently forgot about his intention not to publish me, and published my article on interracial rape this past week. That gave UBM the opening to attack Horowitz as a hypocrite who publishes people whom he himself considers to be racist. In fact, Horowitz has defended my interracial rape article to the UBM. That article is not the basis of my being expelled from FP. The basis is other statements and positions of mine on race which UBM showed to Horowitz, which Horowitz has not specified or told me about. It was when I asked Horowitz for an explanation of all this, that he called me a “big pain in the ass” who was “attacking” him and “piling” on him and giving him the “third degree.” He then told me, “I want you to go away Lawrence,” thus ending our relationship of over five years standing. This happened on Friday, May 4, one day after he published my article on interracial rape.

Michael K. writes:

Nicholas Martin is not only an “ass” but an idiot. His sophistries are a testament to the absurd lengths people will go to deny the factual truths about black crime and black-on-white violence.

First, classifying nonwhite “Hispanics” (who have a lower medium-age than blacks) as “white” skews the statistics and undermines his argument about age. Moreover, If nonwhite “Hispanics” weren’t classified as “white,” blacks would commit rape at over 10 times the white rate rather than 7 times.

Secondly, even generically, his point about age is of negligible significance. Whites are roughly 65% of the population,” blacks roughly 13%. But even if, amongst young males in their teens and twenties, whites outnumbered blacks by only 4-1 rather than 5-1, so what? What’s his point—not only in respect to interracial rape but also generically?

Even acknowledging the lower medium-age of blacks, all this would mean is that the black propensity to commit rape at over 10-times the white rate is only slightly less remarkable and outrageous than it first appears.

And even if whites outnumbered blacks by only 2-1 amongst young males in their teens and twenties, or even if there were roughly equal numbers of young black and white males in their teens and twenties (and, also, equal numbers of black and white females of comparable age), what relevance is this to the statistics cited by L. Auster on black-on-white versus white-on-black rape and “sexual assault”?

Lastly, of the hundreds of thousands(?) of male-on-male rapes in our hellish (for whites!) racially-integrated prisons and jails, what percentage are black-on-white versus white-on-black? One can reasonably assume that the disparities are similar to those of male-on-female rape outside of prison walls. Would Nicholas Martin argue that such numbers are irrelevant because blacks outnumber whites in prisons and jails by almost 2-1?

A. Zarkov writes:

In looking at the comments on your web page I notice that some people are making a big deal out of age. They seem to believe that a significant part of the greater incidence of rape by blacks can be explained by the difference in the age distribution between the two races. But if you go the BOJ justice statistics http://www.ojp.usdoj.gov/bjs/crimoff.htm#lifetime you will see the following:

If recent incarceration rates remain unchanged, an estimated 1 of every 15 persons (6.6%) will serve time in a prison during their lifetime.

Lifetime chances of a person going to prison are higher for

—men (11.3%) than for women (1.8%)
—blacks (18.6%) and Hispanics (10%) than for whites (3.4%)

Based on current rates of first incarceration, an estimated 32% of black males will enter State or Federal prison during their lifetime, compared to 17% of Hispanic males and 5.9% of white males.

Thus we see blacks are 5 times more likely to enter prison than whites over their whole lifetime. Certainly this establishes that blacks are more crime prone than whites, regardless of age, unless you believe that the criminal justice system as a whole is biased against blacks. Of course there are people who claim this is true, but to my knowledge offer no convincing evidence for it. Of course some people will also claim that the drug offenders dominate the prison population, not violent offenders and this explains the disparity in lifetime incarceration rates.

If you look at Fig 11 in BOJ report “Sex Offense Offenses and Offenders” February 1997, NCJ-163392 you will see a bar graph that gives the age of rapers. Each bar corresponds to a four-year age cohort. The bars average around 16% up to age 34. Then 12% up to age 30 and don’t really decrease until after age 50. So yes rapists tend somewhat young, but not very young, depending on what one considers at young.

The race and age data is available at DOJ, but perhaps not in report form. One might have to download the raw data and analyze it. If I find the time I might do just that.

In any case I strongly doubt age explains the gigantic rape and crime disparity between blacks and whites. I notice people seem to bring up excuses, but then don’t follow up with an analysis.

Posted by Lawrence Auster at May 05, 2007 09:49 PM | Send