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Please, enlighten us. Why is "shot by police" the leading cause of death among black men?

What is your proposed solution?




Homicide is the leading cause of death among non-Hispanic black males under 44 (taken in total, it’s not) [0]. In the same year as the CDC statistics above, 223 black men were killed by police [1].

It’s tragic, but many orders of magnitude away from your claim.

It’s not the quantity that makes it horrible, tragic, and infuriating. It is all those things because it’s evidence of a larger systemic issue which includes lots of other awful things that fall short of homocide; and it’s largely unnecessary.

[0] https://www.cdc.gov/healthequity/lcod/men/2017/nonhispanic-b...

[1] https://www.statista.com/statistics/585152/people-shot-to-de...


Thanks, I misread the source and didn't think about it.

You're right the quantity isn't specifically important but it does illustrate that there is a problem. Even if it is not the #1 cause of death it is disproportionately higher.


It isn’t. Not even remotely close. What a silly stat to invent.

For what it’s worth, black men kill more cops than cops kill unarmed black men.


Apologies, I misread [1] and didn't apply the sniff test. It's the sixth leading cause of death, not the first. And it's 2.5x the rate of whites.

Regarding your second claim, I can't find those numbers. The closest thing I can find is this newsweek piece [2] with data from 2013 and 2014. That suggests most people who kill police are white. But it also includes prison guards as police.

[1]: https://www.latimes.com/science/story/2019-08-15/police-shoo...

[2]: https://www.newsweek.com/who-kills-police-officers-315701




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