Outlaw motorcycle gangs are blaming media sensationalism for the

Question

Outlaw motorcycle gangs are blaming media sensationalism for the growing public clamour for banning tattoo parlours run by bikers in city A. They cite crime data from the last decade, showing that only 0.37 percent of all offences are committed by bikers, in support of their claim that their culture is not a threat to mainstream society.

Evaluation of the argument of the outlaw motorcycle gangs is not possible without answer to which of the following questions?

A) What percentage of regular traffic rules violators sport a tattoo?
B) What percentage of the 0.37 percent of the offences were committed by the outlaw gang members?
C) What proportion of the offences by bikies resulted in deaths and serious injuries?
D) What percentage of crimes in cities of comparable size is committed by bikies?
E) What percentage of the offenders are bikies?

Guilio · Accepted Answer

"They cite crime data from the last decade, which show that only 0.37 percent of all offences are committed by bikers, in support of their claim that their culture is not a threat to mainstream society."

Whos culture? Bikers culture (their) or Outlaw motorcycle gangs culture? This is the ambiguity that led me to false answer.

Not sure if other had the same problem.

WillGetIt · Answer

Hello Aryama,

Thanks for editing question stem.

There are some grammatical issues also. I am not that good at GMAT SC, so may be you have a further look at this argument.

Regarding the argument, it is very hard to understand that why "Outlaw motorcycle gangs were concerned about media sensationalism about tattoo parlous run by bikers in city A"

More importantly how the "low percentage of offenses committed by bikers" linked to the culture of "Outlaw gangs"??? Is there any linkage, I could not see any.

I again would like to mention that the argument is in pieces only.

AryamaDuttaSaikia · Answer

Thanks for the points. As with this question, we would like to keep the language the way it is..( a bit fragmented)

WillGetIt · Answer

Dear Aryama,

Don't you feel the obvious grammatical/typo errors need to be corrected:

1. Which in following sentence is referring to decade instead of crime data

They cite crime data from the last decade, which show that only 0.37 percent of all offences are committed by bikers, in support of their claim that their culture is not a threat to mainstream society.

2. No clear antecedent of "their" in the second sentence

Moreover answer choice B should read as

What percentage of the bikers offences were committed by the outlaw gang members?

Instead of 
 
What percentage of the 0.37 percent of the offences were committed by the outlaw gang members?

(It is confusing to call 0.37 percent of the offences)...

Feel free to correct me, if anything wrong with analysis.

Regards

ada453 · Answer

The grammar and typos in the question should be corrected, but the answer is B.

All instances of bikies should be changed to bikers (C, D, E)

But for the answer, it says that .37% of all crimes are committed by bikers, but we don't know what portion of the biker group are outlaw gang members. That's the missing piece to the puzzle

AryamaDuttaSaikia · Answer

Edited:
Outlaw motorcycle gangs are blaming media sensationalism for the growing public clamour for banning tattoo parlours run by bikers in city A. They cite crime data from the last decade, showing that only 0.37 percent of all offences are committed by bikers, in support of their claim that their culture is not a threat to mainstream society.

Thanks for the points! 
Rest we will keep it like this! 
Explanation will be there soon!

b9n920 · Answer

So, the argument goes this way: Outlaw motorcycle gangs (OMG) are showing data pertaining to 'bikers' in order to prove their 'safe' culture. 
We need to evaluate this. and the choice that basically relates OMGs to 'bikers' is the correct one. Right??

Pls help if I still got it wrong. In the first read I comprehended a totally different story.

Thanks.

megha_2709 · Answer

I had the same issue , I thought bikers and outlaw gangs are same thing , could not make out that outlaw gangs are subset of bikers. I think its highly ambiguous question.

. Regards Megha

warriorguy · Answer

I believe the question is 75% hard because the argument is not drawn correctly. It creates ambiguity.

Among the given options, I opted for C because if you take an example that -- In city A during the last decade, if Biker gang was responsible for 370 crimes and if all of them were of serious nature and some of them resulted in deaths then it would be better to curb the source.

Also, in B "their" culture is ambiguous in the argument. Unless stated clearly, we would assume they are representing the biker group.

abhimahna · Answer

Argument states

Outlaw motorcycle gangs --> Blaming --> media sensationalism--> for growing public clamour . Reason ( banning tattoo parlours run by bikers in city A).

Evidence used : Last year, only 0.37 percent of all offences are committed by bikers.

We need to evaluate this argument.

