The lead story in the opinion pages of yesterday's New York Times was a fine reflection on children and gun violence by Alex Kotlowitz, a distinguished reporter formerly of the Wall Street Journal, and the author of the acclaimed bestseller "There Are No Children Here: The Story of Two Boys Growing Up in the Other America," about a violence-plagued public housing project.
Kotlowitz's Sunday piece was entitled "The Price of Public Violence," and it deals with the problem not of children who are murdered, but of those who are wounded or who witness violence. "What is the effect on individuals," he asks, "especially kids, who have been privy to the violence in our cities' streets?"
He begins by reporting on time he spent with two social workers at a high school on Chicago's South Side. The year before he was there, the high school "had lost eight current and former students to gun violence–and 21 others were shot and wounded," he tells us. He mentions a Department of Justice report that said that children exposed to violence might turn to violence themselves. And then he goes on to talk about a small program at Drexel University in Philadelphia which pulls children who have been shot from emergency rooms and arranges for counseling. The program's director says he saw signs of post-traumatic stress disorder in the kids, which doesn't seem too surprising.
But Kotlowitz's story is missing something. Questions about what happens to children who are wounded or otherwise exposed to violence are questions that can be addressed by scientific investigation. I don't know whether good studies have been done on these questions, but I think Kotlowitz should have told us that. What we have here are two persuasive and moving anecdotes, but there are just that–anecdotes. Are experiences at other high schools different from those of the one at which he spent time? Is there something about that neighborhood, or the school or its administrators that makes it worse, or not as bad, as some other schools? We do not know.
Science writers are generally eager to condemn anecdotes as presenting only a slice of what's happening, and often a misleading one. Science writers are also sometimes too eager to report on the science and let a story fly without doing the kind of ground-truthing that Kotlowitz does here. But with regard to reliance on anecdotes, they have a point–a point that I agree with.
Kotlowitz might have done better to give us a quick review of what's been found in research on children exposed to gun violence. If there is little such research, or it doesn't seem to be very good, he could have told us that. That might also have affected his choice of anecdotes. If he knew what research was showing, he could have chosen anecdotes that he was confident reflected larger truths.
My aim here is not to condemn Kotlowitz, but to make a larger point: Reporting that relies on anecdote without putting it in the context of what is known and what isn't could misinform readers. And I'm sure that's something Kotlowitz wants to avoid.
-Paul Raeburn
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