It is a myth that crime is worse in the third world, compared to the US and other developed countries.
Corruption is rampant in Asia, but violent crime is actually low in per capita terms (at the bottom of world rates), although it has to be said that reporting might not be as extensive in poor countries as it is in rich ones. And in cities like Bombay (no Mumbai for me) and Delhi, it’s probably much, much higher, leading to the perception foreigners have of a seething cauldron of crime.
Still, it’s indisputable that the highest rates for violent crimes, overall, are to be found outside Asia and the Middle East, in Africa and the New World, including the US.
The Middle East and most Muslim countries are some of the safest places in the world, because street crime is simply not tolerated.
You don’t even get to take random photos of people. They have such a developed sense of privacy and such low tolerance for barbaric behavior on the streets. So-called honor-killings just don’t occur at rates comparable to street crime in the US or South Africa or the Honduras, so, on the ground, where it matters, Islamic countries actually protect women better than most other countries.
Strikingly, the highest levels of crime taken altogether are actually in the United States, mostly, it seems, the work of organized gangs.
Stories of slums and dacoits play well in the West, but relative to the enormous numbers of people in India, the actual crime rates aren’t anywhere as high as they are in, say, Colombia or even in the US.
EndOfTheAmericanDream lists some supporting statistics about American crime.
#1) The city of Detroit, Michigan literally looks like a war zone and violent crime is thriving. So far this year in Detroit, car thefts are up 83%, robberies are up 50%, burglaries are up 20% and property destruction is up 42%.
#2) Lawmakers in Illinois say that violence has become so rampant in Chicago that the National Guard needs to be sent in. In just one night last week seven people were killed and 18 were wounded – mostly by gunfire. In fact, there have already been 113 murders in Chicago this year.
#3) The city of Phoenix, Arizona has become the car theft capital of the world as millions of illegal aliens who can’t get work have found that stealing cars can be very profitable indeed.
#4) There are approximately 12 million crimes committed in the United States every single year. That is by far the worst in the world. No other nation has more than about 6 million reported crimes per year.
#5) In New York City, the number of homicides in the first quarter of the year had shot up by approximately 22 percent compared with 2009.
#6) U.S. prisons are already bursting at the seams. As you read this, there are over 2.2 million people in prison in the United States. In fact, America leads the world in the number of prisoners and in the percentage of the population in prison. The United States has 5% of the world’s population, but 25% of the world’s incarcerated population.
#7) U.S. law enforcement authorities claim that there are now over 1 million members of criminal gangs inside the country. These 1 million gang members are responsible for up to 80% of the crimes committed in the United States each year.
#8) There are over 100,000 rapes in the United States every single year. That is the highest number for any of the countries in the United Nations.
#9) According to USA Today, 58% of state and local law enforcement agencies in the United States reported that violent criminal gangs were active in their areas in 2008. That was up from 45% in 2004.
#10) Every year, one out of every five people is a victim of a crime in the United States. No other nation on earth has a rate that is higher.
In twenty years living a relatively sheltered life in mostly safe neighborhoods in the US, I’ve had, two break-ins, in which my things were stolen; I’ve been physically accosted on the road three times, and assaulted more than once; I’ve been the victim of a rental scam. I’ve had jewelry stolen twice, once by visitors. I’ve been cheated several times by merchants. I was the target of a dating scam. I was accosted by a sexual pervert. My computer’s been hacked and my telephone conversations monitored over months, maybe even a year. I was the victim of serious medical malpractice twice. I suffered intellectual property theft/misattribution several times. My car was stolen the glove box rifled through twice. I’ve been the victim of a hit-and-run driver. I was sued indirectly twice (unsuccessfully). I’ve been threatened/intimidated more than once and been discriminated against illegally dozens of times. I was slandered and harassed in the workplace once and was extorted twice. I’ve been libeled on the web scores of times. I was even subjected to false charges once….
It might be as bad in India. I don’t know. But when I lived there, life felt a lot more secure. Difficult and restricted in many ways. And I do recall eve-teasing in the form of occasional pinching and prodding of us girls on buses. Some minor short-changing in the shops.
