An analysis of the popular TV show “Law and Order” has discovered that there is a racial bias to the way the show portrays criminals — it wildly over-represents whites and under-represents blacks.
According to a study cited by The Washington Post, between the original Law and Order show, and the two offshoots, “SVU” and “Criminal Intent,” black Americans are portrayed as murderers on Law and Order shows only less than 10 percent of the time, despite committing around 50 percent of murders in the United States, according to the FBI’s Uniform Crime Reports (UCR).
There is a similar disparity for rape. The UCR shows that a little less than 35 percent of rape perpetrators are black, yet were perpetrators on “Law and Order: SVU” less then 10 percent of the time. For all perpetrators of crime in general, blacks are also underrepresented.
Meanwhile, whites are significantly over-represented, making up around 90 percent of the criminals portrayed, a significantly inaccurate over-representation. (RELATED: How The Federal Government Inflates Crime Statistics For Whites)
Women are also over-represented, committing around 40-60 percent of the murders in the shows, yet in real life, women only commit around 10 percent of murders.
There are similar disparities in representation on the shows in the portrayal of victims, over-representing whites and females in comparison to reality.