Lies, Damned Lies and Statistics

A report published this week by HM Inspectorate of Constabulary, Fire and Rescue Services confirms that police actions such as ‘taking the knee’ or wearing rainbow lanyards are causing confusion amongst police officers and undermining public confidence. The review also suggested that police officers have been recording trivial matters such as non-crime hate incidents (NCHIs) because of worries about getting into trouble. We briefly touch on an article by Labour MP Graham Stringer in The Sun that highlights how the Higher Education (Freedom of Speech) Act has shocked MPs of all political stripes before moving on to the murky world of government statistics. The Times reported this week that 2021 census figures claiming there are 262,000 transgender people in England and Wales have had to be formally downgraded. The Office for National Statistics admitted that there was “potential for bias” in answers to the question: “Is the gender you identify with the same as your sex registered at birth?”. Yet, as we discuss in the episode, reliable statistics are the essential building block for informing public debate, especially when the underlying issue is so culturally taboo that there are repeated attempts to shut down debate. Finally for this week, we dip into an excellent article by Greg Lukianoff in Quillette. He lays out twelve assertions that are frequently made against free expression before marshalling the counterarguments to demonstrate why each of them is flawed. 

‘That's Debatable!’  is edited by Jason Clift.