Neither have the demographics in these areas "changed" much. The east end of London has had a large immigrant population since the 1970s and arguably since the 1700s when the Huguenots arrived from Northern France.

The most danger I was ever in was when they discovered an unexploded WWII bomb next to my flat ("The parties we've had in here, if it was going to go, it would have by now").

Acid attacks are so incredibly rare (350 last year) that any increase at all in them is going to represent a large statistical increase. If I had to hazard a guess as to why acid attacks were on the increase, it's because carrying a knife carries with it the chance of losing your own life as well and a life prison sentence if you kill someone. It's also (marginally) easier to argue that you're carrying a corrosive substance innocently than if you're found with a gun/knife. You are still 70x more likely to be involved in a knife attack than an acid attack.

Asking why immigration and changing demographics has caused this presupposes there being a racial motive at all. Explicitly asking for evidence which supports your theory suggests you've already made up your mind.

Why it is a convenient weapon? Cheap to buy and readily available, easy to carry around in a bottle and completely legal(I think that part is changing).

Some Immigrant neighbourhoods being poor is nothing new, and poor neighbourhoods suffering from criminal activities is again nothing original. Again, these neighbourhoods are not new and the immigrants hadn't moved there recently. So it doesn't look like some kind of immigrant critical mass was reached and they start throwing acid.

So no, you hadn't uncover a mystery or spoken the words that nobody dares to.

My guess would be that someone used acid for their criminal activities and had positive(from offender POV) results and it spread out as MOW.

Seems highly likely to me this is a result of improved and increased pressure over knife crime, pushing criminals into new methods, alongside increased exposure to the idea of acid attacks from news.

Something tells me its not a coincidence.

But most of the attacks in the U.K. are random and are often connected to robberies or gang violence. Many of the perpetrators are in their teens."

I don't follow how we can lay the responsibility for this increase in attacks at the feet of people from the Middle East coming to the UK if the motives are so different. The method is the same but the motivation is fundamentally different.

Perhaps the simpler explanation -- that it's a method of assault that is easier to get away with, has lighter sentences if caught and is not illegal to carry the weapon -- is more likely.

Yes, that something being racial prejudice. Sad to see this attitude rife on HN.

You forgot to call me a "Nazi" and "bigot" and "facist" and all the other things you ANTIFA folks call those who have different opinions than yourselves.

How many more alt-right talking points can you squeeze out? Your reaction is so amusingly predictable, it’s sad to see someone so programmed to dullness.

I haven't seen that stated, let alone proven - can you back up that statement?

and acid attacks: https://www.thesun.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/hd-map-a...

Again - I'm sure you could locate the source or find much more recent maps to show the correlation. The borough with the second highest Muslim population currently has the highest number of Acid attacks.

If you want to make such a outlandish claim, you need real sources where this has been studied and thought out carefully.

Sounds to me like you are making up statistics to push your narrative. It sounds a lot like the "black people are only x% of the population, but y% of prisoners in the USA!" you hear racists hark back to a lot. See a vague correlation, assume causation.

I also dislike your implication. Just because numbers don't seem to pass your standard (which isn't a coincidence, those numbers are very politically charged) does not change the fact that it is very much a problem that muslim communities impose their "values" on women (and elderly, and kids, and ...) with violence in immigrant neighborhoods in the west. Most worrisome these days is that not a week goes by without an article how some banal government intervention (fire brigade, wasps, car crash, shoplifting, ...) goes by without muslim youth attacking everyone, the police, firemen, bystanders, ...

But if you want to see whether this is happening or not, just go there. They've got good food (if you like it), and it won't take you very long to see aggression in the street against women at all. Probably nothing as serious as acid throwing, probably just shouting, but you'll see it. In the evening, especially on fridays, you stand a very good chance to see a physical confrontation between the police and locals near the police station or perhaps the train station.

Or perhaps just search it on youtube:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VP51aD_72PU

Search it and you'll see just how common and normal these things are. Or visit.

