Dueling claims on crime trend.

Dueling Claims on Crime Trend
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Dueling Claims on Crime Trend
Crime refers to any offense punishable by law. In the United States, the Department of Justice is charged with handling issues of violence presented to them by the police department. As a result of the gruesome nature of certain crimes, citizens fear falling victim to the gangs or perpetrators of violent activities. Most Americans believe that the levels of criminal acts in their cities are on the rise (McCarthy, 2015). This finding by a survey conducted to gauge the thoughts citizens had about violence in their neighborhood revealed that even those who were neither victims nor closely affected by cases of abuse said that the crime rates were high.
However, the actual statistics reveal that the rate of crime has been on a steady decrease since the 1990s until the year 2014. This revelation means that people rely on wrong perceptions about crime. According to McCarthy (2015), the beliefs emanate majorly from news which is the leading source of information for Americans. Broadcasting the scenarios of terror or violence against humanity brings the attention of the public to the reality of crimes. For instance, the recent coverage of the shootings at a school in Florida opened the eye of the people to realize that they are still susceptible to acts of terror. An incident like the mass killings overpowers the past years of tranquility, leaving people with the conclusion that crime rates are still high.

On the other hand, politicians take advantage of specific incidences of violence to generate campaign slogans or to badmouth their opponents. According to Robertson (2016), politicians choose the statistical findings that fit their definitions of the trend of crime. For instance, when President Trump was using one example of an outcome in a single city to say that the Obama regime failed in combatting crime, he knew it was a way of gaining political mileage. Conclusively, it is upon the public to have an urge of enlightenment and expose themselves to the ultimate findings of the rates of increase or decrease in crime. The real picture helps in discovering the most effective means of curbing this social menace.
References
McCarthy.,J. (2015, October 22). More Americans Say Crime Is Rising in U.S. Gallup, Inc.
Robertson, L. (2016, July 13). Dueling Claims on Crime Trend. The Wire