Asking from a US-perspective, but am also curious about other jurisdictions.

  • disregardable@lemmy.zip
    link
    fedilink
    arrow-up
    0
    ·
    3 months ago

    Victims getting shot by the police happens regularly to non-rich people in regular homes. I would say the risk is at least less than normal, because rich neighborhoods can afford better police services. However, it’s still definitely not zero and is definitely much higher than for white people.

    • Horsecook@sh.itjust.worksBanned
      link
      fedilink
      English
      arrow-up
      0
      ·
      3 months ago

      and is definitely much higher than for white people.

      That’s not necessarily true. While blacks are shot by police at a higher rate than whites, blacks are also arrested by police for violent crimes at a higher rate than whites. If you adjust for apparent difference in violent criminality by race, it suggests that police are actually more willing to shoot whites than blacks.

      Now, it is possible that the data is bad, that the bar for arresting a black is so significantly lower than for arresting a white, as to give incomparable racial violent crime rates by which to estimate how often police shootings might occur. Similarly, it is possible that blacks are more likely to display exaggerated passive body language for fear of being shot, while whites are more likely to present themselves in an ambiguous or hostile manner as they don’t believe it is likely they will be shot.

      However, an argument in favor of what the data suggests, is that police shootings of blacks are far more likely to result in protests, riots, and rare criminal prosecution of the police, while police shootings of whites, no matter how unjustified, never receive such responses.