tag:theconversation.com,2011:/institutions/duquesne-university-1752/articlesDuquesne University 2021-08-30T12:28:11Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1667882021-08-30T12:28:11Z2021-08-30T12:28:11ZIs it a crime to forge a vaccine card? And what’s the penalty for using a fake?<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418094/original/file-20210826-6126-1ssbxkq.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=10%2C43%2C3583%2C2333&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">A nurse displays a real COVID-19 vaccination card.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/VurusOutbreakNewYork/a08a3aab2bff493281150f094f7e4124/photo">AP Photo/Craig Ruttle</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>Schools, businesses, the military and local governments are requiring proof of vaccination. Yet, unlike the European Union and Australia, which have <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-56522408">secure digital proof of vaccination</a>, the United States has not created a systematic way to track vaccinations around the nation. Most places in the U.S. instead rely on paper cards with handwritten notes, which can be easily forged.</p>
<p>As scholars of <a href="https://www.bu.edu/law/profile/christopher-robertson/">health law</a> and <a href="https://www.duq.edu/academics/faculty/wesley-oliver">criminal law</a>, <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=9GZnzpQAAAAJ&hl=en&oi=ao">we</a> <a href="https://scholar.google.com/citations?hl=en&user=mPJubJMAAAAJ">know</a> that people who forge their own vaccine cards, or buy forged cards, are already facing criminal charges.</p>
<p>Federal prosecutors have already brought <a href="https://www.nbcbayarea.com/news/local/north-bay/doj-naturopathic-physician-sold-fake-covid-19-vaccine-cards/2594493/">criminal charges</a> against a naturopathic doctor in northern California. In a case involving a licensed pharmacist in Chicago, prosecutors argued that selling official vaccination cards to people who were not really vaccinated <a href="https://www.justice.gov/opa/press-release/file/1425031/download">effectively stole something from the government</a>, by giving it to others without the government’s permission.</p>
<p>This isn’t an entirely new phenomenon. For many years, it has been a <a href="https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/18/1035">federal crime</a> to make or use “any materially false writing in any matter involving a health care benefit program.”</p>
<h2>What is the harm?</h2>
<p>When people are caught knowingly buying, selling or using false cards, the proof of guilt will often be clear. The real question is about the appropriate punishment.</p>
<p>Some of the relevant laws, such as wire and mail fraud, have penalties of up to $250,000 and 20 years’ imprisonment for each email, website visit, call or package sent as part of the scheme. These charges can add up, so that a person who sent an email requesting the card, used Venmo to pay for it, then received it in the mail could face 60 years of imprisonment and $750,000 in fines. </p>
<p>But in practice, the law gives prosecutors and judges huge <a href="https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=3893820">discretion</a> on how to charge and sentence offenders. Typically, judges consider the degree of harm caused or at least the value of the thing that was wrongly acquired. In the case of forged vaccine cards, that is a thorny question. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418095/original/file-20210826-21-1dypveo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="A laminated document" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418095/original/file-20210826-21-1dypveo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/418095/original/file-20210826-21-1dypveo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=244&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418095/original/file-20210826-21-1dypveo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=244&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418095/original/file-20210826-21-1dypveo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=244&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418095/original/file-20210826-21-1dypveo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=306&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418095/original/file-20210826-21-1dypveo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=306&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/418095/original/file-20210826-21-1dypveo.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=306&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">This forged COVID-19 vaccination card was seized during a criminal investigation in California.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://newsroom.ap.org/detail/VirusOutbreak-FakeVaccinationCards/c417813c1d744e3cbc6dfa1b98e1170d/photo">California Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control via AP</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>A fake vaccination card deceives universities, businesses and employers into granting access they otherwise would not, letting someone use land, buildings or equipment they otherwise would be barred from. In some cases, such as those involving an astronomy researcher supported by federal grants or athletes in bowl games, that access might be worth thousands of dollars. More importantly, that fraudulent access might risk the health of students, clients and staffers who rely on vaccination policies for their own safety. </p>
<p>Prosecutors don’t need to prove that someone was infected or died as a result of a particular person’s use of a fake vaccine card at a specific place and time. The fake card user’s intent to violate trust is sufficient to make the act a crime.</p>
<h2>Counterfeiting is serious</h2>
<p>Aside from the institutions and individuals defrauded, the social harm is obvious. Like counterfeit money or forged checks, a fake vaccination card undermines the public’s faith in all vaccination cards. If a sizable number of documents were illegitimate, people would be unable to trust any of them. </p>
