There are more guns than people in the USA. More than 100 US citizens are killed each day by gun violence, mostly poor young black men.

When ’black lives matter’ became a slogan, some complained that ‘all lives matter’. Of course they do, but seeing that as a counterargument to the original statement misunderstands the desperate cri du cœur for the poor young black men who are killed in massively disproportionate numbers.

The repudiation of political violence in the USA over the past 36 hours strikes me as similar. Of course political violence is abhorrent. But where is the force of anger, the outpouring of rage, the flood of statements condemning the gun violence that killed tens of young black men in the last 36 hours? How is it that US society condemns an old white man’s grazed ear with so much more fervour than the deaths of thousands of other citizens every week?