Florida Gun Deaths Graph Inverted Data
The Claim
The following graph accurately depicts gun deaths in Florida following implementation of the Stand Your Ground law.
News posted on
Emerging story
In 2014, Reuters published a graph alleging to show Florida gun deaths following the enactment of the “Stand Your Ground” law. The graph was used by other sources including Business Insider and the Florida Department of Law Enforcement.
The graph went viral in June 2021, when many social media users recirculated it and discussed how misleading they found it to be.
Misbar’s Analysis
Misbar’s investigation found that the creator of the graph, Christine Chan, said that she inverted the graph because she prefers “to show deaths in negative terms (inverted).”
Using normative graph analysis, however, the graph seems to show that deaths by gun decreased massively following Stand Your Ground, even though the numbers show the opposite. The following shows the graph using a normative depiction.
Ever since Stand Your Ground – which takes away the duty to retreat from self-defense laws – was implemented in Florida, gun-related homicide rates have increased drastically.
Since the graph uses an inverted approach to depict data in a way that many find to be misleading, we rate this claim as such.
