It shouldn’t matter that Jordan Edwards was a good kid. It shouldn’t matter that he got great grades in school. It shouldn’t matter that he was well-liked by his peers, his teachers, and his football teammates at his Texas high school.

But the tragedy of Jordan Edwards – a young man, shot in the head by a police officer as he sat in the passenger seat of a car leaving a party that had become dangerous – is all the more wrenching for the way it highlights a truth that is a devastating reality to young black men in America: doing all the right things is not enough to ensure you are safe or will be treated fairly.