Mitt Romney’s campaign put out a set of graphics illustrating a “gap” between what Obama promised and what he has delivered. The graphic is in the form of a Venn diagram, a visual designed to show the overlap between two conditions. For an example, see this platypus playing a keytar.
Unfortunately, Romney’s overlapping circles are not Venn diagrams, making the campaign somewhat ridiculous and giving nerdy liberals all over America a good chuckle.
So, there you have it, an example of how not to use Venn diagrams to illustrate your data.
Via Feministing and Dolores R.
Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.
Comments 42
Yrro Simyarin — July 6, 2012
That sound you hear is every conservative in the country face-palming in unison.
Also why marketers need to pay attention in math class.
Umlud — July 6, 2012
And then there's this tumblr about it:
http://mittvennandnow.tumblr.com/
Phenol — July 6, 2012
Nowhere in the Romney campaign post does it state that these are Venn diagrams.
Mark Burban — July 6, 2012
mitt really does need to get a better graphic designer.. Whose doing all this crap?
Steve — July 6, 2012
Although it doesn't appear that Mitt actually claims these to be Venn diagrams, they technically are. In realities where the left circle (or what's implied by it) and right circle are both true, then the middle is also true.
Lane Yarbrough — July 6, 2012
deleted...
helen sotiriadis — July 7, 2012
the people who created these graphics -- and approved them -- are out of touch with reality, both in mathematics and economics. they live in a bizarro alternate universe in which the romneys know/care what the american people want and need, and these are, in fact, venn diagrams.
TheKnowledge — July 7, 2012
I see two overlapping circles, and from the context it is clear that the overlap represents a gap. 90% of Americans understand this, because they don't know what a Venn diagram is.
TheKnowledge — July 7, 2012
And now, Lisa, can you figure out why "platypus playing a key tar" is not a Venn diagram?
10zero11 — July 7, 2012
In case you're some opionated dickwit. The 'Gap' should be the component of the 'Promise' that does NOT intersect with the 'Result'.
If this is in any sense a Venn diagram - which by the convention of Venn diagrams, it is. The bit where the circles overlap is what they have in common. Which would be how much of the 'Promise' was actually in the 'Result'.
How Not To Venn Diagram - [CHART] — July 7, 2012
[...] Images’s Lisa Wade has good concise blog post highlighting the errors in a recent set of graphics released by the Romney campaign. She points [...]
anon — July 7, 2012
You can do a venn diagram to show the symmetric difference b/t 2 sets of things but I'm not sure that they did it totally correct (maybe they did but I'm not going to spend tons of time analyzing it to confirm that). I see what they were trying to get at though. "The symmetric difference is the union without the intersection" http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Symmetric_difference I think the wise thing would be to actually look at the information in the diagrams and focus on whether or not it's actually true as that's the actual important thing, no?
Political Irony › Venn Diagrams — July 7, 2012
[...] Romney campaign draws some Venn Diagrams, proving that they don’t understand how Venn Diagrams [...]
KitchenCookiesRock — July 7, 2012
Can't say I agree with the politics, but it's pretty good advertising. Sure, it's technically incorrect, but it gets the message across to his key demographics.
Pshaffer — July 8, 2012
Wow. How stupid (chortle, chortle). That guy Romney is really too stupid to be president if he can't even get Venn diagrams right. Oh, wait, it was some advertising guy? Romney didn't really design this.
Hey, what about the other guy, Obama, who said that we would all save $2500 and instead it is costing us $2300? Can't hide behind an advertising guy for that one. And, that is costing me real money. So either he knew it was false, or didn't know enough about what he was selling to know it was wrong. Maybe that is the worse offense and the one that should really disqualify the candidate.
Did no one else even notice this??
Shawn Anderson — July 10, 2012
It's OK because Republicans don't understand Venn Diagrams