ronburgundy
Contributor
No, I didn't miss the blatant misrepresentation of facts. Your thread title has nothing to do with the presented data. People were not asked anything about anyone's "right to protest". Support for such rights could easily be at 100% for every group, and this graph would not suggest otherwise.
The actual question they were asked was whether they felt protests "always make our country better". That has zero relation to supporting people's right to such protests.
Also, the "Americans" implies that people of any and all groups and races may be involved in the protest, whereas "Black Americans" clearly implies that no non-blacks are at all joining in on the protests, because if they were it would be stupid and misleading to single out Black Americans.
IOW, the experimental variable they tried to manipulate is confounded. They are trying to manipulate race but they are also manipulating inclusivity and general consensus about the injustice. The "Americans" wording includes protests where people across all races, groups, income level, etc. are involved and agree on the injustice. The "Black Americans" wording means that only one particular group sees an injustice worth protesting. No matter who that selective group is, that can make it less likely that the claimed injustice is as obvious and as extreme compared to when people from more varied backgrounds are protesting. This is especially relevant given the question of "always make the country better". "Always" is a rather high bar to set for protests, and a narrow select group is more likely to have some protests that are unjustified than widespread coalition protests.
The proper comparison would have been to ask about "White Americans" versus "Black Americans" versus just "Americans".
I bet dollars to donuts that among white respondents, they answer to the "White Americans" would be at or below their support for "Black Americans". It would vary alot on political ideology. Liberals would say that Black Americans' protests makes the country better then do White Americans' protests, while conservatives would say the reverse.
Finally, what does it say that black responders view protests more positively when they are exclusively by blacks than when they are by a broader and more inclusive group of "Americans" which can include but is not limited to their own ethnic group? Whites view the more inclusive "Americans" more positively, whereas black view the more exclusive protests more positively, which is rather odd unless it is specifically about favoring the exclusive group only because it is their own group. IOW, their response conveys self-centered racial thinking, whereas the white responders might be doing that but could as easily just be sensibly favoring protests that are more inclusive and supported by a wider ranger of interests.