<p><a href="https://guidelines.ussc.gov/gl/%C2%A72B5.1">Punishment in money counterfeiting cases</a>, quite logically, often tracks the value of fake currency possessed. In June 2021, two Maryland men were sentenced to <a href="https://www.justice.gov/usao-md/pr/captial-heights-man-sentenced-more-three-years-federal-prison-conspiracy-pass-counterfeit">37 months in prison for creating and passing $95,000 in counterfeit bills</a>. But in other cases, the Supreme Court has said that a series of <a href="https://scholar.google.com/scholar_case?case=8709258039539996037">even minor financial frauds</a>, amounting to less than $250 in total losses can lead to life imprisonment.</p>
<p>So far, no one has been sentenced for creating or possessing fake COVID-19 vaccination cards. It is therefore not clear how courts will evaluate the harm done by this sort of fraud.</p>
<p>Nonetheless, whether the harm is conceived as against the government, against the particular people who rely on cards, or against social trust, it is clear that prosecutors and judges have sizable penalties they can hand down.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/166788/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Christopher Robertson is author of Exposed: Why Our Health Insurance Is Incomplete and What Can Be Done about It (2019).</span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Wesley Oliver does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>People who forge their own vaccine cards, or buy forged cards, are already facing legal problems, including criminal charges.Christopher Robertson, Professor of Law, Boston UniversityWesley Oliver, Professor of Law, Duquesne University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1651582021-07-29T12:23:21Z2021-07-29T12:23:21ZThe largest news agency in the US changes crime reporting practices to ‘do less harm and give people second chances’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413432/original/file-20210727-13-osmn5i.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&rect=8%2C33%2C5599%2C3699&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Reporting about minor crimes is about to change.</span> <span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/photo/teenager-being-handcuffed-royalty-free-image/180703112?adppopup=true">Illustration by kali9/iStock/Getty Images Plus</a></span></figcaption></figure><p>When suspects’ names appear in crime stories, their lives may be broken and never put back together. </p>
<p>For years, people have begged The Associated Press, known as the “AP,” to scrub their indiscretions from its archives. Some of those requests “were heart-rending,” said John Daniszewski, standards vice president at AP who helped to spearhead the worldwide news service’s <a href="https://apnews.com/article/crime-technology-df0a7cd66590d9cb29ed1526ec03b58f">new policy</a>.</p>
<p>Acknowledging that journalism can inflict wounds unnecessarily, AP will no longer name those arrested for minor crimes when the news service is unlikely to cover the story’s subsequent developments. Often, such stories’ publication hinges on an odd or entertaining quirk, and the names are irrelevant. Yet, the ramifications can loom large and be long-lasting for the persons named.</p>
<p>How much detail American reporters include in a crime story depends on how newsworthy it is, <a href="https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/oso/9780190863531.001.0001/oso-9780190863531">our research found</a>. A minor story might be based solely on a police incident report. A big story, the kind discussed around the water cooler, can include interviews with acquaintances and deep probes into the person’s past. Whether the story is big or small, most accounts include full identification of the accused in the American press.</p>
<p>“I received a very moving letter from a man who, as a college student, had been involved in a financial crime,” Daniszewski recalled in an interview with us, both <a href="https://www.duq.edu/academics/faculty/margaret-patterson">media ethics</a> <a href="https://www.fims.uwo.ca/people/profiles/romayne_smith_fullerton.html">scholars</a>. When an old news account of the incident surfaced, the young man lost friends. Even his upcoming marriage was jeopardized until he could persuade his fiancée and her family that he had learned from his experience and was not an incorrigible villain.</p>
<p>For others, stories of their alleged crimes showed up on Google searches 10 or 15 years after the incident, even if they were never convicted or courts had expunged the criminal record. Daniszewski said many people making requests to the AP had been arrested for minor drug offenses, such as small amounts of marijuana, but stories about those offenses were blocking them from getting jobs, renting apartments and even meeting people on dating apps. </p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413430/original/file-20210727-15524-1t7wb0f.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="The Whitman County courthouse in Colfax, Washington." src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413430/original/file-20210727-15524-1t7wb0f.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413430/original/file-20210727-15524-1t7wb0f.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413430/original/file-20210727-15524-1t7wb0f.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413430/original/file-20210727-15524-1t7wb0f.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413430/original/file-20210727-15524-1t7wb0f.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413430/original/file-20210727-15524-1t7wb0f.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413430/original/file-20210727-15524-1t7wb0f.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">News organizations don’t always follow their reporting that someone has been criminally charged by going to court to see how the case is resolved.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.gettyimages.com/detail/news-photo/whitman-county-courthouse-in-colfax-washington-news-photo/1289092542?adppopup=true">Don & Melinda Crawford/Education Images/Universal Images Group via Getty Images</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Culture shift</h2>
