Today, in America, the call for change towards how black Americans are treated, especially with their interaction with law enforcement officers (LEO's) has never been clearer. Black Americans are not only calling for change on LEO policing tactics in a community of color, but they have been calling for the defunding of police. For those that may not know, defunding the police is not a call, in essence, to delete the LEO’s from American streets, but instead, to use or increase funding for other resources that would supplement police officers. Basically, ‘defunding the police’ is a call to use funding (for example $40million) that is typically all used for LEO operations, but ‘defunding the police argument’ calls for instead of using the full $40 million for police operations; use $15 million of that to hire social workers, and other mental health professionals to supplement police when attending calls. The thought behind this approach is those police officers are already asked to do too much, such as act as social workers, counselors, and mental health professionals when making their calls, but lack the education and training to effectively perform such that task; especially when dealing with an irate or drug-induced decompensated person. With all of this being said, I am posting today to discuss the conversation being had on police shootings vs. that of black on black shootings.
One thing I keep hearing or seeing is every time an African American is killed by a white police officer, it leads to national outrage, protest, and calls for change. Ultimately, we see many people of color hit the streets with valid concerns pertaining to law enforcement killing of unarmed black men. The concern is not only valid, but should be addressed socially, and through policy. But, I want to be frank here, what happens when black on black death/murders, killing of our kids, or innocent blacks are killed by our own over petty stuff? I must also admit that there are groups and people that protest these deaths, but rarely receive national media attention, but let's be real here, the protest, outrage, and discontent are completely different from that when compared to when a white police officer kills a black American, WHY? I have heard, ‘that’s a different issue, we ain’t talking about that right now,’ or, if you bring the issue up, you’re called an ‘uncle tom,’ a ‘sell-out,’ or ‘white supporter.’ I promise you that I am none of those things and denounce the thought that someone may be called names for bringing-up intellectual issues that plague our community. I am a supporter of black success and success for all Americans who have struggled and come from poverty. I believe that the best way to grow and be better is through supporting those who drive is to get further educated, while also calling for social-change through policy. But to change, we must always discuss all issues.
One of the most common arguments I have heard from white Americans is that they say whites are shot and killed more than the number of blacks in America, let’s look at that: According to the ‘Statista Research Department’ on people shot by police, we learn that in the year 2020, thus far, there were 215 whites killed by police and 111 blacks killed by police. So, from that, you would think, oh wow, whites are killed by police more than that of blacks, so why are they complaining. Well, according to 'Statista Research Department,' we find that in 2019 there were 250 million white Americans and 44 million black Americans. So, approximately more than 4 times more whites are living in the U.S. when compared to blacks, but remember there were 215 whites killed by police thus far in 2019, and 111 blacks were killed by the same group. This means that if blacks made up the same number (250 million people), black deaths would equate to 555 total black deaths. So, to finally make this as clear as could be: If black and white populations both were at 250 million, we know that there were 215 police shootings of whites, but black would be 555 for blacks, which is more than double that of whites. So, yes, black Americans are killed at a higher rate than that of their white counterparts. It is a problem that needs to be addressed by LEO’s and their approaches to how they police black communities and the use of deadly force.
Back to black and black shootings, we are not as vocal, and at least from what I have seen, are not showing outrage at the same level towards black on black deaths when compared to when white LEO’s kill/shoot blacks. It almost feels like as a people, we have become numb to our black on black deaths. I want to support what I am saying through another quick analysis. According to a 2016 FBI data analysis on U.S. deaths by race, we learn that black Americans accounted for 2,570 of black on black homicides, and whites in the same year accounted for 2,854 of white on white homicides. So, now, we can say wow, white people are killing their own just as much as blacks, why are they complaining about our black on black homicides? Well, digging deeper, we find that as I stated earlier in the post, there are 250 million whites and only 44 million blacks living in the U.S., but our homicide numbers are just about the same. So, let’s just say we (as black people) also had 250 million blacks living in America, that means we would have 12,850 black on black deaths in America. We are killing each other at approximately 2,500 per every 50 million people, whereas whites are killing each other at approximately 570 per every 50 million people. To me, this is a problem, and we can't ignore it any longer, it is literally leading to our extermination. I know there are other factors I did not discuss such as ecological environments, mental health, trauma, and other variables. This post is to start a conversation on a hot topic. I am in no way saying I am 100% correct, I am saying this is my take-away from my analysis and life experience.
Please add to the conversation!
Sources used in the post (References):
1. Statista Research Department. (2020). ‘Number of people shot to death by the police in the United States from 2017 to 2020, by race.’ Retrieved from https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-death-by-us-police-by-race/.
2. Statista Research Department. (2019). ‘Resident population of the United States by race from 2000 to 2019,’ Retrieved from https://www.statista.com/statistics/183489/population-of-the-us-by-ethnicity-since-2000/.
3. FBI. (2016). ‘Crime in the United States.’ Retrieved from https://ucr.fbi.gov/crime-in-the-u.s/2016/crime-in-the-u.s.-2016/tables/expanded-homicide-data-table-3.xls.
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