Black Americans are no strangers to state-sanctioned violence. Yet some people claim they are shocked that our nation is capable of perpetuating harm against citizens, refugees, and immigrants, after seeing video footage of an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officer fatally shooting a 37-year-old White woman, Renee Nicole Good, struck some like a bolt of lightning. She was a poet and the mother of three, killed while volunteering as a legal observer during federal raids in Minneapolis. Her last words, “that’s fine, dude, I’m not mad at you,” are painfully ironic compared with the officer’s words — “fucking bitch.” His use of this slur to demean women, directly after firing shots, demonstrated a callous disregard for her life. A photo showing her open glove compartment filled with stuffed animals highlighted the absurdity of officials claiming she was a “terrorist.” Because of this tragedy, some Americans are waking up to the threat posed by state-sanctioned violence. But the emphasis on her experience as something “new” exposes one of the nation’s oldest problems, selective empathy. Black people can’t help but raise an eyebrow in disbelief at the notion that America has only recently become a nation where law enforcement officials can violate the rights of citizens without facing consequences.

One filmmaker, Bret Hamilton, commented, “The government can execute you in cold blood in the streets,” adding, “This is a new reality.” But calling this phenomenon new is like ignoring the rings in a tree stump that point to something much older. To understand how we got here, we must consider the nation’s history of state-sanctioned violence targeting Black people, a tradition that dates back to the chattel slavery era. The Casual Killing Act of 1669 authorized white slave owners to violently punish or kill any enslaved person without being charged with a felony. This violence against Black people was supported by state and, at times, federal laws. For instance, the 1850 Fugitive Slave Act granted authorities the right to whip, beat, maim, and mutilate runaways, and even set hunting dogs on them. Anyone caught aiding a so-called fugitive by offering them food, clothing, or shelter “was subject to six months’ imprisonment and a $1,000 fine.” According to historian Gary Potter, slave patrols provided “a form of organized terror to deter slave revolts,” in addition to chasing down, apprehending, and returning runaway slaves. As precursors to modern policing, these officers set standards for the use of force that continue to impact how Black people are treated today.

One of the most common metrics of demonstrating the persistent problem of systemic racism is statistics that reveal disparate treatment. For example, “Black people are 2.8x more likely to be killed by police than White people in this country,” according to the Mapping Police Violence database. In some states, the difference between the two groups is as severe, as night and day, such as police killing Black people at 15x the rate in the District of Columbia, 9.3x the rate in Wyoming, 6.4x the rate in Illinois, 5.1x the rate in New York, and 4.4x the rate in Minnesota, the state in which an ICE officer shot Renee Good. A little more than five years ago, and blocks away from this tragedy, a Minneapolis officer killed George Floyd, a 46-year-old Black man. So, while state-sanctioned violence is a problem Americans of every racial and ethnic background should be concerned about, it’s disproportionately impacted Black people. It’s like the violence they endure is elevator music — heard but not listened to in earnest.

A witness, Brandon Hewitt, told reporters, “I’m pretty right-leaning, but seeing this, this is not what you need to do. It’s not how we’re supposed to do things around here in America,” in reference to an ICE officer shooting Good. The death of a White woman seemed to shake him to his core. While expressing sympathy for those who endure state-sanctioned violence is positive, we must also reckon with the selective empathy revealed in the aha moment some White Americans are having. Racism explains why violence against Black people, despite persisting for generations, wasn’t seen as a red line. When law enforcement kills a person, they act as their judge and jury, depriving them of due process. Yet, many place blame on the victims rather than hold those in power to account. White people routinely say they “should have complied” upon learning about a Black person killed by an officer. There’s an assumption that they deserved this violence. Officials attempting to dismiss the death of Good, under the false premise that she was a terrorist, are using the same playbook. While Black people are often stereotyped as dangerous thugs, violent criminals, or gang members, to excuse the death of White people by the state, they are labeled as radicals. But there are many White Americans who do not see the common thread that an injustice inflicted on some impacts us all.

