Regarding Personal Risk

Hi, lovelies. Let's talk about a statistical shorthand that I find very useful in my life for assessing personal risk.

An American's chances of dying in a car accident is about 1/10,000. This is a statistic on a human scale. It's a kind of death I can visualize, and while it's unlikely, it's likely enough that I moderate my driving behaviour to mitigate my risk. So I don't text and drive, and I drive defensively, but I don't consider driving to be a high enough risk to justify not ever driving anywhere. It's a risk I accept as a part of my life

Relatively speaking, I'm much more likely (<100x) to die of heart disease, and much less likely (<.001x) to die in a mass shooting. Heart disease is a big risk, and I change my behaviour every day to avoid it: diet, exercise, lifestyle. A terror shooting is a negligible risk, so I live my life exactly as I otherwise would.

I'm already a very risk-tolerant person, so I can tolerate much, much greater risks than driving, but basically every person in the US has accepted the risk of driving as a part of their life.

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So, let's apply this. You, person reading this, have accepted a risk of death of about 1/10,000 so that you can go to work, or the grocery store, or to hang out with people.

Now, think of something you're afraid of. Is your risk from that thing less than your risk of death while driving your car?

If it's lower, how much lower? Is it worth changing your routines? Is it worth changing laws? It is worth worrying about at all?

And here's one of the most crucial questions: If the risk can be mitigated to reduce your RELATIVE risk (i.e. how risky the thing was with the initial condition versus how risky it is with the new condition), does the ABSOLUTE risk change significantly when the mitigating conditions are implemented?

IF NOT, is it worth trying to mitigate the risk?

We have finite time and resources. If we cal allocate those resources to risks we CAN mitigate and set aside things we can't, we'll be both safer and more effective.

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HANDY EXAMPLES:

- The relative risk of being killed by a refugee is obviously smaller when there's no refugees, but your ABSOLUTE risk barely changes (it's pointless to calculate, because in the US your current absolute known risk is essentially zero, since no one's been killed by a refugee in a long-ass time).

- Getting a yearly mammogram in your thirties with no family history of cancer might lower your relative risk of death by cancer (by a couple percentage points), but barely touches your absolute risk (.03% chance of death versus .04% or so, given my very rough ballparks). So getting a mammogram every year when you're thirty is essentially useless in increasing your chance of survival but does increase risks of false positives/ unnecessary biopsies and treatment, which are actually MORE likely to be dangerous in this age range.

- Current models suggest the ocean levels will be around 2-3 m higher in 2100. If we cut all emissions to 0, this will drop to a 10% chance. Obviously we will NOT be able to do that, so we got a coin flip as to whether or not we'll be able to either knock emissions fast enough or find some other magic pill (with currently unknown or unplanned technology) to keep this from happening. So the absolute risk of most of our costal cities being destroyed by the end of the century (and droughts, and massive displacement, and resource wars, and destruction of cropland, and large parts of the world rendered uninhabitable) is about 100%, but relatively speaking, if we can prevent that by any means necessary we can drop the absolute risk to ANYTHING LESS THAN 100% ARE YOU PEOPLE EVEN PAYING ATTENTION THIS IS FUCKING CALAMITOUS AND YOU ARE DOING NOTHING THIS WILL AND ALREADY DOES AFFECT EVERY LIVING HUMAN ON THE PLANET INCLUDING YOU, PERSON READING THIS, YOU WILL PERSONALLY SUFFER AND MAYBE DIE BECAUSE OF THIS AND SO WILL EVERYONE YOU LOVE

- Walking around for a few minutes every hour and working out a little every week is basically the best thing you can do for your health; it can reduce your relative risk of dying of BASICALLY ANYTHING by about 30%, which, for our big killers like heart disease, can mean up to a 20% ABSOLUTE reduction.

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TL;DR read my whole post, mofo, it's got a really useful risk benchmark and some analysis, go read it and stop being lazy

Regarding the Making of a Mass Shooter

It was just over a year ago I wrote about Pulse and some subsequent but unrelated shootings, and it's that time again, I guess.

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I've read about thousands of terrorist attacks, lone wolf attacks, attacks against former/current partners, and revenge attacks over the last 15 years of my life, and they all run together. We know the shape of this thing. We argue about WHY, but a lot of times I think we lose that question under the deluge of factors involved in WHO, WHAT, WHEN, WHERE, HOW.

A lot of attacks have come from a lot of disparate ideologies in the last few months, and that's because while ideology is relevant to the way a killer chooses their victims, and sometimes to the method by which they choose to kill, it is fundamentally irrelevant to the act of violence itself.

Looking up news articles this morning I found an unrelated shooting from 2009 which apparently happened just up the street from my current office. From the article: "He had written about contemplating carrying out a shooting, which he referred to as the "exit plan", while also revealing that he "chickened out" of carrying out such a shooting earlier in the year."

The dude in question was lonely and blamed women for his plight, but that's not why he shot people.

Self-radicalization, we call it. Isolation plus fringe ideas fed to us by groups we admire plus a sense of shame, humiliation, or resentment against a group that has stolen something you think is yours.