I don't care how much your worldview depends on denying these things are real. They are fact, they are obvious, and they have become so banal, so normal, and in some cases so brutal. Meanwhile, you'll never read about these incidents in either the normal press, or on the BBC or newspapers, and figures detailing these events are so absurd they're utterly ridiculous. More and more stories of people forced out by "crime" (somehow specifically targeting them and not others) keep finding me and dismissing all of them as if this doesn't exist, well, I wish you wouldn't do that.

I can find you a similar number of articles, youtube videos, or whatever of white English attackers. Your "evidence" doesn't show what you claim it does, and you are drawing incorrect conclusions from them. These are not "my standards" - they are the standards for something to be believable, to be valid.

You say "just go there" - I have! I currently live in a town with a very large immigrant population. I have lived in Leicester, the only city in the UK where you are technically a minority as a white English person. I did not see what you are describing.

You have seen a trend of articles and extrapolated them wrongly - it's a common mistake, but one we have seen before. It could be your sources are biased, reporting on those cases more, it could be that the link you are inferring is wrong, it could be that you are selectively remembering articles or picking them out. There is a reason we rely on more than "well, I remember a lot of cases of X being reported" when understanding the world.

Your claim it's all some conspiracy being covered up is untrue. If it was true, where is the evidence - your anecdotal evidence isn't useful. If that's all you respect, well, my years of living in places that fit this bill provide plenty of "counter" anecdotal evidence, so even by that (terrible) standard, it's rubbish.

If your claim is so "obviously" true, then prove it. Find the statistics - show the correlation is there, show that it's not other factors making the correlation.

I don't understand your reasoning. First you claim to be evidence based, and then say wild claims without back up. Okay. I'm sorry but I'm a math major. So let's analyse the claims:

1) my claim is that these attacks happen, and secondarily that they're common in specific areas

2) your claim is that they don't happen

Now my claim is what a logician would call an existential claim. A single anecdote obviously means that it is true, and yes, for an existence proof a single example is enough. This is exactly the approach every constructionist proof follows. And there are some beautiful and important constructionist proofs and I assure you they are quite valid. It doesn't prove the extent of the problem, but it does prove the claim is true. Of course a number of anecdotes does prove the extent of the problem, in the sense that it provides a lower bound. No need for statistics (but read on). Regardless, a single anecdote logically rejects your claim. Many anecdotes, and we both know that there are a great number such anecdotes, even if you count just in trustworthy papers, prove my claim. Again, no need for statistics.

So your supposed scientific view is really bullshit.

Then, your whole argument and it's conclusion is a logical fallacy known as "argument from ignorance". There is a claim A, and you say you destroy the arguments supporting A, and then conclude that (not A) must be true. Logic only allows a claim that "A or (not A)" is true, in that situation. It doesn't matter whether you successfully countered those arguments in ironclad logic, since (not A) NEVER follows. The conclusion closest to your thesis that you can possibly achieve is "we don't know if these things happen or not".

But your arguments have yet more problems than merely the method you claim to be using for deciding the truth, and the logical fallacy used in reaching your conclusion. Your arguments don't actually imply a difference. As a statistician would say, they contain zero information. This means that you could be saying 100% the literal truth and your thesis could be true or false, you could be entirely lying about everything and your thesis could be true or false. Your arguments are not a distinguishing factor in rejecting or accepting the claim that you make. So why make them ?

Your arguments are merely rhetorical, and devoid of meaning. They only appear related. Even worse: the criticism of anecdotes, given your claim, actually attempts to point out a flaw where there is none. It is a direct attempt to deceive. Maybe you're deceiving yourself and this is simply an error, maybe not.

And of course, the other details. First of all, we were all talking here about London, not Leicester. Apparently there are a few other cities that are really also part of London where this also happens. I'm glad to hear Leicester is not one of them.

As for the conspiracy, see [1], for example. Given that logically, a positive claim can be proven by giving a single positive example, while a negative claim (like your "not a conspiracy") cannot be proven by any amount of evidence. Note that anecdotes DO prove a positive claim. If the claim is that something happens, a single such anecdote obviously proves this to be the case. You claim to be evidence-based, and we both know what logic says in this case.

