Ahmaud Arbery Was the Victim of Two Deadly Cultures

Before the killing of George Floyd by a police officer in Minneapolis last month, before the killing by police of Breonna Taylor in Louisville in March, there was the fatal shooting of Ahmaud Arbery in Georgia. Two armed white men pursued him through the Satilla Shores neighborhood of Brunswick in February, while a third filmed the adventure on his phone.

Police violence against unarmed black individuals is a well-documented occurrence in the U.S. The asphyxiation of Floyd and the shooting of Taylor, who had been sleeping in her own home, join a long strand of evidence. The killing of Arbery, on the other hand, was not an exercise of state violence. It was a smash-up at the well-traveled crossroads of systemic racism and radical gun culture.