<p>The <a href="https://www.ap.org/about/">Associated Press</a>, the largest American news agency, was founded in 1846. It is a cooperative enterprise whose members include most mainstream American news outlets and many in other countries.</p>
<p>AP’s new policy signals a shift in U.S. politics and culture. It takes a small step away from the traditional “tell-all” practice of American crime reporting. It embraces a bit of the empathy toward wrongdoers shown by reporters in some European countries.</p>
<p>We interviewed nearly 200 reporters and media experts in 10 countries in Western Europe and North America for our book, “<a href="https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/oso/9780190863531.001.0001/oso-9780190863531">Murder in Our Midst: Comparing Crime Coverage Ethics in an Age of Globalized News</a>.” We uncovered significant differences in journalism practices, despite the similarities in these countries’ democratic institutions and values.</p>
<p><a href="https://www.presserat.de/files/presserat/dokumente/download/Press%20Code.pdf">German</a>, <a href="https://www.rvdj.nl/english/guidelines">Dutch</a> and <a href="https://research.tuni.fi/ethicnet/country/sweden/code-of-ethics-for-the-press-radio-and-television/">Swedish</a> press council ethics codes encourage protecting the identity of both suspects and those convicted. These codes are largely voluntary and allow each news outlet to make case-by-case decisions, but their default practice is not to identify. </p>
<p>In those countries, journalists withhold the full names of those arrested or even convicted of crimes except in some cases of public figures or crimes of particular public concern. Instead, news accounts carry just initials or a first name and last initial to shield that person from publicity. </p>
<p>Since 1973, <a href="https://second.wiki/wiki/lebach-urteil">German courts have mandated</a> that news reports refrain from identifying inmates as their prison release draws near to allow for their “resocialization” and “right to personality” or reputation. </p>
<h2>Irreparable harm</h2>
<p>When we asked an editor at ANP, the Netherlands’ counterpart to the AP, why her staff routinely withheld names, she paused, then said: “What if he had children? They did nothing wrong,” yet they would be irreparably harmed by being tagged as a criminal’s offspring.</p>
<p>While German, Dutch and Swedish reporters expressed similar concern for families, they also said they wanted to preserve the presumption of innocence for those merely accused and the ability to resume a productive life for those who were convicted.</p>
<p>When the Dutch editor learned how many deeply personal details American reporters routinely publish about those arrested, she gasped at what she saw as cruel and unethical. “Why would you do that to someone?” she asked.</p>
<p>Most American reporters we interviewed regretted the harm such revelations caused but saw the practice as collateral damage. In their eyes, their first obligation is acting as a watchdog on police and government. They believe the public has the right to public information, and police should never be trusted with the power to make undisclosed arrests. That commitment runs much deeper in the U.S. than it does in the Netherlands. For the most part, “we trust our government,” said one official of the Dutch union of journalists.</p>
<p>Watchdog ethics loom large at the AP, Daniszewski told us. However – as the research for our book found – journalism ethics and practices are rooted in culture. And the American “zeitgeist” around the criminal justice is shifting, Daniszewski said.</p>
<p>In 2018, <a href="https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/technology/who-deserves-to-have-their-past-mistakes-e2-80-9cforgotten-e2-80-9d-newspapers-are-trying-to-figure-it-out/ar-BB1dJEHE">The (Cleveland) Plain Dealer began considering petitions</a> to remove some stories from its archives. <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/media/old-arrest-boston-globe-fresh-start/2021/01/22/122cbd0c-5cd1-11eb-b8bd-ee36b1cd18bf_story.html">The Boston Globe’s Fresh Start initiative</a> made a similar move this year. These are small steps when compared with the <a href="https://www.npr.org/2019/09/24/763857307/right-to-be-forgotten-only-applies-inside-eu-european-court-says">European Union’s guarantee that citizens have a “right to be forgotten</a>” by having at least some humiliating stories removed from search engine archives.</p>
<figure class="align-center zoomable">
<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413433/original/file-20210727-22-nj0tv7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="Statement by the Boston Globe about its Fresh Start Initiative" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413433/original/file-20210727-22-nj0tv7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/413433/original/file-20210727-22-nj0tv7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=441&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413433/original/file-20210727-22-nj0tv7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=441&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413433/original/file-20210727-22-nj0tv7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=441&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413433/original/file-20210727-22-nj0tv7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=555&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413433/original/file-20210727-22-nj0tv7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=555&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/413433/original/file-20210727-22-nj0tv7.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=555&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">Text on the webpage of The Boston Globe’s Fresh Start Initiative, which allows people to petition to have their name removed or added to old stories, or removed from Google searches.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/01/22/metro/globes-fresh-start-initiative-submit-your-appeal/">Screenshot, https://www.bostonglobe.com/2021/01/22/metro/globes-fresh-start-initiative-submit-your-appeal/</a></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<h2>Public figures</h2>
