Murder has fallen off the list as a major cause of death in America.
The 2010 list, released by the government Wednesday, reflects at least two major trends: Murders are down, and deaths from certain diseases are on the rise as the population ages, health authorities said.
Criminologists have debated the reasons but believe several factors may be at work. Among them: Abusive relationships don’t end in murder as often as they once did, thanks to increased incarcerations and better, earlier support for victims.
“We’ve taken the home out of homicide,” said James Alan Fox, a Northeastern University criminologist who studies murder data.
Some also credit better police work and public health programs aimed at reducing violence.
Demographics are an important factor, too, as the largest segment of the population is now 50 and older. Younger people — who are most likely to commit or fall victim to murder — are making up a smaller share of the population.
That ties in to the changes in the CDC’s list of causes of death.
“The risk of homicide declines with age, and the risk of death by disease increases,” Fox said.
… James Alan Fox, a Northeastern University graduate-with-a-useless-degree-and-is-therefore-looking-for-a-job-and-got-quoted-by-his-uncle-the-editor-as-a-favor.
Criminology is a useless degree? I can see it having less utility than some other more technical degrees but there are way worse party degrees that can be gotten.
You have to understand, Staff Sergeant, that in a world where people interact with each other more than ever over country lines, where the value of a company is sometimes measured in number of users and where branding and trademarks are as much about creating a culture as it is about design, subjects meant for understanding the human condition are more useless than ever.
So there would be a real problem if the percentage of social science and humanities grads were increasing, but they’re not.
There is nothing wrong with a degree in criminology unless you are a grizzled 50 year old detective with an ex-wife, a drinking problem and a serious squint.
So, unless any of you motherfuckers want to upload A: a picture of your serious squint and B: your accompanying screed about froo froo Starbucks coffee drinks aaaahhhhhAAAHHHHH, you better shut up.
Interesting stats, I guess. But stats are always capable of being deceptive, so I never know how to take them, especially when we get them in a vacuum like this.
The author is a professor of criminology at Northeastern, not a graduate. I’ll grant the wording was vague but this is the internet and right-click-search was right there.
Pneumonitis is another example. Despite its name, pneumonitis is not related to pneumonia. It occurs in people who have lost the ability to swallow or protect their airway.
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Surprisingly common among senior citizens who suffer from any kind of dementia. I recently learned this one the hard way.
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After the riots here, the right-wing government in the UK has basically dismissed them as “criminals rioting because that’s what they do”. And refused to do anything at all about the causes.
