Utah has the Highest Proportion of Blacks Killed by Police

   Utah as the highest proportion of minorities killed by police than of any state in the nation, according to one study. So, it cannot be said that this a problem other states have, and not us. It cannot be said that there is no problem in Utah.
   Rather, from that survey, we must conclude the problem is greater in Utah than anywhere in the nation.
   Police across our nation are trained much the same: You pull your gun and you use it in accordance with the training. If there is a problem in one part of the nation, there is a problem in another. Training is pretty consistent.
   But, that addresses the problem of police violence in general, not of police violence on minorities. The officers may be trained to kill in certain situations, but they are not trained to kill Blacks and Browns any quicker than Whites.
   But, an officer is taught to react to his or her perception. If they perceive a fleeing person might do harm to another person, they are instructed to shoot. And, it is in that perception that gives rise to discrimination. Society teaches that Blacks and Browns are more likely to be criminals. Indeed, though Blacks account for only 13 percent of the population, they are responsible for 52 percent of the homicides. No matter that there are surely societal reasons for the disparity -- poverty being likely a factor -- Black killers are more common than White ones.
   So, an officer gets in his (or her) mind that Blacks and Browns are more likely to be criminals. That becomes part of the profile, the image, that an officer has of a person of color. So, they are quicker to shoot based on the color of skin. It is a bias. It is wrong for officers to carry such bias, but they do.
   We should seek to end this bias in Utah.
   Here is an interesting comparison, it showing that officers are more likely to assume some people are more likely to just bounce around a corner and kill someone. In September of 2014, a person of color, Darrien Hunt, had a cosplay samurai. Police spotted him and were fearful he was going to go around the next corner and kill someone. So, they killed him, figured they had to to protect the public from him.
  Contrast that with recent weeks in which militia members have been carrying weapons to protests. There is a real chance one of them could shoot down one of the protesters. Some say they have even heard them verbally threaten to do so. So, why do they get to carry their weapons around, even though there are threats to back up the thought that they might just go around the next corner and kill someone? Why kill Darrien Hunt and yet not even stop the militia?
   Clearly, Darrien Hunt fit the police profile (and that includes his color) of a possible killer, but the militia do not. Never mind the reality that Hunt may have been, in fact, less likely to go around a corner and kill someone than what some militia members are.
   Biases exist in Utah. In Utah, we are more likely to think of a young colored person like Darrien Hunt as a criminal than we are a member of a militia. The militia members are trained to await the day when they use their weapons to kill. "Make my day," sometimes even rules their minds. Can you say there is not an anxiousness in such a thought? Darrien Hunt had no such thoughts of ever killing. Yet, we judged him of being the more likely criminal. Is it fair, or is it unfair profiling?