In the US, troubled kids are treated if they are white — and punished if they are black. A court will consider whether this is illegal.

Evidently the system is racist, but why? The people who decide how to deal with these children might be bigots. Or they might unconsciously make biased decisions, influenced by the child's race. Or they may judge some students harshly because of secondary characteristics that in fact are correlated with race.

Or perhaps the schools black kids attend tend to be underfunded, desperate, and harsh.