Community and Cultural Affairs Minister Wayne Perinchief gave a long interview to the Royal Gazette on the proposed quota law in which he stated several times that the PLP had plenty of anecdotal evidence that the law was needed.
Anecdotes are not a reliable basis for lawmaking! Here’s why. Anecdotal evidence is hearsay, with no objective analysis. It may also be highly inaccurate because of several well-known psychological factors:
- Subjective validation occurs when two unrelated or even random events are perceived to be related because a belief or expectancy demands a relationship.
- Availability occurs where a cause might be easily linked to an effect, leading people to overestimate the likelihood of the cause having that effect.
In particular, vivid and emotionally-charged anecdotes seem more plausible, and are given greater weight than they deserve. Racial anecdotes are the ultimate example of these phenomena at work. For every anecdote held by one side, there is a mirror anecdote on the other. It is the fuel of discrimination, suspicion, hatred, and political drama.
We need objective facts not anecdotes. So, brothers Perinchief, please spare us the dogma, the spin, and the constant us-vs-them. And the anecdotes.
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