Progressivism In Another Nutshell: LePore Repeats Obviously False Claim About Police Violence...In An Extended Instance Of The Genetic Fallacy...The New Yorker Fails To Fact-Check It

This doesn't even surprise me anymore.

   I loved Lepore's These Truths...at first. (Confession: I was listening to the audiobook, not reading it. I still find that vaguely shameful...) And I loved hearing her read it. But, honestly, I didn't finish it. Though I may someday. Honestly, I thought her attention to slavery and racism was a bit lurid. At first I thought it was good: honest and unflinching. After a couple hundred pages, though...eh...I thought something was a bit weird about it. But it may well have just been a matter of taste, and a measure of how fed up I am with other people lying about such things and reveling in them. 

   The stats on which Lepore reports are not even vaguely plausible. They should send up a geyser of red flags for anyone who's even vaguely objective. And there's absolutely no excuse whatsoever for The New Yorker not catching it.

[Oh yeah, sorry: this nonsense about the origins of policing being in slave patrols is a blatant instance of the genetic fallacy. Origins don't necessarily have anything to do with such things. Astronomy has its origins in astrology. Chemistry's are in alchemy. Origins are very commonly irrelevant.]