I’m rethinking my use of the term “black on black” crime.  For the last few weeks some have complained there is too much [disproportionate] attention on the Trayvon Martin murder and not enough on the day-to-day murder of blacks and browns; especially in Chicago.  Could it be that the media simply does not lend itself as heavily to so-called “black-on-black” crime?  Show me one poll that suggests citizens in these communities are NOT outraged!  The media and others use “black-on-black” to signal the relative “unimportance” of such murders.  Have you ever heard the term “white-on-white” crime?  If not, then “black-on-black” is perhaps inherently racist.  “Black-on-Black” and “gang related” are terms that operate often to minimize and routinize the senseless killings of minority youth.  The media refrain “black-on-black” sets these crimes apart from “real” murders and categorizes them in a fashion that often trivializes them and makes them less newsworthy as the Trayvon Martin murder.  True, blacks are more likely than whites to die from gun homicide [and whites more likely than blacks to die from gun suicide]; but this does not diminish the outrage over these “black-on-black” deaths, just the media and political context in which we discuss them.