Not again.

Sean Taylor, safety for the Washington Redskins, a man I never knew, died yesterday. When the horrific news got to me, shock gave way quickly to an all too familiar emotion - despair. And one relentless thought.

Dammit, not again.

You reach for words, and profanities come to mind. Some days, nothing is as eloquent.


Another player from "The U" (of Miami) dies young.

Again.

Another senseless homicide of a young black man. A daughter left fatherless.

Again.

"I never ever ran from the Ku Klux Klan
I shouldn't have to run from a black man,
'Cause that's self-destruction..."

- Kool Moe Dee, "Self Destruction" (1988)

It is a statistical fact that the leading cause of death for black men ages 15-24 is homicide. It is also a fact that the killer is likely to be another black male.

I am a black male. I know the numbers too well. As Jemele Hill points out, we are SIX times more likely to be killed than a white male in the same age bracket.

Like a sick, twisted, Indiana Jones movie, growing up as a young black man seems to involve avoiding death traps on a regular basis, except that all too often, if it isn't the big, huge boulder (gang-life) running you down, or the poison-tipped darts (drugs), or a broken education system (over 65% of all black college students are female), it is the guns. There are even more reasons and factors, but that is a discussion for another day.

Worst of all, your friends - yes, your friends can drag you down.

"Friends" who are jealous of your success, or demand that you keep it real by being involved in their foolishness. The road to hell is an 8-lane highway paved with best intentions of proving that you haven't forgotten your homies.

After all of that, institutional racism - in all it's forms - doesn't have to pick off many men.

I can't pass judgment on what happened Sunday night in the Taylor home. And you know something? It's really immaterial.

Sean Taylor was 24, and had by all accounts had truly turned his life around from a rocky start, which makes this all even more painful. Sadly, he probably should have moved out of Miami, as there is a fairly good case that can be made that he knew his assailant.

Already, much has been made about Taylor's past somehow still catching up to him, but it really doesn't matter. Ask the late Broncos cornerback Darrant Williams who had the misfortune of getting killed by a bullet meant for someone else. Case still unsolved.

Ask the Timberwolves' Antoine Walker, or the Knicks Eddie Curry. Both men were the victim of savage home invasions, like the one that killed Sean Taylor. Neither man has been in any trouble whatsoever with the law.

Neither story got more than a brief mention when it happened. Somehow, I have to believe that if Brett Favre was the victim of a home invasion, if Deanna Favre had a gun shoved in her face and terrorized, the story would have rated slightly more press no?

Clearly, judging by the overkill of the Michael Vick scandal, we know what would have happened if, heaven forbid, that Curry and Walker were holding guns, rather than facing one.

Our media has a much easier time (and makes more money) envisioning black men as perps rather than victims of violent crime.

We live in a society that is increasingly violent. We also live in a society where even wealth and success guarantees no real escape for some unless they are willing to make real changes in associates and even geography. Perhaps if Taylor had made his full-time home in D.C. instead of near his old haunts in Miami, life would have been different. It is tragic that that would even have to be an option. But it is fact.

The deepest feeling I have today is pain. I feel his loss the same way I felt the fall of Maurice Clarett. The same way I may feel when I hear about the senseless loss of a young brother locally. We can't afford to lose any black men. It is hard enough already.

It is the reason why I have contempt for writers and talking heads that wallow in barely concealed schadenfreude when a Vick or Clarett blow their chances to escape their environments.

Yes, I know it is good business, low hanging fruit, and easy copy, but there is a bigger story and far bigger issues.

It is far, far too personal for me. Today, yet another young black man lies dead at 24.

A father, a soon-to-be husband.

A friend and a teammate.

Another luminous life, a world of potential snuffed out too soon.
Again.

Damn.