<p>Journalists in all 10 countries we researched agreed that the public needs to know when politicians are accused of crimes tied to their official duties. </p>
<p>When a politician or celebrity is alleged to have committed major crime, like a hit-and-run accident, the press should name names, most journalists in our sample agreed. The press must also pin blame, journalists said, when political crimes affect public welfare.</p>
<p>However, Dutch reporters and others often turn a blind eye when celebrities or political officials are accused of domestic violence or sexual harassment, which they consider private indiscretions. American reporters are more likely to consider such accusations news. </p>
<p>Private individuals committing crimes, even major crimes, are rarely identified in mainstream news accounts in the Netherlands, Sweden or Germany, despite those names being on the public record with the potential to be revealed by tabloids and websites. One reason: “We believe everyone deserves a second chance,” said Thomas Bruning, head of the Dutch journalists union.</p>
<p>Is a similar sentiment catching hold in the United States?</p>
<p>[<em>Over 100,000 readers rely on The Conversation’s newsletter to understand the world.</em> <a href="https://theconversation.com/us/newsletters/the-daily-3?utm_source=TCUS&utm_medium=inline-link&utm_campaign=newsletter-text&utm_content=100Ksignup">Sign up today</a>.]</p>
<p>The U.S. incarcerates felons in places we call “penitentiaries,” Daniszewski said – that is, places for repentance. The term might imply forgiveness could follow, but in fact felons are stigmatized for life, he said. </p>
<p>The AP will never sugar-coat accounts of serious crime nor whitewash public corruption, he vowed. But speaking of the AP’s new policy, he said, “We thought if we could do less harm and give people second chances, it would be for the good.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/165158/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Maggie Jones Patterson received funding for this research from the Mort Weissman Memorial Fund, the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada, the National Endowment for the Humanities, and Duquesne University Faculty Research Fund. She is affiliated with the Society of Professional Journalists, Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, and PublicSource . </span></em></p><p class="fine-print"><em><span>Romayne Smith Fullerton does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The Associated Press will no longer name those arrested in minor crimes when the news service is unlikely to cover the story’s resolution. That’s a major shift in US news culture.Maggie Jones Patterson, Professor of Journalism, Duquesne University Romayne Smith Fullerton, Associate Professor, Information and Media Studies, Western UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/1124392019-03-04T13:33:49Z2019-03-04T13:33:49ZLetters reveal Africanist hero Robert Sobukwe’s moral courage, and pain<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/262378/original/file-20190306-48438-1ny6tjw.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">Between 1963 and 1969 Robert Sobukwe spent six years of near-complete solitary confinement on Robben Island.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source"> Book cover</span></span></figcaption></figure><p><em>On 21 March 1960 the apartheid police <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/article/sharpeville-massacre-21-march-1960">opened fire on unarmed marchers</a> protesting against a law that forced black people to carry identity documents. Over 200 were injured and 69 killed. The following edited excerpt is from a new book featuring the prison letters of Robert Sobukwe, who organised and led the march.</em></p>
<p>In a letter of condolence written on 5 August 1974 to Nell Marquard, a friend who he had been corresponding with since his time on Robben Island, South African pan-Africanist leader <a href="https://theconversation.com/sobukwes-pan-africanist-dream-an-elusive-idea-that-refuses-to-die-52601">Robert Mangaliso Sobukwe</a> made a telling observation:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I learnt some time ago that one cannot put oneself in another’s position. We may express sympathy, feel it and even imagine the pain. But we cannot feel it as the one who suffers it. They have a saying in Xhosa that the toothache is felt by the one whose tooth is aching.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Sobukwe, who clearly knew about suffering, loneliness and the impossibility of ever fully communicating one’s pain to another, was writing just after the death of Nell’s husband, the noted Cape liberal, author and historian, Leo Marquard. Given that Leo was a prominent liberal, and that white liberals had not always been friendly to the aims and agendas of the Pan Africanist Congress (PAC) – the organisation that Sobukwe led from 1959 until his arrest in 1960 – one might have expected coolness from Sobukwe. Not at all. He, as always, was gracious:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>I am thankful that I was able to talk to you two years before Leo’s death and more thankful that he died knowing how much his contribution had been appreciated.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Touching as this acknowledgement of his contribution would have been for Marquard, the real poignancy of Sobukwe’s letter comes a little further on, when he starts speaking of the myriad difficulties he has faced since leaving <a href="https://whc.unesco.org/en/list/916">Robben Island</a>, where most of South Africa’s liberation struggle leaders were jailed. </p>
<blockquote>
