Is there an "adultification bias" that "uniquely plagues Black girls"?

I'm reading "The Columbus mayor called Ma’Khia Bryant a ‘young woman.’ Here’s why people are angry. Some said it exemplified ‘adultification bias’ against the Black 16-year-old girl who was fatally shot by police" (The Lily/WaPo): 

Earlier that night, Columbus Mayor Andrew Ginther (D) took to Twitter to share news of the killing, calling Ma’Khia a “young woman.” 

Replies quickly poured in, noting that Ma’Khia was a child — not an adult. At the news conference a few hours later, Ginther acknowledged Ma’Khia was a child: “The city of Columbus lost a 15-year-old girl today,” he said. “This young 15-year-old girl will never be coming home.” 

But some still took to social media to criticize his initial characterization of Ma’Khia, calling it “adultification bias” — a form of discrimination that uniquely plagues Black girls, leading them to be perceived by adults as less innocent and more adult-like than their White peers, according to a widely covered 2017 Georgetown study. 

It may be that black kids are often regarded as older than white kids of the same age. When there's an emergency, like the one in the case of Ma’Khia Bryant, those who need to help can only judge by what they see. We've seen the video, and Bryant looks like a powerful attacker about to slaughter someone who looks utterly defenseless. 

But the question of how to talk about the dead person afterwards is different. City officials ought to be circumspect and use careful language. But what is the best way to refer to a 16-year-old female? I would have thought "young woman" is the most respectful locution and that "girl" for someone that age is questionable. 

But I understand the desire to encourage the police to see minors in a different light from adults.

They're equal, oftentimes, in size and power, and they are out in the world acting independently and capable of causing great harm, but they haven't had the chance to mature mentally, and we ought to give them special care.... if we can. Video can be deceiving, but based on the video, I'd say there was no time to give Ma’Khia Bryant special care befitting her young age. The life of the other girl/young woman was on the line. 

But The Lily goes on like this: 

To [Ijeoma Opara, an assistant professor in the school of social welfare at Stony Brook University], the shooting exemplified [the sexism black girls face], given the familiarity of the situation: kids fighting. But police aggressively responded to Ma’Khia because of sexism and racism, she argued. “Children fight all the time, regardless of race, regardless of class level,” she said. “When we think about Ma’Khia or other Black girls like her … they’re not given the chance to be in situations that could be de-escalated.”...

Ma’Khia’s mother, Paula Bryant, said she was an honor roll student and that she had a “motherly nature about her.” “She promoted peace. That’s something I want to always be remembered,” she told local TV station WBNS.

It’s those memories, Opara said, that journalists should make sure to include in coverage of the girl’s death. “Journalists need to stop for a second and reflect and think: ‘Would I talk about Ma’Khia this way if she was a White girl?’” she said. “We all really have to make a conscious effort to undo what we’ve learned in school and in the media.”

Does anyone really think that a white girl seen on video doing what Bryant did would get more respect than has been shown to Bryant? I think she'd get much less.

FROM THE EMAIL: Jim writes: 

I read your post and shortly thereafter came across a related comment from Justice Thomas in a footnote to his opinion in Jones v. Mississippi, released this morning, on p. 5 where he comments : 

The Court’s language in this line of precedents is notable. When addressing juvenile murderers, this Court has stated that “ ‘children are different’ ” and that courts must consider “a child’s lesser culpability.” Montgomery, 577 U. S., at 207–208 (emphasis added). And yet, when assessing the Court-created right of an individual of the same age to seek an abortion, Members of this Court take pains to emphasize a “young woman’s” right to choose. See, e.g., Lambert v. Wicklund, 520 U. S. 292, 301 (1997) (Stevens, J., joined by Ginsburg and BREYER, JJ., concurring in judgment) (emphasis added); Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pa. v. Casey, 505 U. S. 833, 899 (1992) (joint opinion of O’Connor, Kennedy, and Souter, JJ.); Ohio v. Akron Center for Reproductive Health, 497 U. S. 502, 532 (1990) (Blackmun, J., joined by Brennan and Marshall, JJ., dissenting). It is curious how the Court’s view of the maturity of minors ebbs and flows depending on the issue. 

