Unarmed victims are unarmed victims (op-ed)

First, a quick story.

           

Back when Black Lives Matter threatened to shut down the 2016 Democratic presidential primary, a friend of mine turned the crossfire of slogans between BLM and their detractors into a litmus test.  Attempting to determine my allegiance he asked, which is it, black lives matter or all lives matter?

            

I said, there’s no side to take in a false dichotomy.

          

He replied, that’s a cop-out.  In some situations, you have to choose sides.

I said, maybe, but this isn’t one of them. 

        

Last week I wrote about a report, citing a new study, that claimed fatal police shootings of unarmed blacks was creating a national mental health burden comparable to stress caused by a chronic illness like diabetes.  The report stressed that in the United States an unarmed black person is three times more likely to be shot by the police than an unarmed white person, and in 2015 30% of unarmed victims were black compared to 21% of whites.

          

First, I questioned the use of percentages when the Washington Post Police Shooting Database had the actual body count.  I didn’t think the disparity would be great enough to cause depression among total strangers.  (The study was referring to people who didn’t know the victim.)  I was right.  In 2015 there were 38 black, unarmed, victims of police shootings and 32 white.

         

The disparity was 6 people.

        

Then I questioned the focus on 2015 when the database had the figures for the subsequent years.  The answer was obvious after I checked the database.  (2016, 22 whites, 19 blacks, 2017, 30 whites, 20 blacks, 2018, 15 whites, 11 blacks) 2015 was the only year there were more unarmed blacks killed by the police than whites.

        

Last week I said 6 bodies were too insignificant to cause any mental health concerns, but that was a micro-statistical rebuttal.  The macro-analysis is that the report, citing this new study, cherry-picked the data from 2015 to incorporate their findings into a larger framework.

      

One of the new study’s authors stated, events that communicate to people that maybe they are worthless or their lives are not valued can influence people’s health … black people face multiple forms of racism every day, bias in the criminal justice system, housing and employment discrimination are important factors.  Previous research found that the chronic stress caused by experiences of racism can impact mental and physical health in myriad ways from higher rates of hypertension to increased incidents of breast cancer.

        

So, this new research assisted previous research that claimed racism caused health problems.  That’s why six more black bodies mattered in 2015.  (Think about this, the most publicized police shootings are when a white police officer kills an unarmed black, so the motivating factor behind everything isn’t the black victim, it’s the white officer, because white cop/black victim is the police shooting profile that proves racism.)

          

Now, there’s one detail the Washington Post Police Shooting Database doesn’t show.  It gives the names of the officers involved in the police shootings but not their race or ethnicity.  That’s because it’s irrelevant.  The database isn’t pointing out racism.  It’s pointing out the universal problem of police shootings.

            

The report, citing the new study, said more than 70 unarmed black people have been killed by the police in the last three years, but the Washington Post Police Shooting Database points out, in the same three- year span, over 240 unarmed people have been killed by the police.

         

There are times when issues are race sensitive.

         

But, this isn’t one of them.

       

This is when “all lives” should matter, but in the 21^st century that’s a racist concept.  

  

That’s the real mental problem.

First published in the New Pittsburgh Courier 7/18/18