<p>It has not been a good year for me. I had planned to leave [from Kimberley] … by car on the 31st May and make straight for Cape Town. But these boys [apartheid security police] beat me to it. They came on the 30th May, 1974 to serve the fresh lot of bureaucratic output. Well it’s good to know that our security is entrusted to such alert people.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>Despite the fact that he makes light of it, one senses in Sobukwe’s letter that the constant surveillance and harassment of the security police was taking its toll. Behind the ironic salute to the astuteness of the police, there is also a disturbing foreshadowing. <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/stephen-bantu-biko">Steve Biko</a>, in many respects Sobukwe’s most direct political heir, would be stopped and arrested on a not dissimilar road trip from Cape Town four years later, an event which would lead directly to his death at the hands of the Security Police. Sobukwe continues: </p>
<blockquote>
<p>Veronica (Sobukwe’s wife) has had a major operation as you probably read in the papers. She should have had this operation last year, but did not and the condition got worse. She has made a remarkable recovery, thanks to my very efficient and tender nursing, and has now gone back to Joh’burg for a check up. From there she will be in Durban to spend a week or so with her sister before proceeding to Swaziland to see the children.</p>
</blockquote>
<figure class="align-left ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/261212/original/file-20190227-150728-13uhl5s.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/261212/original/file-20190227-150728-13uhl5s.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=906&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261212/original/file-20190227-150728-13uhl5s.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=906&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261212/original/file-20190227-150728-13uhl5s.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=906&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261212/original/file-20190227-150728-13uhl5s.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261212/original/file-20190227-150728-13uhl5s.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261212/original/file-20190227-150728-13uhl5s.JPG?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1139&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption"></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>Between May 1963 and May 1969 Sobukwe was to spend six years of near-complete solitary confinement on Robben Island.</p>
<p>These circumstances had their origins in a momentous historical event organised by Sobukwe himself. On 21 March 1960, he had led the Pan Africanist Congress in what he called a “positive action” campaign, protesting against the oppressive pass laws that governed the movements – and indeed the lives – of black South Africans. </p>
<p>This mass action resulted in the <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/topic/sharpeville-massacre-21-march-1960">Sharpeville massacre</a> later that same day, in which at least 69 people were killed when the South African police opened fire on a crowd of protesters. This event, which drew international attention to the injustices and brutality of apartheid, was a watershed moment in the history of South Africa. It led to a three-year jail sentence for Sobukwe for inciting people to protest against the laws of the country.</p>
<p>Not content that by 3 May 1963 Sobukwe would have served his sentence, the apartheid government passed an amendment to the General Law Amendment Act, the notorious <a href="https://www.sahistory.org.za/people/robert-mangaliso-sobukwe">“Sobukwe Clause”</a>, which enabled the Minister of Justice to prolong the detention of any political prisoner year after year.</p>
<p>He was then relocated to Robben Island, and kept apart from other prisoners, where he remained for six years. The clause – never used to detain anyone else – was renewed annually by the Minister of Justice.</p>
<p>Sobukwe, in a very significant sense, was never a free man again after his 1960 imprisonment. The apartheid government unleashed a series of bureaucratic cruelties upon him after his May 1969 release from Robben Island. They forced him to live in the geographically remote town of Kimberley – far removed from any friends, family or associates. </p>
<figure class="align-right ">
<img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/261245/original/file-20190227-150705-uun26y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=237&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/261245/original/file-20190227-150705-uun26y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261245/original/file-20190227-150705-uun26y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261245/original/file-20190227-150705-uun26y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=450&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261245/original/file-20190227-150705-uun26y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261245/original/file-20190227-150705-uun26y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/261245/original/file-20190227-150705-uun26y.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=566&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px">
<figcaption>
<span class="caption">The house where Sobukwe was held on Robben Island .</span>
<span class="attribution"><span class="source">Flcker/Daniel Mouton</span></span>
</figcaption>
</figure>
<p>They insisted he take on a low-ranking job that would have made him complicit in the apartheid policies that he went to jail protesting. He refused. They repeatedly refused to allow him to leave the country to take up job offers he had received from the United States; and they obstructed his attempts to get the medical treatments that he needed, and that would have extended his life (he died of lung cancer on 27 February 1978).</p>
<p>This then is the background to the consolations that Sobukwe sought to offer Nell Marquard in his 1974 letter. It’s only on the last page of that letter that he seemed to finally find the words that suited both his emotions and the note of commiseration that he wished to convey to Nell:</p>
<blockquote>
<p>The Xhosa have standard words of condolence. They say
<em>Akuhlanga lungehlanga lala ngenxeba</em> (There has not occurred what has not occurred before … lie on your wound).
