I urge everyone to read Ghettoside by Jill Leovy (white lady reporter for LA Times), Spiegel & Grau, 2015.

This is a book about the plague of black on black murder, focusing on male blacks.  I’m only up to page 60 or so, but I thought I’d share with you her opening info, since it’s something I ranted about myself decades ago when I was a print reporter.

Ms. Leovy presents a subject most of us Whiteys don’t want to hear about–Urban black men murdering other urban black men at astronomical rates, something like 8 to 10 times more than white on white murder.  And the cases solved by the cops run about 30%, as compared with about 80% clearance for white on white murder.  Even Hispanic murders have a higher ‘clearance’ rate.  This has been going on and getting worse for decades, especially in South Central (Watts) LA, mainly because, according to Leovy, there is a substantial lack of law enforcement when it comes to black on black murder.  Urban police departments (she’s focusing on LA) don’t use the same amount of manpower and resources to solve male black on black murder than they use on white on white or Hispanic on Hispanic murder.  As one black woman says in the beginning of the book:  “Another black man down.  And nobody cares.”  

Black men shooting down other black men is viewed by the police, the media, and, yes, all of US as something everyday endemic to black communities, much like feel-good liberalism is endemic to Vermont.  And also something we don’t want to hear about, so the media hasn’t been reporting most male black on black murder.  Not as ‘juicy’ a story as celebrity murder, gun-nut massacres, and even white on white murder.  Another woman in the beginning of the book laments that when her husband was killed there was no story about it anywhere in the papers, on TV, or radio, because:  “Nobody cares.”

Leovy presents the case that black on black murder rates would go down if police investigated these murders more fastidiously; put the same effort into apprehending the killers as the effort they put into finding the killers of white people–in other words, EQUAL LAW ENFORCEMENT.  South Central LA has been at the bottom of the barrel in ‘clearing’ black on black murder.  Leovy writes that only around 17 to 20% of black men now in prison are there for the murder of another black man.  That most of our prisons are filled with black men who have committed the heinous crimes of shoplifting, car theft (whitey’s property), drunkenness, drugs, or general ‘arrogant behavior’ on the streets.  Black men go to prison for petty crime, not for murdering other black men.

Also, there sometimes is the ‘revenge murder’– where a couple of black men who are friends of the victim know that the cops are going to do little or nothing to bring in the killer.  If they know the killer, they go out and murder him, vigilante style.  And, according to Leovy, this solves another problem for the cops.  And the cops are not going to go after the revenge killers because the whole neighborhood would say something like:  “You leave those boys alone!  They did your job for you, cause you don’t care!”  So, ‘unequal’ law enforcement begets more male black on black murder.

Leovy writes that white activists and liberals do not want to talk about male black on black murder, and especially not about having more ‘law enforcement’ as a solution to it.  Bringing up black on black murder and suggesting a law enforcement solution is ‘racist’ according to these liberal activists.  Yes, equal law enforcement for male black on black murder suggests ‘police brutality’ to the liberal activists. They would rather not hear about it at all.  They would rather mouth the same platitudes and clichés about ‘education’ and ‘jobs’ and ‘outreach’ over and over again than face the reality that black men know that killing another black man is ‘no big deal’ to the police–or to ALL OF US WHITEYS.  It is more important for us whiteys to ‘feel good’ by saying ‘Black Lives Matter’ than really knowing just how much Black Lives DO NOT MATTER to us.  Because we don’t want to know or speak of male black on black murder, we make for more of it.  And Hell, the cops say when there’s a black on black shooting, one more dead N-Word is just one less problem out there. Let them kill each other.

Here is where lib-er-al-ISM has brought us–Now the cops are killing black men, cause what the Hell, they probably need killing, and “Nobody cares.”  Except for liberals who don’t want to be ‘identified’ with any of it.  That’s what the lib-er-al squawking is all about.  They have to squawk about this latest outrage of cop on black male murder to show that they are NOT racists.  Yet, black male on black male murder–we (I’ll include myself now) don’t want to hear about it.  And THAT, to me, is where the real racism is.

Now, one more thing, although I haven’t come across it yet in this book–GUN CONTROL.  Liberals seem to think that gun control, like education and outreach, is the answer to all gun murder in the U.S.  NO!  Saying that we need gun control as a substitute for ‘equal’ law enforcement of all gun-related male black on black murders is avoiding the issue–and TOTALLY RACIST.  Guns will always be available, and if we turn our backs again on urban male black on black murder because we’ve passed some ‘feel good’ gun laws, THAT IN ITSELF IS MURDER!  We’ve got to say that BLACK LIVES MATTER every time a black male is gunned down by another black male and the police blow-off the proper investigative procedures.  That BLACK LIVES MATTER every time a black man is murdered for no goddamn good reason except for being on the wrong street corner at the wrong time.  BLACK LIVES MATTER should mean cops should be held just as accountable for not solving male black on black murders as they should be for murdering black males themselves.

EQUAL LAW ENFORCEMENT FOR ALL AMERICANS!  And let’s pay attention when we hear a story (IF we get to hear it) about another black on black murder.  There is no such thing as a ‘nothing’ murder.  No such thing as a black person being ‘less murdered’ than a white person.  It’s all MURDER.

And PLEASE–I don’t want to hear shit about how ‘gun violence’ by black men against black men “effects us all.”  That’s BULLSHIT.  We’re white privileged assholes who have it pretty damn soft.  We’ve got our cops watching over us.  And we have our signs and candles.  Black folks pay taxes too–WHERE IS THEIR GODDAMN POLICE PROTECTION?!

Peter (Talking To Myself) Buknatski

Montpelier (SENSITIVEVILLE), Vt.