President Trump seemed to double down on support for the agency despite public outcry over an ICE agent fatally killing Good. On Friday, he said, “We will always be protecting ICE and our Border Patrol and our law enforcement.” Of course, we shouldn’t miss the irony that Trump pardoned 1500 of his supporters who stormed the Capitol on January 6, 2021, some of whom violently attacked police. Some were Proud Boys and Oath Keepers, far-right groups who espouse racism. The fact that a federal officer can shoot an unarmed White mother in the face, without facing any consequences, is troubling. But, so is the refusal to acknowledge the value of Black life. For instance, while the story has received considerably less public attention, an off-duty ICE agent killed a 43-year-old Black man, Keith Porter, a father of two, on New Year’s Eve in Northridge, Los Angeles. An attorney for the victim’s family, Jamal Tooson, suggested the officer’s decision to leave his apartment was a “premeditated and calculated decision,” one that resulted in a fatality. While officials referred to this Black man as an “active shooter” and suggested the officer responsible was a “hero,” witness statements undermine that narrative. The reason so many expressed outrage over the death of Renee Good, but not Keith Porter, is racism.

State-sanctioned violence against Black people and other racial minorities is often dismissed as inconsequential. This, in turn, creates an environment where no one is safe. Last October, for instance, ICE officials in Chicago raided an apartment building under the cover of night, some arriving by Black Hawk helicopters. While authorities claimed to be targeting immigrants who were seeking asylum, doing so in the predominantly Black South Shore neighborhood, led officers to storm into the homes of Black citizens in the middle of the night, placing even small children in zip-ties. When Roderick Johnson, a Black American, asked for a warrant, officers refused to do so. Agents “fire tear gas and smoke grenades, and they make it look like a war zone,” Illinois Gov. JB Pritzker commented about the event. And yet, the story didn’t seem to wake enough people to the dangers of militarized federal officers infringing on citizens’ rights, carried out under the guise of public safety. Anne Frank, a Jewish girl who hid from the Nazis during WWII in an attic for as long as she could, wrote in her diary, “terrible things are happening outside. At any time of night and day, poor, helpless people are being dragged out of their homes.” However, in America, when those terrible things are happening to Black people, injustices are readily dismissed.

Neydin Milián, a communications strategist, noted: “racial profiling and discrimination make Black and Brown people targets for anti-immigrant police stops, detention, and deportation.” Of course, officers cannot determine whether someone is an immigrant or a citizen on sight alone. They are making assumptions about someone’s citizenship status based on their appearance and their place of employment. White people are afforded the benefit of the doubt, but Black and Brown people are deprived of that privilege. Instead, they are expected to prove they belong here. For instance, even members of Indigenous tribes are put through this ordeal by immigration and customs officials. Oglala Sioux Tribe leader, President Frank Star said, “All Native people born within the territorial limits of the United States are recognized as US citizens by birth. Because I am both a tribal citizen and a US citizen, ICE has no lawful authority to detain me.” It’s astounding that even people who are descendants of those who lived here before European colonization are facing harassment. But it reveals the racist absurdity of these draconian policies.

Last Monday, Emmanuel Sackie, a Liberian-born naturalized American citizen who is Black, was hospitalized after ICE agents attacked him in Brooklyn Park. With tears in his eyes, he said, “America is a place of equal rights… but that’s not how I was treated. I was treated like an animal, and it really hurt me.” Enduring physical violence left him “questioning whether citizenship paperwork offers protection during this immigration operation.” While Sackie was a citizen, ICE authorities assumed he wasn’t. The anxiety he expressed was reminiscent of enslaved Black people who feared their free papers would be disregarded and their freedom denied. The story of Solomon Northup, a Black man born free but enslaved and sold to Louisiana traders, highlights this historical problem. Even if you were technically free, simply by virtue of being Black would place your status in jeopardy. State-sanctioned violence against Black people would have been seen as a red line, one that the government should not cross, and citizens would have mobilized against the government’s use of these tactics. But that didn’t happen.

Some Americans are just waking up to the idea that law enforcement officers can harm citizens without being held accountable. To that I say, “better late than never.” But, we must also reckon with the only reason this seems new to them, that so many overlook the injustices Black people routinely endure. Many White Americans couldn’t bring themselves to say, “Black Lives Matter,” a rallying cry first used to highlight the persistent problem of state-sanctioned violence targeting the black community. And now, they wonder paradoxically how America has become a nation where the government defends a federal officer who shot a White woman in the face. It’s like Gloria Purvis, a scholar, activist, and author, commented, “the behavior you are witnessing is the America the Black community has been experiencing for a long time.” The disregard for Black lives laid the foundation for the rights of others to be disregarded. In light of all they’ve endured, the position America finds itself in is not shocking, but rather, the natural result of racially selective empathy.