God bless you. Affectionately, Robert.</p>
</blockquote>
<p>This resonant phrase – which also appears in Sobukwe’s letters to his friend Benjamin Pogrund – applies equally, if not more so, to Sobukwe himself. “Lie on your wound(s)” is a call to bide one’s time, to heal, and to reconstitute one’s self despite evident suffering. It is a call to have courage, to bear the moral burden of pain, and it provides an apt title for what was the most difficult period of Sobukwe’s life, namely his time on Robben Island, which the selection of letters collected in this <a href="http://witspress.co.za/catalogue/lie-on-your-wounds-2/">book</a>, published by Wits <a href="http://witspress.co.za/">University Press</a>, represents.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/112439/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Derek Hook does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>A collection of prison letters provides a peek into the suffering of South African liberation hero, Robert Sobukwe.Derek Hook, Associate professor of Psychology, Duquesne University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/552872016-03-31T10:25:10Z2016-03-31T10:25:10ZWhy so many baseball experts whiffed with last year’s predictions<p>For Major League Baseball teams, spring brings the promise of a better year. For the baseball media, it means putting their expertise to the test and forecasting player and team performances. Most of these forays into the future will be quickly forgotten, and for baseball’s prognosticators, the public’s amnesia is fortunate: they’re prone to swing and miss with great frequency.</p>
<p>In fact, last season featured some of the most surprising final regular season standings in the last 60 years – at least, when compared to how the media experts envisioned things panning out. </p>
<p>A close look at the final <a href="http://www.cbssports.com/mlb/standings/regular">2015 MLB standings</a> finds American League West teams finishing in almost inverse order of some <a href="http://www.sportingnews.com/list/4640745-mlb-predictions-2015-playoffs-division-winners-wild-card-teams/slide/3">preseason forecasts</a>. The previous season’s bottom dwellers – the Texas Rangers and Houston Astros – captured first and second, respectively. </p>
<p>In the American League Central division, the story was much the same. The favored Detroit Tigers, division winners the four previous years, collapsed, finishing last. The White Sox, <a href="http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/12006380/chicago-white-sox-bold-offseason-moves-attracting-attention">seen by many</a> as the “winner of the off-season” player acquisitions, were only a game and half better than the Tigers. The Cleveland Indians, picked by <a href="http://www.si.com/mlb/2015/03/27/si-mlb-preview-playoff-bracket-indians-world-series"><em>Sports Illustrated</em> to win the World Series</a>, finished third in their division. </p>
<p>And in the National League East, the Washington Nationals were nearly everyone’s pick to claim the division flag, but finished seven games behind the Mets, who surged after their trade deadline acquisition of Yoenis Cespedes from the underachieving Tigers. </p>
<p>Isn’t that what we expect and love about baseball: its unpredictability?</p>
<p>Yes. But the division races in 2015 were unpredictably unpredictable. After breaking down the numbers, we pose a couple of reasons why this may have happened. </p>
<h2>From mediocre to abysmal predictions</h2>
<p>Last spring, <a href="https://theconversation.com/can-experts-predict-final-mlb-standings-better-than-the-average-fan-38883">we examined the accuracy</a> of nine media sources that predicted MLB’s division races between 2009 and 2014. </p>
<p>For the nine sources, we found that the average correlation between the predicted finish and the final standings was .49. Perfect predictions would yield a correlation of 1.0, while perfectly awful predictions would produce a -1.0.</p>
<p>A .49 correlation isn’t anything special. A budding MLB Nostradamus could produce exactly the same correlation over the six years by simply taking the previous year’s final standings for each division and using it as the next year’s prediction. </p>
<p>But compared to 2015, the mediocre 2009 to 2014 media forecasts were positively clairvoyant. </p>
<p>This spring, we analyzed the 2015 preseason predictions from <em>Sports Illustrated, Sporting News</em> and a panel of baseball experts who attended the <a href="https://muse.jhu.edu/journals/nine/">NINE</a> Spring Training conference in Tempe, Arizona in March 2015. All of them fell well below the .49 average achieved by the media prognosticators in our previous study. </p>
<p>The strongest correlation between preseason rankings and the final standings was <em><a href="http://www.si.com/mlb/2015/03/23/2015-season-previews-all-30-teams">Sports Illustrated</a></em>’s forecast that produced a .23 correlation. The NINE experts were next with at .12, while <em><a href="http://www.sportingnews.com/list/4640745-mlb-predictions-2015-playoffs-division-winners-wild-card-teams">Sporting News</a></em> finished in the cellar with a .08 correlation. For perspective, <em>Sporting News’</em> average correlation for all years from 1955 to 2015 was a solid .60.</p>
<p>Yes, 2015 was a very tough year indeed.</p>
<p>We also wanted to see exactly how these poor predictions stacked up, historically. </p>
<p>So in the second part of our study, we examined the preseason/final standing correlations for three publications over several decades: <em>Sporting News</em> and <em>Sports Illustrated</em> from 1955-2015 and Street and Smith’s <em>Baseball Yearbook</em> from 1962-2007. Combined, the publications produced an average yearly correlation of .58, vastly better than our 2015 sample. When individual years were examined, only the years 1984, 1990 and 1991 produced a poorer correlation than 2015. </p>
<h2>Splashy free agent signings build hype</h2>
<p>So why was 2015 such a bad year for MLB predictions? </p>
<p>Here we leave the data behind and move to slippery slope of speculation. </p>
