Systemic Racism: The casual racism of the phrase "Black on Black crime"

 I grew up in a county that was 95%+ white, I live today in a county that is 97% white, and yet, I have never heard anyone complain following a dramatic drug bust, armed robbery, rape, or murder about "White on White crime".  The same isn't true about the phrase, "Black on Black crime".  I've heard it many, many times, from casual use by white people I know, to pundits, provocateurs, and politicians.  When I was younger, and ignorant of the actual truth of the matter, I even used the phrase myself, and why not, everybody was saying that "Black on Black crime" was a particularly significant problem. Unfortunately for my past self, and for many people today, the concept of "Black on Black crime" being unique or particularly egregious comes not from crime statistics, but racism.
1. Most crime is committed against one own's racial/ethnic group.
Race and Hispanic Origin of Victims and Offenders 2012-2015 - Bureau of Justice Statistics, US Dept. of Justic
In 2014, 89% of Black murder victims were killed by Black offenders, 82% of White murder victims were killed by White offenders {55% for smaller minority groups, less likely to live in homogeneous neighborhoods, Indian, Asian, or Pacific Islanders} 2014 Crime in the United States report - F.B.I.
The Bureau of Justice Statistics' 2019 crime victimization statistics report shows those who commit violent acts tend to commit them against members of the same race as the offender.  Offenders were white in 62% of violent incidents committed against white victims, Black in 70% of incidents committed against Black victims and Hispanic in 45% of incidents committed against Hispanic victims, according to the BJS report. {Crime Victimization, 2018 - Bureau of Justice Statistics, U.S. Dept. of Justice}
Why do most violent crimes occur against one's own racial/ethnic group?  The answer is simple, most crime is committed within one's own social circle and/or within one's own neighborhood, which leads to the next point.
2. Most Americans (and most people worldwide) live in segregated neighborhoods.
The Racial Segregation of American Cities Was Anything But Accidental - By Katie Nodjimbadem, Smithsonian Magazine
"Despite these declines, residential segregation was still higher for African Americans than for the other groups across all measures. Hispanics or Latinos were generally the next most highly segregated, followed by Asians and Pacific Islanders, and then American Indians and Alaska Natives, across a majority of the measures." {2000 Census Report}
The data proves that school segregation is getting worse - by Alvin Chang, Vox.com

The short cartoon below on racism, segregation, and schools is very helpful in framing the issues.

The short video above explains how modern segregation came to be.

The reasons why America became a very segregated nation post WWII are clear and well documented, it was official Federal Government policy to encourage Whites to move to the suburbs and to ban Blacks and other minorities from joining them.  These policies had a lasting impact on minority communities still being felt to this day. {Redlining's legacy: Maps are gone, but the problem hasn't disappeared -by Kristopher J. Brooks, CBS News}  In addition to its affect upon crime statistics, segregated neighborhoods have had a massive impact upon public education.  In the wake of Brown vs. The Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas, the idea of "separate but equal" school was no longer legal, but outlawing purposeful segregation in the schools hasn't made schools equal.  The majority of public schools are funded by property taxes in the neighborhoods in which they reside.  Thus segregation has also brought us poor urban schools, primarily minority, and relatively affluent suburban/rural schools, primarily White.

3. Black crime rates are comparable to White crime rates, incarceration rates are not.

The conclusions about the Criminal Justice System below are from the Sentencing Project's 2018 report, each claim has a footnote in the article for those wishing to judge the data for themselves.  While somewhat higher crime rates for Blacks and Latinos correlates well with higher poverty rates (Poor Whites commit crimes at higher rates than affluent ones, poverty rates are higher in minority communities), the disparities in how those crime are dealt with by the Justice System based on the race of the offender, cannot be ignored.
Report to the United Nations on Racial Disparities in the U.S. Criminal Justice System - The Sentencing Project
More than one in four people arrested for drug law violations in 2015 was black, although drug use rates do not differ substantially by race and ethnicity and drug users generally purchase drugs from people of the same race or ethnicity.  For example, the ACLU found that blacks were 3.7 times more likely to be arrested for marijuana possession than whites in 2010, even though their rate of marijuana usage was comparable.
African Americans were incarcerated in local jails at a rate 3.5 times that of non-Hispanic whites in 2016.
Pretrial detention has been shown to increase the odds of conviction, and people who are detained awaiting trial are also more likely to accept less favorable plea deals, to be sentenced to prison, and to receive longer sentences. Seventy percent of pretrial releases require money bond, an especially high hurdle for low-income defendants, who are disproportionately people of color.
Although African Americans and Latinos comprise 29% of the U.S. population, they make up 57% of the U.S. prison population. This results in imprisonment rates for African-American and Hispanic adults that are 5.9 and 3.1 times the rate for white adults, respectively—and at far higher levels in some states.
Of the 277,000 people imprisoned nationwide for a drug offense, over half (56%) are African American or Latino.
Nearly half (48%) of the 206,000 people serving life and “virtual life” prison sentences are African American and another 15% are Latino.
Prosecutors are more likely to charge people of color with crimes that carry heavier sentences than whites. Federal prosecutors, for example, are twice as likely to charge African Americans with offenses that carry a mandatory minimum sentence than similarly situated whites. State prosecutors are also more likely to charge black rather than similar white defendants under habitual offender laws.
Disenfranchisement patterns have also reflected the dramatic growth and disproportionate impact of criminal convictions. A record 6.1 million Americans were forbidden from voting because of their felony record in 2016, rising from 1.2 million in 1976. Felony disenfranchisement rates for voting-age African Americans reached 7.4% in 2016—four times the rate of non-African Americans (1.8%). In three states, more than one in five voting-age African Americans is disenfranchised: Florida, Kentucky, and Tennessee. The majority of disenfranchised Americans are living in their communities, having fully completed their sentences or remaining supervised while on probation or parole.
Read the whole report from the Sentencing Project, the picture it paints is bone chilling, as each of these statistics represents real people whose lives have been affected by the racial inequities in the American Criminal Justice System.  Also, look at the recommendations they make for addressing this disparity, they are, at the very least, worth consideration and discussion.
The video by Phil Vischer touches on the topics addressed here, and more, please watch both of them.

4. If your explanation crime statistics, or the wage and wealth gap in America between Black and White families involves characteristics inherent to Black DNA, Black intelligence, or Black culture, that is racism.
These are only 4 pieces of a large and complicated puzzle.  To understand the past and present of racial issues in America is no small task, to advocate for policies and laws that will help rather than hurt, likewise requires both a breadth and depth of understanding.  What we cannot sustain as a society, and especially as an American Church, is a continuation of racist attitudes that offer simplistic explanations of racial inferiority devoid of connection to reality.  To my fellow White American Christians: Stop pretending that it is 'their' problem and not our problem, stop blaming 'them' instead of looking to see how we can help. 
"There but for the grace of God, go I" was famously said in the 16th century by the Englishman John Bradford as he watched condemned prisoners being led to the gallows.  Bradford understood that Grace played a far more important role in the outcomes of our lives than we were willing to admit, that it is far less our merit that determines the road we travel than our pride would claim.  Human beings are the same, not matter what they look like on the outside.  If the shoe were on the other foot, if we were the minority facing a history of oppression and injustice and an ongoing legacy of discriminatory policies forcing us to walk uphill, how would we be any different?  To think our thoughts, attitudes, and actions would be different is not only to ignore human nature, but to indulge in racism.