Ming Chuan University Department of Criminal Justice

Teacher Wang, Po-Chi was interviewed by Liberty Time Net	2022/11/14

Freedom to speak" What happened to the security in Taichung? Can seeing really be relied on? 2022/11/14 15:35 Wang, Po-Chi [City of Qingji] may be the stereotype of public security in Taichung City, or the pain in the hearts of Taichung citizens. For example, in the past (110) year, Maserati’s three villains were hit by a car and beat people. In June this year, after the braised pork rice in the second market in Taichung was beaten to death, the owner of the braised meat stall was shot and killed. The shooting at the car wash, although the suspects have been arrested, but the public is worried about the proliferation of guns. Even in October, an idle factory in Shengang District found a horrifying corpse of a cement barrel. I believe that in the hearts of Taichung citizens, There is a lot of fear of being victimized! ! For ordinary people, media reports or the upcoming general election may become the focus of political offense and defense, forming a stereotype of poor public security in Taichung. But is that really the case? Because of the frequent and unusual occurrence of major public security incidents in Taichung over the past year, and the extremely violent methods used in each case, it has naturally become the focus of media pursuit and reporting, causing collective fear in the society and panic among the people. These several violent cases that occurred continuously within a year have attracted high attention from the news media and sustained reports, making the public feel as if they are also living in the midst of violent incidents. Social psychologists call this availability ( availability heuristic). That is to say, when the news continues to report violent pictures or horror descriptions, the public will access the vivid details they see or hear into the cognitive shortcuts of their brains. If there is news about violent killings in the future, they will associate relevant pictures. Images and scary descriptions create a sense of fear. Some scholars also call this the vividness effect, that is, when faced with solving a major violent case, people remove information related to the current situation from memory. Therefore, in terms of solving current problems, the facts that are easier to obtain, that is, when a major event occurs, will immediately extract from the brain that similar cases have occurred in the past, and the more people will use it to solve problems or make decisions. From this point of view, while satisfying the public's right to know, it is also very important to avoid causing panic among the public and to strengthen balanced reporting to prevent such incidents from happening.Based on the above, we may wish to take a look at the statistics of the Police Department in the past ten years. In terms of the number of general criminal cases in Taichung City, the number of criminal cases has decreased year by year in the past 10 years. -19.52% reduction. Furthermore, the number of violent crimes has decreased year by year, with a decrease of -81.25% in 110 years (51 cases) compared with 101 years (221 cases). That is to say, if we observe objective statistics, the criminal law and order data in Taichung City have shown a stable trend in the past 10 years, especially the decline in violent crimes has a significant downward trend compared with 10 years ago. Focusing on the comparison of the number of general criminal cases per 100,000 population in Liudu from January to October in this (111) year, compared with the previous (110) year, it decreased by 17.49 cases (-2.63%) compared with the same period last year. The number of incidents was lower than that of the other five capitals. See Table 1 below. In addition, looking at the violent crimes that the public fears the most, the number of violent crimes per 100,000 population in six cities from January to October this year decreased by 0.68 (-42.24%) compared with the same period last year. The number of incidents is also lower than that of the other five capitals. See Table 2 below. It can be seen that there is a clear downward trend in violent crime cases. Therefore, the reports of the news media, as well as the offense and defense of security issues in the upcoming elections, highlight major cases. Is seeing is believing? Is it mixed with the fear of being persecuted by the public, coupled with the elements of availability, quick thinking and fresh effects, affecting our judgment and losing trust in the Taichung police to maintain law and order? Worth pondering. It is believed that it is the basic pursuit of every citizen to live and work in peace and contentment without being under the shadow of fear of being persecuted. The stability of law and order and the expectations and requirements for law and order are of course the result of the dedication of all police officers. Moreover, the central and private opinion polls and evaluations have their own reasons. The single bureau is duty-bound. But at the same time, it also affirms the serious efforts of the police colleagues. From the evaluation data in Table 1 and Table 2 above, the public security performance in Taichung City is not bad. While affirming that the police colleagues have worked tirelessly for public security work, don't let the efforts you have made be discredited just because this period of time coincides with the election. Perhaps, returning to the basics and letting the official statistics speak for themselves, the public will not be affected by the freshness effect, and a rational view of relevant statistics may be the best solution to reduce the fear of being victimized. (Associate Professor of the Department of Criminal Justice of Ming Chuan University)

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