VANDALS: PLAGUE DOGS

by Steven Boone

This is the last time I will ever write about race. Until the next time. Or maybe I mean it this time.

Was riding with my cousin from her home in Crenshaw, Los Angeles the other day. She is a schoolteacher with a beautiful home in a quiet neighborhood. We were on our way to visit her adult sons, who share an apartment in Inglewood. Both of these young men are educated professionals. They have their mother's charm, eloquence and gracious good humor. The apartment complex they live in is immaculate and charming. On the ride there, we were accompanied by another female cousin, a very successful WNBA executive from the East Coast.

Nobody got shot.

Yet the subject of getting shot for no particular reason (other than a particular reason) came up. Crenshaw cousin was still visibly shaken by recent news items involving various slain black men, some younger than her sons, others around my age, whose killers the justice system protected from any legal repercussions. Her melodic voice strained and cracked as emotion pressed down on her words. It was all just too much. She didn't mention them, but I knew she was thinking of the "boys" we were on our way to see, the ones she raised to be such pillars of responsibility, compassion and respect. They only recently left the nest. Will they be alright out there in a land that now seems to have legalized the killing of black men (so long as the killer is not black)?

- Big, Black and Scary Uncle Crizzle

- Superthug Ta Nehisi Coates

- America's Nightmare: Kiese Laymon

- Prime Suspect Odie Henderson

- Rich the Villain (courtesy of Cube the Killer):