On the Garland Shooting

This article notes two interesting facts on the recent Garland shootings.

I recently retweeted a writer named Brad Thor regarding this issue, who I thought put it pretty well. He said:

"If you look at the #garlandshooting and your first impulse is to criticize free speech, you are a HUGE part of what is wrong with America."

Interesting fact 1: The two Muslims attacked the group <a href="http://www.npr.org/blogs/thetwo-way/2015/05/04/404158281/5-things-to-know-about-the-organizers-of-mohammed-cartoon-contest">right after SPLC labeled it a hate group.

The Southern Poverty Law Center is a far left organization that likes to paint far right organizations as near-terrorist organizations.

However, the SPLC itself has now instigated two violent attacks. <a href="http://www.wnd.com/2013/04/see-terrorist-with-gun-attack-family-research-council/">They also contributed to the terrorist attack on the Family Research Council.

Naturally most of the leftist media failed to identify the two gunmen as Muslims. I suspect it would have been the primary interesting fact if the shooters had been Christian, but Christians don't engage in the violent things Muslims engage in. Just think through recent history.

Actually, <a href="http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2015/05/isis-posts-warning-we-have-71-trained-soldiers-in-15-states-names-5-targets/">ISIS specifically claimed responsibility for the attack as a planned event and went on to state that they have 71 trained soldiers in 15 U.S. states including Virginia, Maryland, Illinois, California, and Michigan.

Geller has actually been conducting anti-Islam campaigns around Houston for a while now. Back when I was at school in Houston she was still doing this.

Interesting fact 2: Garland is among the nation's most desegregated areas.

Nate Silver at the 538 blog recently released an article entitled, "<a href="http://fivethirtyeight.com/features/the-most-diverse-cities-are-often-the-most-segregated/">The Most Diverse Cities Are Often The Most Segregated."

Tangentially, AFR's Bryan Fischer posted the article on Facebook, saying, "The most segregated cities in America are all run by liberals."

Some might look at the Garland attack and correctly identify the issue as the result of conflicting cultures and worldviews. What is the solution? Some might propose that increased diversity and integration will fix the problem. I actually tend to agree with this view, but Nate's data makes an interesting point.

Anyway the interesting thing here is that it turns out that Garland has abnormally high levels of desegregation. Now, some cities have high desegregation because there is low diversity. If everyone is white, then there is low segregation and low diversity. Without looking at the data you might think Garland was such a case.

Not so! Garland has diversity which rivals Chicago. This surprised even me. It turns out that Garland may be a prototypical case of the American melting pot idea, and that is precisely where this unfortunate event occurred.

Interestingly, Aurora, CO is also a high desegregated area with high diversity, but lower than that of Garland.

In conclusion, it seems that very high diversity is not necessarily the socially optimal arrangement. I also doubt that very low cultural diversity is optimal. I suspect all things should be in moderation and there is a Goldilocks level somewhere.

Smack in the middle of the diversity index is Jacksonville, FL. This city has <a href="http://www.bestplaces.net/economy/city/florida/jacksonville">lower than US average unemployment and higher than US average job growth, but lower than US average income. Maybe there's something there, I don't know.