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The process goes like this:

You are lonely and deeply unhappy. You are almost certainly a man, but maybe a boy, and you have few or no close friends (other than perhaps a partner or former partner)

A group tells you, or you hear, directly or indirectly, that someone else is to blame for your misery

They tell you that some else stole something that was rightfully yours: work, opportunities, happiness, love, pride, wealth, power

They tell you that someone else has humiliated you by doing so

You listen

You isolate yourself further

You create your own mental or physical manifesto to consolidate your problems into chains of of causal relationships

Your views become fringe enough that you fear sharing them with others. If there are groups that shares your views, this drives you closer to them. If not, you withdraw further into yourself

You become even lonelier

You toy with the idea of fighting back. You make plans, vague or concrete

Sometimes something happens that makes you decide you have nothing else worth living for. Sometimes the isolation and misery is enough to lead you to that conclusion

You seek out the people who are, in your eyes, the source of the problem

You need to restore your pride by taking something from them, by showing them you're powerful. You won't accept their insult any longer

You have nothing left to lose, anyway

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The people shot this morning were almost incidental targets, selected based on the killers' specific ideologies and situations, which are broadly relevant. But while Pulse was Homophobic Radical Islam, Portland was White Supremacy/Islamophobia, this morning was Anti-Trump and GOP, Collier Township guy was Misogyny, etc., that's only WHO gets targeted, not WHY.

The same kinda thing goes with method of attack and existing societal archetypes: gun laws, security, access to weapons, historical precedent for weapons used, etc. That addresses the HOW and WHERE and WHEN.

Don't get me wrong: these are ALL vital questions, and need to be answered in order to create a path to prevention or deterrence.

If there's a lot of rising White Supremacy, expect an uptick in violence against POC, and expect reciprocal acts of violence that target White Supremacists. Track hate groups. Find where extremists hang out online.

In places without guns, expect people to use knives or trucks or bombs, and plan accordingly. In places with guns, find better ways to get them out of the hands of those with prior histories of violence.

Resist the tropes that glorify murder, the tropes that force men into stereotypical roles, the tropes that increase our tribalism.

Keep in mind other factors that correlate with violence and help mitigate those conditions: poverty and deprivation, race/class/gender/etc. inequality, longstanding social/tribal/sectarian tension, physical and mental health access, media consumption, political climate, prevalence of lead in the environment, etc.

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All of these are incredibly important. But this pattern listed above is generally the difference between the people who DO kill people and the ones who DON'T.

Regarding the Transactional Sex of Poverty

Some thoughts about sex, poverty, and birth control:

I've heard people say, "well, if you can't afford birth control, don't have sex" (which is its own kettle of value-judgement fish but whatev, I'll deal with that later), but it's not that simple, especially for poor women.

A lot of sex is transactional in nature. It's not used in those words very much, and usually only to refer to prostitution, but it also means the millions of shades of transaction, reciprocity, and coercion that we all have in our lives and relationships.

What if you're a single parent, and your new partner is willing to help you pay for your kids, but doesn't want a non-sexual relationship? Sex might be the currency you use to procure stability for your kids.

What if your partner is abusive? Sex might be a way to keep them appeased for your own physical of mental safety.

What if you're facing probable sexual assault? It's often much safer to not fight back so as not to risk escalating the situation and putting yourself at greater risk.

What if you have a loving, caring partner, and you don't have a lot of money or free time but you want to show appreciation and share intimacy? This kind of sex is also transactional. Transactional isn't always bad; it can simply mean there's a give and take, and all relationships have this on some level.
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The transactional nature of sex means that sex often is a tool that poor and less-powerful women without access to birth control have to use to try and reach physical and psychological goals.

Poverty is the biggest factor in a population's unplanned pregnancy rate, followed by education and access to affordable birth control. Reducing poverty gives women more options and lets women choose whether or not to have sex. Better access to birth control and better education means that both those who choose to have sex and those who resort to sex as a tool are able to be safer, and are less likely to suffer negative outcomes.

Regarding laws that force women to get partner's consent for abortion

"I believe one of the breakdowns in our society is that we have excluded the man out of all of these types of decisions,” he said. “I understand that they feel like that is their body,” he said of women. “I feel like it is a separate — what I call them is, is you’re a ‘host.’ And you know when you enter into a relationship you’re going to be that host and so, you know, if you pre-know that then take all precautions and don’t get pregnant,” he explained. “So that’s where I’m at. I’m like, hey, your body is your body and be responsible with it. But after you’re irresponsible then don’t claim, well, I can just go and do this with another body, when you’re the host and you invited that in.”

TURNS OUT IT'S STILL MY BODY, EVEN IF SOMETHING ELSE IS ATTACHED TO IT.

This is always couched in terms of a woman's choice because a fetus is literally inside her body, taking nutrients, squishin' organs. The man in this scenario is taking no risks with pregnancy. He won't be missing work. He won't suffer hemorrhaging if something goes wrong. His kidneys are fine. His arches don't fall. His legs don't swell. He doesn't have to either push a baby out of his vagina or have it cut from his womb.

We don't even take organs from a dead person if they haven't consented to it, because bodily autonomy is that integral to the concept of human rights.

Let's say my best friend is hurt and, to save their life, I offer to graft myself to their body. I give my nutrients, my tissues, my energy to my friend through an umbilical. I'm weaker, hungrier, at higher risk for a few medical conditions, but I've chosen to take this on for my friend.

Now let's say I don't want to do it anymore, for any reason at all. I CANNOT be forced to continue using my body as a lifeline, even if cutting that umbilical will instantly end my friend's life.

Whether or not it's ethical for me to separate myself from my friend, it's my right as a person with a body. It would be morally wrong to force me to give up my bodily autonomy, even to save another's life, even to sustain another's life that already depends on me. Even more obvious would be a case in which I did not want this graft, but it was done either against my will or despite my efforts to prevent it.

And this is my right, even if it ends the life of my hypothetical dying friend, who is an adult human with adult human rights.

And now you're telling me I have to give up those same rights for the sake of a cell-blob that I didn't ask for because a man says so?

No.

I will not.