But I don’t recall violence. I don’t recall theft.
But then again, I was one of “us” there. Here, I’m one of “them”.
SOURCES: UNICRI (United Nations Interregional Crime and Justice Research Institute). 2002. Correspondence on data on crime victims. March. Turin; UN International Crime Victims’ Survey; Transparency International; The Eighth United Nations Survey on Crime Trends and the Operations of Criminal Justice Systems (2002) (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Centre for International Crime Prevention); Amnesty International; Wikipedia: Gun violence ; The Eighth United Nations Survey on Crime Trends and the Operations of Criminal Justice Systems (2002) (United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, Centre for International Crime Prevention); World Health Organization: World report on violence and health, 2002; International Centre for Prison Studies – World Prison Brief; Fifth Annual BSA and IDC Global Software Piracy Study; GECD Society at a Glance 2001, Statistical Annex Table D3
North America > United States > Crime
Assault victims 1.2% [11th of 20]
Believe in police efficiency 89% [1st of 17]
Bribe payers index 6.2 [9th of 19]
Car thefts 1,246,096 [1st of 46]
Drug offences 560.1 per 100,000 people [4th of 46]
Executions 42 executions [5th of 22]
Gun violence > Homicides > % homicides with firearms 39.5604 [7th of 32]
Gun violence > Homicides > Overall homicide rate > per 100,000 pop. 9.1 [14th of 32]
Jails 1,558 [5th of 80]
Murders committed by youths 8,226 [3rd of 73]
Murders with firearms 9,369 [1st of 36]
Perception of safety > Walking in dark 82% [2nd of 15]
Prisoners 2,019,234 prisoners [1st of 168]
Prisoners > Per capita 715 per 100,000 people [1st of 164]
Rape victims 0.4% [13th of 20]
Software piracy rate 20% [107th of 107]
Suicide rates in ages 15-24 13.7 per 100,000 people [7th of 17]
Suicide rates in ages 25-34 15.3 per 100,000 people [10th of 17]
Total crime victims 21.1% [15th of 20]
Total crimes 11,877,218 [1st of 50]
Welcome back. Good to read some new topics analyzed in a rational fashion rather than from a standard cookbook list.
“It is a myth that crime is worse in the third world, compared to the US and other developed countries.”
I live in a non US neighborhood where crime is low because historically and culturally they just don’t put up with it. There probably exist many such areas in the world.
Thanks, Barry.
I’m sorry but I’m in a full-blown anti-American mood these days.
If the government wanted to round me up, I might not make a plausible defendant.
So, all white people bear with me.
It’s not “truth of the fact”, it is “truth of the moment” that I’m feeling toward America…or more accurately toward the American media and Wall Street.
There is nothing irrational about feeling anti-American. In fact it would be hard to build a “rational” case to be pro-American. Why subject yourself to the abuse and intolerance? Personally I took your advice long ago and am glad I did. Thank you.
“The rest of the world has its own problems, true. Some of them are grave. But it’s here in the US that activism is most sidetracked by partisan politics, insularity, grandstanding, and politically correct insanity. Really and truly, there are few countries in the world outside totalitarian regimes that are as conformist, pervasively and fundamentally, as this country.
I’d rather live under a benign despot that left me to my own devices from day to day, than in a democracy where I’m spied on and manipulated constantly. I may have theoretical rights, but much good they’ll do for me if they’re strangled at birth by spies, PR flacks, and thought-police.
Meanwhile, half these so-called rights don’t exist any more, even in theory. A government that monkeys around with habeas corpus, privacy, bankruptcy procedure, eminent domain, and contracts is signalling loud and clear that it has no respect for the rule of law. It’s telling you as plainly as it can that it’s arbitrary. It’s telling you that it’s a mass state and not a constitutional republic. It’s telling you that it’s on the auction block.
Which part of all that hasn’t got through to you yet?
There are times to fight and there are times to sit out the battles for the sake of the war.
On the sidelines, waiting and watching, you who have left, you who will leave, may do more to keep alive the spirit of freedom abroad. There, in soil more fertile than any in your native land today you may discover America once again.” LR