Why Is The US Police Force So Paranoid When It Comes To Colour?

Just as we believe things are going to get better, they get worse, shadow of Covid hangs over everything

- Gamini Akmeemana

Writing week after week about Coronavirus becomes a drag. There are plenty of issues out there, but the terrifying shadow of the pandemic hangs over everything else. Just as we believe things are going to get better, they get worse. Even so, there are long-standing issues that cry out for attention because of the damage they cause to their respective societies.

Gun-related violence in the US is one such issue. On the one hand, there is a gun-control debate. Every time a deranged gunman mows down men, women and children in a shopping mall, church, school or park, the protests start and the debate becomes heated. Then it’s put on hold till the next massacre.

According to the Violence Project, which maintains a database of shootings that caused four or more fatalities, there have been dozens of mass shootings in the US in the last five years. On a per-capita basis, this is a much higher rate of gun-related violence than any other country in the world (leaving out civil wars).

There were 14,400 gun-related homicides in 2019. Nearly 75% of all homicides were caused by a gun. Figures from the US centres for Disease Control and Prevention show that, out of 38,300 gun-related deaths in 2019, some 23,900 were suicides. A study published in the American Journal of Public Health in 2016 showed there was a direct relationship between higher levels of gun ownership in the country and higher firearm suicide rates for both men and women.

This is only part of the picture. The way the US Police forces use firearms is the other.