I think there is a tendency to attribute adulthood/maturity to a minor when it serves another purpose of the speaker/writer.

Yes, there is a new Supreme Court case on exactly this subject. The majority opinion is by Kavanaugh, joined by Roberts, Alito, Gorsuch, and Barrett. Thomas's opinion is a concurrence. And the 3 liberal justices — Breyer, Sotomayor, and Kagan — dissent. Thomas is the only member of the Court who brings up abortion.

AND: Bill emails:

I have two comments: 

1. When I was a kid, even before puberty, it was common for authority-figure adults to call me "young man." Coaches in middle school and high school called us guys on the team "gentlemen." Depending on the context, it could feel like a reprimand or a sign of respect. It was "adultifying" in the sense that it carried with it an expectation that I would act a certain way. 

2. Apparently one must tread very, very carefully when remarking about a black person who appears to be in their late teens. Once a black person turns 18 years old, it is a terrible insult reminiscent of Jim Crow to refer to him or her as "boy" or "girl." But the day before that black person turns 18, it is "adultification" (also reminiscent of Jim Crow, probably) to refer to him or her as "young man" or "young woman."

"All that transpired played a role in his condition," said the medical examiner, in the case of Officer Brian D. Sicknick, who died after the January 6th breaching of the Capitol.

"His office said that it attributes death to natural causes when it can be ascribed to disease alone and that 'if death is hastened by an injury, the manner of death is not considered natural.'" Yet the medical examiner, Francisco J. Diaz, determined that Sicknick died of "natural causes."

I'm reading "Officer Attacked in Capitol Riot Died of Strokes, Medical Examiner Rules The determination is likely to complicate efforts to prosecute anyone in the death of the officer, Brian Sicknick" (NYT).

"The determination is likely to complicate the Justice Department’s efforts to prosecute anyone in the death of Officer Sicknick, 42; two men have been charged with assaulting him by spraying an unknown chemical on him outside the Capitol. But an autopsy found no evidence that Officer Sicknick had an allergic reaction to chemicals or any internal or external injuries.... Two men were charged last month with assaulting Officer Sicknick, but prosecutors have avoided linking the attack to his death...."

That's written confusingly. If "prosecutors have avoided linking the attack to his death," then what are the "efforts to prosecute anyone in the death of Officer Sicknick"? The assault is an assault regardless of whether it caused a death that happened to occur soon afterward. But there's also that discrepancy between what the medical examiner said — "All that transpired played a role in his condition" — and the assertion that the finding of death by "natural causes" excludes the idea that death "was hastened by an injury."

Not discussed in the New York Times article is the way the media ran with the notion that the Capitol protesters had killed a cop. That's the legend they created, and I bet that legend will live.

FROM THE EMAIL: I'm getting a lot of email, much of it expanding what I've already said in that last paragraph. I get the sense many readers need that to be said more elongatedly, more emphatically. But let me give you this emailed comment, from James. It's short and pithy, and it kicks things up with an observation that I didn't make — speculation that there was deliberate delay to give life to the legend:

Maybe the reason prosecutors have not tried to link anyone to Officer Sicknick’s death or charge anyone with homicide is that they have known for months that he died of natural causes and there was no homicide. The powers that be just did not bother to let the rest of us know this until after the “they killed a cop” narrative was firmly rooted in the public mind.

ALSO: Glenn Greenwald is especially outraged for the way other journalists treated him: 

Because of its centrality to the media narrative and agenda, anyone who tried to point out the serious factual deficiencies in this story — in other words, people trying to be journalists — were smeared by Democratic Party loyalists who pretend to be journalists as "Sicknick Truthers,” white nationalist sympathizers, and supporters of insurrection.

For the crime of trying to determine the factual truth of what happened, my character was constantly impugned by these propagandistic worms, as was anyone else's who tried to tell the truth about Sicknick's tragic death. Because one of the first people to highlight the journalistic truth here was former Trump official Darren Beattie of Revolver News and one of the few people on television willing to host doubts about the official story was Tucker Carlson, any doubts about the false Sicknick story — no matter how well-grounded in truth, facts, reason and evidence — were cast as fascism and white supremacy, and those raising questions smeared as "truthers”: the usual dreary liberal insults for trying to coerce people into submitting to their lies....