Claiming claims

The polar vortex deep freeze has interfered with our class schedule, as well as slowed down my router. I've been looking over your claims worksheets based on the "Public Enemies" Wired article, and we'll take some time at the beginning of Wednesday's class to go over them together. Think of a claim as any statement that some could realistically disagree with and/or provide evidence for.

Claims of fact: These are statements that argue whether a thing is true or not. Here's a good one from Emily (taken directly from the article): "Compared with its pace in 2012, the homicide rate this year has decreased." This is a fact that should be easy to prove or disprove by looking up the FBI crime stats, right?

Here's a trickier example; let's take a claim such as Chicago has the highest rate of gun violence in the U.S. If you were to make this claim, you would want to support it by citing specific, credible evidence. If you are going to make a counterclaim, however, you can't just say Chicago does not have the highest rate of gun violence in the U.S.  Then we're just arguing like kids: "Does not!" Does so!"

So what is a good counterclaim of fact, and how can we support it? The article does state that "Last year more than 500 people were murdered in Chicago, a greater number than in far more populous cities such as New York and Los Angeles." This is true, but BE CAREFUL of assuming this means Chicago has the highest rate of gun violence - it's not even in the top 5 most dangerous U.S. cities. So if someone tells us that Chicago is the murder capital of the U.S., they're making a claim of fact - it's just that, in this case, the "fact" is not true.

Claims of causation: Ronald make a claim of causation in the article: "“If Facebook and all that wasn’t here, JoJo and them would still have their lives.” He's claiming that Facebook caused Jojo's death. Austin makes a similar claim: "Social media harassment such as drilling is getting people killed." What kind of counterclaim of causation could be made to this (besides the generic "Facebook did not cause Jojo's death")? Darrin argues that the deep rivalry between street gangs is to blame for this violence, not the medium of Facebook itself.

Here's a good claim of causation from Brett: "Gun violence among inner-city youth in the Chicago area has become more frequent because of online altercations." This could also be restated as a claim of evaluation: Street gang presence on Facebook is bad {because it increases the risk of violent altercations).

So what counterclaims can we make in response to these? Savannah offers this one: "Gang related deaths would still occur even without social media." This could be taken further to claim that The ultimate cause of rising gang violence is due to other factors [such as poverty, easy access to firearms, etc.]. Alyssa, Victoria and Diana point out that the presence of gangs on social media causes police to be able to better identify and prevent violent conflict between rivals. This can also be restated as a claim of evaluation: Street gang presence on Facebook is good because it helps law enforcement stop violent crime before it occurs, or identify and arrest violent offenders.

Several of you made claims of policy arguing that Facebook should not allow the posting of such photos and videos. Who might disagree with this claim and why?

To be continued tomorrow!