<p>The 2015 season saw the blossoming of young teams like the Houston Astros and Chicago Cubs, the rebound of steadily solid teams with injury-riddled 2014 campaigns like the Texas Rangers, and unrealistic expectations for teams active in off-season player shuffling like the Boston Red Sox, San Diego Padres and Chicago White Sox. </p>
<p>There is also the element of luck. Balls batted into play fall for hits in greater numbers one year than other. High flies drift over the outfield wall with more regularity some seasons. Injuries can destroy one team’s chances and hardly influence another’s. The baseball gods smile and frown at whim.</p>
<p>Deities aside, media prognosticators could have been overreacting to the impact of high-profile free agent signings – a tendency pundits have shown in the past.</p>
<p>When we broke up our data sets, we found that predictions were weakest from 1977 to 1992 – the era when free agency emerged and took effect. </p>
<p>The average correlation for this era was .40, compared to a .58 average for all other eras. The shuffling of marquee players from team to team certainly produces big headlines. But it also may cause media observers to overestimate the difference a handful of players can make. </p>
<p>When we examined the 30-team era – from 1998 to 2015 – the average yearly correlation moved up to .56. This coincided with the rise of <a href="http://sabr.org/sabermetrics">sabermetrics</a>, which allowed journalists and front offices to begin using advanced statistics to precisely evaluate the contributions of individual players. This may have helped media prognosticators do a better job of evaluating the true impact of off-season transactions. For example, the <a href="http://www.baseballprospectus.com/glossary/index.php?ltr=W&context=alpha">Wins Above Replacement Player</a> (WARP) statistic shows how, most of the time, the addition of a couple of new players is unlikely to significantly move the win needle.</p>
<p>We also found that some teams are more predictable over time than others. </p>
<p>Over our decades-long study, the easiest teams to predict were the Astros (.79), Athletics (.78), Mets (.77), Blue Jays (.76) and Mariners (.71). Dramatically more difficult to forecast were the Diamondbacks (.10), Dodgers (.20), Cardinals (.20), Giants (.30) and Reds (.30). </p>
<p>The pattern is fairly clear: four of the most predicable were expansion teams that went through a long period of predictably poor play before finally finding some success. When we examined what place in the standings was easiest for media sources to predict, it was last place by a clear margin. In other words, very bad teams are the easiest to spot. On the other hand, four of the hardest to predict were National League stalwarts (Dodgers, Cardinals, Giants, Reds) that weren’t likely to finish last very often.</p>
<p>What stands out from our study of division standings predictions over the past 60 years is just how bad a year 2015 was for MLB division diviners. The year <a href="http://www.si.com/mlb/2016/03/22/astros-mets-giants-cubs-sports-illustrated-cover">2016</a> will have to be better – at least, that’s what we’re predicting. </p>
<p>And for the record, our money’s on the Cubs or the Pirates to win it all.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/55287/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>As the talking heads line up to predict this season’s division winners, many are hoping fans will forget their abysmal forecasts for the 2015 season.James Walker, Executive Director, International Association for Communication and Sport, Emeritus Professor of Communication, Saint Xavier UniversityRobert Bellamy, Professor; Department of Journalism and Multimedia Arts [JMA], Duquesne University Licensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/388832015-04-02T05:12:42Z2015-04-02T05:12:42ZCan ‘experts’ predict final MLB standings better than the average fan?<p><em>Der mentsh trakht un got lakht.</em></p>
<p>This Yiddish proverb is usually translated as “Man plans and God laughs.” And if plans include predictions then the saying aptly applies to the upcoming Major League Baseball season. </p>
<p>As happens every spring, dozens of media experts and publications have offered their predictions for the 2015 Major League Baseball season. For example, The Sporting News has <a href="http://www.sportingnews.com/mlb/story/2015-01-08/cubs-world-series-sporting-news-picks-lester-maddon-bryant">the Cubs winning the World Series</a>, while Sports Illustrated sees them as <a href="http://www.si.com/mlb/2015/03/25/season-preview-chicago-cubs">a third place team</a>.</p>
<p>How correct are these prognosticators of high repute? Historically, does one source consistently emerge above these rest? </p>
<p>A colleague and I decided to find out.</p>
<h2>From weather to…wins?</h2>
<p>The ability to predict successfully (at least some of the time) is a key aspect of mankind’s evolution and development. Observations of cause and effect are one of the earliest ways in which humans learned to predict outcomes such as changes in the seasons. Throughout history, the supernatural, mythological and the divine <a href="http://www.amazon.com/The-Complete-Book-Psychic-Arts/dp/1567182364">have all served</a> as major sources of prediction. </p>
<p>More recently, psychological constructs such as <a href="http://prospect-theory.behaviouralfinance.net">prospect theory</a> (which considers how people make decisions based on potential losses and gains) and cognitive bias have become important advances in understanding <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Heuristics-Biases-Psychology-Intuitive-Judgment/dp/0521796792">why some people predict outcomes as they do</a>.</p>
<p>Not surprisingly, the mainstream sports media spends little, if any, time considering the historical or psychological roots of prediction. Instead, predictions of season outcomes seem to emerge from two distinct groups:</p>
<p><strong>1) Media “experts”</strong></p>