The truth is that while there is a conspiracy to hide these facts, it is not that powerful or well organised at all. It is just a bunch of idiots protecting their reputation under direction of their management. The truth is far worse: these things, like the new normal of attacks on the police and firefighters in almost every instance are banal, trivial, and well known. Life adapts. The police force is no exception. No newspaper reports that tide rose today just like every time it did before. No newspaper reports that there were -once again- "mild" riots in East London (because they happen essentially every week, most are "mild" compared to the worst incidents). It is almost understandable, in a horrible way. Is calling this a conspiracy reasonable ? I can see good arguments for and against.

It's like those car torchings in France. They started in 2011 I believe. And now, you never read about them. One might conclude they've stopped, but they haven't. They are now simply a constant of life in certain cities [2] (at this point, almost all cities above a certain size, any city non-French people might know by name has this problem according to the article). As the linked article puts it "That’s because of a longstanding French tradition that sees youths in certain parts of cities torching scores of cars". Banal, trivial, and a fact of life. Also, a conspiracy, obviously, in the sense that there are groups of people working together to both commit these things and to hide them. It is however not a conspiracy in the James Bond sense. There is no dark villain behind the scene petting a cat while organizing these things as a single actor.

[1] http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/crime/10460158/Police...

[2] https://www.thelocal.fr/20170406/is-the-famous-french-tradit...

You then proceed to say we are talking about London - your statement was not bounded to London - if your correlation only holds in London, why is that? That implies that there is another factor influencing things, and only further undermines your link.

Again, you then go on to continue to rant about positive claims - the statement I am arguing was not "acid attacks have happened", it was the one given above, which is not proven by a single positive example. You are not presenting evidence to back up the statement you made.

And then you go into further rants about reporting - which is all totally irrelevant. You can't make broad claims about groups of people based on any reporting like that. It is clear the data can be misleading because of why and how those stories are chosen. Again, you keep falling back to "you can't say this didn't happen" - no one was claiming that! I said I never saw it happen in locations I lived to show the pointlessness of your anecdotal evidence - there is selection bias at play, and it's too small a sample. I'm not claiming they never happened, just that your argument does not prove the point you made. Just because it happened, and was reported on, does not prove a causal link or even a correlation.

Let me make this clear: You made a claim ("There is a correlation between the % of Muslim population and # of acid attacks") with no evidence. If you want to say something like that, you need proof. That is what I have been saying - very clearly - all along.

My claim was that muslim communities do in fact commit violent attacks against people they perceive as being somehow violating islam/sharia (or merely perceived as vulnerable or undesirable for that matter). I then illustrated with examples that, firstly these attacks do happen, and secondly, that the government statistics on that are "routinely misreported" (quote from the linked article).

And once again you make the argument from ignorance logical fallacy. Just because such a correlation cannot be proven DOES NOT prove the opposite. It does not provide any reassurance that your thesis is true. And if you look at it on a somewhat larger scale you will see how your claim is really the unlikely side of the argument.

It is an absolute known fact that muslim communities, by and large, attack their own members if they are perceived to act against sharia. Read Human Rights Watch. Over 20% of the total human population lives in nation where such attacks are in the laws.

Given that over 90% of muslims worldwide do these attacks, directly or through state actions (passively if you will), why would any sane person even accept your claim that such a thing is not done in immigrant communities as a default claim that requires no evidence ? Talk about far fetched.

Do you see the problem here ?

Again, I am not arguing the opposite is proven! You are literally putting words in my mouth.

You are arguing a totally separate point, and just decided to reply to me, for some reason. Please actually read the posts you are replying to and stay on-topic. Your off-topic rants are useless, and you have wasted a lot of my time trying to work out what the hell you are going on about.

Then review increases Swedish acid attacks.

Focusing on just the UK as if it was some mystically isolated scenario is intentionally skewing the statistics and the discussion to allow for demographic plausible deniability.

I'm not here to assert the correctness of my position, for the record, especially since I've already pointed out one only has to look at similar cases from Germany and Sweden. I've already placed my bets on the inevitable rise of European private prisons within the next ten years.

Sounds to me like you are saying you have no evidence for that claim.