Chip Johnson writes a column for the San Francisco Chronicle on the subject of crime in the cross-Bay city of Oakland. The touchy issue is that a high proportion of those arrested in Oakland are black, although the city's population is only 28% black.
The brave thing Johnson does is document who is doing the crime, he reports the perps are mostly black. This causes police to pay more attention to black citizens going about their lawful pursuits. That attention causes resentment.
It's a long time ago but I remember police paying attention to me as a teenager. Mostly I was behaving myself but they knew that male teens were more likely to break laws so they watched, and I felt persecuted. Then I aged a few years, married and became essentially invisible to the police.
When you are a member of a group that does a lot of bad stuff, police are going to be suspicious even if you are as pure as the driven snow. And you'll resent it. They are behaving logically, and so are you. It is just one of those things, a sore spot in the human condition.