<p>This group includes most sportswriters or sportscasters although increasingly professional statistical analysts, such as the team at <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Baseball-Prospectus-2015/dp/1118471458">Baseball Prospectus</a>, will weigh in. </p>
<p>These forecasters seek to demonstrate their professional worth. After all, a professional baseball writer or broadcaster should have access to “inside information” not available to the average fan – and this knowledge should lead to better predictions. Of course, there’s rarely any follow-up to the predictions once they’ve made and disseminated and no one is held accountable for being a good, mediocre or poor prognosticator.</p>
<p>Last year, for example, among ESPN’s panel of baseball experts, <a href="http://espn.go.com/mlb/preview14/story/_/id/10638313/espn-expert-team-predictions-2014-baseball-season">fifteen chose the Tampa Bay Rays</a> to win the American League pennant – with six analysts picking the Rays to win the World Series. </p>
<p>Tampa Bay finished fourth in the AL East, 19 games out of first place. </p>
<p><strong>2) Commercial products</strong></p>
<p>Predictions are also part of annual content designed to attract attention to a particular publication, website, program or podcast prior to a season.</p>
<p>In its predictions, a media outlet will often hype popular teams. For example, The Sporting News’ Baseball Yearbook <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Sporting-News-Baseball-Yearbook-2015/dp/B00SM5DP1Q">is predicting</a> that the Cubs and Red Sox will meet in this year’s World Series, even though both teams finished last in their divisions in 2014. </p>
<p>But there’s a reason for heightened focus (and promotion) of these two clubs: their vast, nationwide fan bases will be pleased that some experts foresee great things for their teams in 2015, which may make them more inclined to impulsively read or purchase these publications. </p>
<h2>And the winner is…</h2>
<p>So who does the best job of predicting MLB standings? Or is any layperson able to use the common psychological adage “the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior” (a favorite of Dr Phil’s) to reliably forecast the final standings? </p>
<p>In order to begin to answer these questions, we conducted a relatively simple correlational study of the recent results of MLB predictions. </p>
<p>For the years 2009-2014, we compared media predictions of outcomes with the final standings for each of baseball’s six divisions. Correlations were run for nine media sources: five print publications (Sports Illustrated, The Sporting News, ESPN the Magazine, Athlon Sports and The New York Times) and four online sources (Baseball Prospectus, ESPN.com, Yahoo.com and Bleacher Report). </p>
<p>We also correlated each source’s predictions with the previous year’s standings to see just how much the prognosticators relied on past performance to predict future performance. </p>
<p>Finally, we correlated the previous year’s standings with the current year’s final standings. This way, we could see how well one could predict by relying only on how the teams finished the previous season – in other words, without access to “expert” knowledge. </p>
<p>In the correlations below, keep in mind that a score of 1.0 would mean a “perfect” correlation – in other words, the predictions and final standings would be exactly the same.</p>
<p>The average correlation between predictions and final standings for all nine sources for all six years was .49. Some individual publications were better forecasters than others, although the differences were modest. </p>
<p>The breakdown was as follows: Sports Illustrated (.51), The Sporting News (.53), ESPN the Magazine (.47), Athlon Sports (.50), The New York Times (.51), Baseball Prospectus (.45), ESPN.com (.49), Yahoo.com (.48) and Bleacher Report (.46).</p>
<p>As a group, the print sources beat the online only sources .50 to .47. Interestingly, the overall winner, The Sporting News, has the strongest historical relationship to baseball. (For many decades it was known as the “Bible of Baseball.”) And who knows, maybe TSN will be right about the Cubs winning the World Series in 2015.</p>
<p>Collectively, the sources seemed to rely heavily on the immediate past. The correlation between the current year’s predictions and the previous year’s final standings for all years and all sources was .65. Baseball prognosticators do seem to believe that “the best predictor of future behavior is past behavior.” </p>
<p>So does baseball expertise contribute to the accuracy of predictions? Can the experts beat an amateur who would rely exclusively upon the previous year’s results for their predictions?</p>
<p>In a word: no.</p>
<figure>
<iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/bBqPTK2_1Fk?wmode=transparent&start=48" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe>
<figcaption><span class="caption">Listen to Dr Phil: The best predictor of future behavior is past behavior.</span></figcaption>
</figure>
<p>The correlations between the previous year’s final standings and the current year’s final standing for the six years was .49 – exactly the same as the experts’ predictions. </p>
<p>So if you simply took last year’s standings and used them to predict the upcoming year’s standings, you would be doing as well as our nine sources did over the last six years.</p>
<p>And the baseball gods laughed.</p>
<hr>
<p><em>Note: no predictions were found for ESPN.com for 2010. Our results for ESPN.com are based on five years (2009, 2011-2014)</em></p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/38883/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>The authors do not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and have disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>It turns out the only insider knowledge you’ll need is a copy of last year’s standings.Robert Bellamy, Professor; Department of Journalism and Multimedia Arts [JMA], Duquesne University James Walker, Professor of Communication (Emeritus), Saint Xavier UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.