Facts Don't Matter To The Mob

Mob rule is what we have right now.  Eventually things will go back to the status quo ante after a few bones have been thrown to black activist groups--but will things really change?  Honestly, I wonder if Democrats want them to change, as race is such an effective wedge issue for them.

My son was a cop, I have a good friend who's a cop.  Still I think cops are given too much power, too much credibility, and I would support real police reforms (e.g., eliminating no-knock raids and qualified immunity).  But to think that white cops are out to kill black Americans?  That just stretches credulity when you look at the numbers.  But before we look at the numbers, look at the pictures of the 4 officers arrested recently in Minneapolis.  Go ahead, go look.  I'll wait.

Now let's look at some numbers:

Most police killings occur for reasons unrelated to race. Most people killed by police in America are white — not African-Americans. For example, Daniel Shaver was white. He was shot and killed while sobbing and pleading for his life, and trying to comply with confusing orders from the police. The cop who killed him was terminated, but later reinstated just long enough to qualify for a taxpayer-provided pension.

Most people killed by the police have a weapon and pose a threat to the police or innocent third parties. The number of unarmed people killed by the police is much smaller. In 2019, 9 unarmed black people were shot and killed by on-duty police officers, compared with 19 whites. Victims remain mostly white if you expand the tally to include off-duty police officers and deaths from causes other than gun shots. Mapping Police Violence recently counted 28 unarmed blacks and 51 unarmed whites who died at the hands of police in 2019.

Don't know or trust the sources above?  Here's a column from Michigan State University published a year ago, so completely unaffected by recent events:

Reports of racially motivated, fatal shootings by police officers have garnered extensive public attention and sparked activism across the nation. New research from Michigan State University and University of Maryland reveals findings that flip many of these reports on their heads – white police officers are not more likely to have shot minority citizens than non-white officers...


“We found that the race of the officer doesn’t matter when it comes to predicting whether black or white citizens are shot," Cesario said. "If anything, black citizens are more likely to have been shot by black officers, but this is because black officers are drawn from the same population that they police. So, the more black citizens there are in a community, the more black police officers there are.”

The data show that it’s not racial bias on behalf of white officers relative to black officers when it comes to fatal shootings, and that’s good news. The bad news, Cesario said, is that internal policy changes, such as diversifying police forces, may not reduce shootings of minority citizens.

Beyond officer race, the team drew other conclusions about details related to racial disparities in fatal officer shootings.

“Many people ask whether black or white citizens are more likely to be shot and why. We found that violent crime rates are the driving force behind fatal shootings,” Cesario said. “Our data show that the rate of crime by each racial group correlates with the likelihood of citizens from that racial group being shot. If you live in a county that has a lot of white people committing crimes, white people are more likely to be shot. If you live in a county that has a lot of black people committing crimes, black people are more likely to be shot. It is the best predictor we have of fatal police shootings.”

By connecting the findings of police officer race, victim race and crime rates, the research suggests that the best way to understand police shootings isn’t racial bias of the police officer; rather, by the exposure to police officers through crime.

This doesn't fit the Left's narrative, that's for sure.  (BTW, the report mentioned above can be found here.)