Predictably, the Memphis death-by-cop of motorist Tyre Nichols has spawned an overabundance of over-the-top, rush-to-judgment commentary. After a dispassionate review, though, what can we conclude, and what can we learn, from the senseless tragedy?

It must first be said, and stressed, without any reservation, that absolutely no excuse can justify the brutal police behavior in the incident. All the videos make clear the violence perpetrated against Nichols was astonishingly out of proportion to his own behavior. Nothing in the questions or observations that follow should detract from that reality or from the compassion merited for Nichols’s family.

Still, if the goal is to figure out how to avoid incidents like this in the future, questions must be asked and distinctions drawn. Furthermore, we can ask if Nichols himself acted inappropriately and insensibly without, in the slightest way, suggesting that he “deserved” the abuse he received.

Initially, let’s eliminate one of the most fatuous claims about the incident. This was not an incident of racism. The very idea is absurd when five black policemen beat up a black motorist. So too with the claim that black officers somehow absorb cultural biases against black people so that they are rougher against a black suspect than a white one. Nonsense.

While a single piece of anecdotal evidence proves nothing, even if it suggests much, I have seen, at the range of three feet, a group of white police dangerously manhandling a drunken white motorist in overreaction to his attempts to evade arrest. (And they did not take kindly to my suggestion that they ease up on the man, either.) Stories like these are legion. Again and again in violent police encounters, the common denominator seems not to be race, but to be police of any race overreacting to perceived disobedience by suspects of any race.

What sent the officers into a rage in the first place? They said Nichols was driving recklessly, but even the Memphis police chief said that claim can’t be substantiated yet.

If the goal is to train police better, maybe someone needs to do a study about what, if any, commonalities exist in examples of exorbitant police violence. If some sorts of suspect behaviors tend to “set them off,” then so-called “de-escalation training” might need tweaking to focus even more on self-control in just those sorts of situations.

For that matter, the public also should be educated about what not to do, aside from the obvious point that disobeying police is a really bad idea. The Nichols video, for example, makes obvious that Nichols didn’t deserve anything near the rough treatment he received even before he got up and ran from the first set of police. It is not irresponsible, though, to say that it was supremely unwise to rise and run.

The problems in the Nichols incident, however, don’t stop with police. The strangest thing, almost as horrifying as the beating itself, was the nonchalance of the medics. As an observer watches the videos, the bile rises as the mind boggles, because for a full sixteen minutes after the medics arrive, they make not a single move to examine, much less offer aid to, Nichols. There he was, beaten to a pulp, moaning in agony, but the medics barely even looked at him. Yes, two medics have been suspended from their jobs, but shouldn’t they be investigated for potential criminal negligence?

The main imperative should be to leave behind the facile talking points — Society is racist! Don’t trust police! Blame the victim! Or whatever — and to try, soberly, to apply the law appropriately to this tragic event. Just as importantly, let’s see if any broader but more reasonable and appropriate lessons can be learned.