Steve Chapman: What About ‘Black-on-Black’ Crime?

The shooting of Michael Brown and its turbulent
aftermath have renewed an old question: Why does the black
community raise a ruckus when a white person kills a black person,
which is rare, but not when a black person kills a black person,
which is far less rare?

It’s a complaint perennially lodged by conservative
commentators. Jason Riley, an African-American editorial writer
for The Wall Street Journal, criticized the Rev. Al
Sharpton’s appearance in Ferguson, Missouri. “The problem is not
cops shooting blacks but blacks shooting each other,” he asserted.
Yet “so-called black leaders are much more interested in making
excuses for this behavior than they are in denouncing it
unequivocally.”

Their charges have more than a whiff of condescension—implying
that most blacks are unable to discern the greatest ills afflicting
them. But black leaders can walk and chew gum at the same time.
They can work to curb violence by blacks against blacks and also
work to prevent the killing of unarmed African-Americans by police
and vigilantes. Both are deeply undesirable.

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