"With 262 incidents of crime committed by non-indigenous people you're still more likely to be assaulted by one of them rather than by an indigenous person."
"For example, over-policing by arresting an Aborigine for conduct that other people might be excused for such as public drunkness or having an open alcohol container in a public place can contribute to the recorded number of assaults." Lucy

"Between 1997 and 2001, a total of 25,000 Indigenous peoples appeared in a NSW Court charged with a criminal offence. This constitutes 28.6% of the total NSW Indigenous population." Australian Human Rights Commission 2008.

Given that the author's figures refer to non-domestic violence related assaults,the percentages are in keeping with the Human Rights Commission figures for criminal offence charges as a whole in NSW. If anything I suspect Orange is above the NSW average.
So yes Lucy one is more likely to be assaulted by a non-indigenous person in Orange than an indigenous one. Why? because there are nearly thirty times more non-indigenous people living in Orange!
How can arresting a person for public drunkeness be recorded as assault? Or do you mean that arresting the indigenous person for public drunkeness led to the assault? I think we are speculating a lot here.
In Orange, as elsewhere in NSW, a disproportionate number of assaults and other crimes are committed by the indigenous population but most assaults and other crimes are committed by the non-indigenous population. Why argue about these figures?
"However, in expressing my dismay at how someone can commit an unprovoked assault, it was explained to me by another (white) Bathurst local that “they’re coons - that’s all they do”. Author

Given the age and sex distribution of the indigenous population it is not surprising that the obnoxious Bathurst local came to that ( somewhat erroneous) conclusion. But it happened and these umderlying views will continue to be held by a large number of rural and urban non-indigenous people. How to change these views, I have no idea, and I don't think too many other people do either.

I declare it racist to talk about humans as statistics. they are not, they are a diverse human community that cannot be measured by western means.

Lucy, you have now changed you argument ever so subtlely to try and slide out of what you originally said. Let’s have a look at how you’ve done this

My original statement was precisely;
“Obviously you would expect ( other things being equal) 3.6% of the population would be responsible for 3.6% of incidents( crimes).”

You disagreed stating; “Why would you expect 3.6% of the population to be responsible for 3.6% of the crimes? Do you actually think that everybody in Australia commits one crime per year thereby making the crime stats add up to a magical 100%?”

I again explained ;
“If you read my previous post I clearly stated "all other things being equal 3.6% of crime should be caused by 3.6% of the population."

To which you now have replied;
“You also haven't explained why 3.6% of the population should account for 3.6% of the crime when there could obviously be other socio-economic factors at play.”

So in this last statement of yours you have misrepresented what was originally said. You have conveniently left out the “all other things being equal “portion. You shouldn’t be so underhand.
I agree that socio-economic factors could play a role, likewise many many many other factors could equally play a role. We could go on arguing all day about these factors and that’s why right at the beginning I stated “all other things being equal”. It pointless having these discussions if people like you are going to misrepresent what has already been said, in order to win an argument.
So I will stand by my original statement above.
“Obviously you would expect ( other things being equal) 3.6% of the population would be responsible for 3.6% of incidents( crimes).”
You also need to further clarify you statement about crime stats magically adding up to 100%. This clearly shows your total lack of primary school maths. But then again you are only a lawyer, I don’t expect much from you.

BigAl,
I’m still waiting for your references to back your claims.

"I declare it racist to talk about humans as statistics. they are not, they are a diverse human community that cannot be measured by western means." TheMissus
I declare TheMissus is talking through his or her hat. I'm not sure what non-western means could be used to mmeasure and describe human populations.
But racist to classify the human population? Surely that should read populationist.

Lucy,

Around 12 % of the population are left-handers, so one would expect that 12 % of criminal acts would be committed by left-handers, and any major deviation would need explaining: yes, if the lefthander rate was much higher, we could propose socio-economic factors, discrimination, etc., etc., and if the rate was much lower, as I expect it is, the simple fact that lefthanders are better-looking and more intelligent, and therefore better able to cope with life's stresses, may account for this, but still the deviation would have to be explained. Those explanations would not change the statistics, as if we can wish them away with excuses.

In this case, Indigenous rates are three times what they should be in Bathurst (11 % : 3.6 %), so how to explain this ? Of course, socio-economic factors, a perception of lack of equal opportunity, police harassment, petty racism, complex racism, act of God, whatever - these would all have to be proposed and examined.

But the facts remain, Missus. Stats tell us something, crude as they may be, that then may need to be analysed and explained. We are all stats, one way or the other - class, age, gender, education level, employment status, right- or left-handed, using public service x or y, over- or under-weight, etc. Suck it up.

Joe

Lucy don't waste your time on Ozzie. For somebody who purports to have a medical degree to come out and said what he said in his first post beggars belief.

If anybody is being dishonest its Ozzie. Where is his evidence that the article is racist?

I like this particularly rancid quote:

"With a little extra maths we can calculate that if the population was purely indigenous there would be 722 crimes versus 271 if the population was all non-indigenous."

You forgot to say all things being equal there Mozzie.