Crime was DOWN everywhere in DC in 2022… except Ward 3 where it increased
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Anonymous
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I think this explains a lot about the entire nature of the discussion around crime in DC.
https://www.axios.com/local/washington-dc/2023/01/05/violent-crime-stats-dc-2022 “Violent crime has decreased in most parts of D.C. compared to five years ago. Wards 4, 6, and 7 had the biggest drops. Ward 3 in Upper Northwest is an outlier, with a slight uptick last year” |
Anonymous
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Typical of many discussions of crime. Perception is not reality.
Cue someone posting that DC police don't ever take police reports seriously so statistics are meaningless. |
Anonymous
Well, the reality is that people in Ward 3 who perceive that crime is getting worse are in fact correct, because they are experience higher violent crime. While people in the rest of the city are experience lower violent crime, which is what spurs comments like yours. It might be worthwhile to consider that there can actually be a factual basis that drives peoples perceptions. |
Anonymous
| If you don't report it then it doesn't exist, good job boweser |
Anonymous
Nobody is perceiving an increase of 0.6%. |
Anonymous
On the other hand, there are also other people in Ward 3, like me, who are not experiencing higher violent crime (I have not been a victim of violent crime in 20+ years living in D.C., whether I lived in Ward 2, Ward 1, Ward 4, or Ward 3). So... sure, if it's all just down to perception based on personal experience, you're going to have a wide range of beliefs. But a .6 percent increase in violent crime is not likely to be noticeable to anyone except the relatively small number of people who were victims of the crimes, especially in a context where overall violent crime citywide is down. What's DEFINITELY up is discussion of crime and rhetoric around crime increasing, even if the stats don't really back that up. |
Anonymous
That’s awesome. Congratulations on not being a crime victim. However, your attitude of “If it doesn’t affect me, then it’s not a problem” is quite selfish and disrespectful to crime victims. In all honestly, it sounds pretty Republican. Everyone looking out for themself. |
Anonymous
| Take a walk around the city. Talk to people. Crime is up by a ton. Police are just making it harder and harder to report it. I personally went to the police station to report a crime a couple months ago. There were two people in line in front of me. No reports were actually filed as the police basically refused to do anything. This is the same as I have seen on the streets. These stats are fully fake. |
Anonymous
No, my point was that you can't make policy based on perception -- some people perceive crime to be worse, some people don't. |
Anonymous
That’s a fascinating viewpoint when you are saying that your perception is that the increase in crime is NBD because you weren’t a victim and that people who were victims or concerned about the increase in crime in their neighborhood have a false perception? Except actual data to the contrary? |
Anonymous
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I think one issue is that people are finding out about the violent crimes in their neighborhood now, when before they didn't pay attention and often didn't know. I say this as a Ward 6 resident. Here are examples of what I'm talking about:
Seven or eight years ago, I was getting my hair cut in Eastern Market and learned from my hairdresser that there had been a string of sexual assaults in the neighborhood at night and it was really stressful for everyone who worked there. It only came up because I had noticed that she used to do evening appointments and I hadn't seen them on the website, and she said that she and the other stylists were avoiding them if they could because they didn't feel safe leaving the salon and walking to their cars after dark. Apparently it had been going on for months and the police had no leads. But I had no idea -- I read the Post regularly, including the local section, I talk to my neighbors, I frequent EM a lot. And after this conversation, I mentioned it to numerous neighbors and no one had heard anything about it. Since it was mostly impacting workers in and around EM, not residents, and I guess those groups don't chat with each other enough, a lot of people were totally unaware of this serious crime spree occurring in the neighborhood. Now, there are several crime reporting accounts on Twitter that track 911 calls and post about them constantly. I hear about every mugging, every car jacking, I'd definitely hear about a string of sexual assaults. I actually unfollowed these accounts over the summer because they are very aggressive in how they report (ALL CAPS, they post frequent follow ups, often they use very dire language about the crimes) and it was having a serious impact on my mental health. But I still see these posts a lot because they get retweeted and replied to by politicians and reports who I also follow. There is this heightened sense on Twitter that the neighborhood is going to pot, and I see it reflected in the comments on DCUM as well. Also the website Nextdoor, which I don't use much but am on, is very active on crime issues and if you read comments on there, it makes you feel like crime is content and worsening daily. But as my DH likes to remind me, when we first moved here, there was regular drug traffic on the street outside our house, there were shooting within a few blocks of our home every few months. We'd hear about bodies being found in cars or homes in the surrounding neighborhood, and "foul play suspected". There was a lot of gang activity. I did not walk home alone at night and we initially had zero plans to stay here once we had kids because of the crime. But over the 8 years we lived her pre-kids, things change a lot for the better. The drug dealers disappeared, the shootings got less and less. In place of the crime a lot of great businesses and community popped up. Other people around us were having kids here, we decided to give it a try. It's actually gone really well, and despite the continued crime, I still feel a million times safer than I did when I moved here, and I don't worry about my kids either. There are certain precautions we take, but the benefits far outweigh the costs. It's easy to lose perspective when you are being inundated with notifications about every crime. This is a city, of course there is crime. But the idea that the crime in this neighborhood is worse than 5 years ago doesn't hold up, and the idea that it's worse than 10 or 20 years ago? Laughable. This neighborhood has come a very long way. |
Anonymous
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Stats juked to mark everything down from violent crime.
The one stat they can’t lie about it Murder and there were more than 200 bodies again in 2022. |
Anonymous
This is true. Need to pay attention to murders the most and 2023 hasn’t started off so good. |
Anonymous
| Crime down? They decriminalized everything |
Anonymous
| People only like stats that confirm their biases, makes sense most in here are upset at the truth 😂 |