A) What percentage of regular traffic rules violators sport a tattoo?  --> IRRELEVANT

B) What percentage of the 0.37 percent of the offences were committed by the outlaw gang members?  --> They are citing 0.37% as the evidence. If very few of these crimes were by gang members, then their point is invalid. if more than 50% of these were by gang members, then it means they point is valid. Earlier it was very less by them and now it has increased. So, may be their point is valid.

C) What proportion of the offences by bikies resulted in deaths and serious injuries?  --> From where does deaths or serious injuries come in? IRRELEVANT.

D) What percentage of crimes in cities of comparable size is committed by bikies?  --> OTHER CITIES?? IRRELEVANT.

E) What percentage of the offenders are bikies?  --> Again IRRELEVANT.

warriorguy · Answer

in B, so you are considering both groups to be different?

abhimahna · Answer

Yes. Unless we are explicitly stated that we have only one group , we cannot assume both "Outlaw motorcycle gangs" and "bikers" same.

So, in a general sense, they would always be different. Hence, B makes sense here.

abhishekdadarwal2009 · Answer

Outlaw motorcycle gangs are blaming media sensationalism for the growing public clamour for banning tattoo parlours run by bikers in city A. They cite crime data from the last decade, showing that only 0.37 percent of all offences are committed by bikers, in support of their claim that their culture is not a threat to mainstream society.

Evaluation of the argument of the outlaw motorcycle gangs is not possible without answer to which of the following questions?

A) What percentage of regular traffic rules violators sport a tattoo?
B) What percentage of the 0.37 percent of the offences were committed by the outlaw gang members?
C) What proportion of the offences by bikies resulted in deaths and serious injuries?
D) What percentage of crimes in cities of comparable size is committed by bikies?
E) What percentage of the offenders are bikies?

The outlaw motorcycle gangs are the subject in the argument.
they cite from teh crime data that only .37% of the total crime was commited by bikers, while analysing the role of the outlaws one should check the share of crime commited by outlaw motorcycle gangs in the biker group.

Option B is correctly addressing the point of evaluation and thus the correct answer.

ayushvyas · Answer

Can someone explain why C is correct? I can't understand the reasoning by @abhimanha.

RiyaJ0032 · Answer

(C) is incorrect

(B) is the correct one

if out of 0.37 %, 95% of the offenses are committed by the gang members, then their claim that 0.37% of the bikers commit offense holds no ground

because out of these 0.37%, 95% of the offenses are committed by these gang members

if only 5% out of the 0.37% offense would have been committed by the gang, then maybe we can accept their claim that their culture is not a threat to the society

but that isn't the case given

purplelemonsoda · Answer

Key Components of the Argument:
Claim: Media sensationalism is responsible for the public’s demand to ban biker-run tattoo parlours.
Evidence: Crime data showing that only 0.37% of all offences are committed by bikers, implying that their culture is not a threat to mainstream society.
The Core Issue:
The argument hinges on the significance of the 0.37% statistic and whether it accurately reflects the relationship between outlaw motorcycle gangs and crime. To evaluate the argument, we need critical information that clarifies or challenges the relevance and context of this figure.

Analysis of Answer Choices:
A) What percentage of regular traffic rules violators sport a tattoo?

Irrelevant. Traffic violations or tattoo prevalence among violators have no bearing on the claim about outlaw bikers and their relationship to crime or public safety.
Does not help evaluate the argument.
B) What percentage of the 0.37 percent of the offences were committed by the outlaw gang members?

Directly relevant. The statistic (0.37%) includes offences by all bikers, not just outlaw gang members. If a significant proportion of this small percentage comes from outlaw gangs, the argument that outlaw gangs pose little threat could be weakened.
Helps evaluate the argument.
C) What proportion of the offences by bikies resulted in deaths and serious injuries?

This could be somewhat relevant in assessing the severity of crimes committed by bikers. However, it does not address whether the outlaw gangs specifically are responsible for a meaningful proportion of crimes.
Partially helpful but not central to evaluating the argument.
D) What percentage of crimes in cities of comparable size is committed by bikies?

This could provide a broader context for the 0.37% figure, but it does not address the specific role of outlaw motorcycle gangs versus other bikers. It compares bikers in general to those in other cities, which is less relevant to the evaluation of the argument.
Less helpful.
E) What percentage of the offenders are bikies?

This shifts the focus to how many criminals are bikers, rather than addressing the core issue: the specific connection between outlaw motorcycle gangs and crime. It’s tangentially related but doesn’t provide critical insight.
Less helpful.

Outlaw motorcycle gangs are blaming media sensationalism for the

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Outlaw motorcycle gangs are blaming media sensationalism for the

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