While American opinions pour in about what France should do better to confront its racism, it is worth remembering the adage about people in glass houses throwing stones.

When a police officer in a Paris suburb fatally shot a 17-year-old of North African descent for disobeying an order to stop his car, a fresh wound opened in France. In addition to the loss of the young man’s life, the riots across the country that followed exacted a heavy toll: over a thousand properties damaged or destroyed, over three thousand arrests a third of which were minors—some as young as eleven years old—and over two hundred police officers wounded. Damages are estimated to near 300 million euros, a new record.

On the American right, the likes of Fox and Wall Street Journal were quick to blame the lack of law enforcement, deriding the rioters and siding with the police. They echoed the same views those as on the French right: more law, more order. Meanwhile, the French media reported both the calls for justice for the young man’s life as well as those for calm as the riots continued for days.

Where the difference between American and French coverage of the case differed was largely on the left. In France, many reported how they feel particularly discriminated by police, at times violently so, due to their perceived race. The American left emphasized this point, focusing on the race of the young man killed. (The race of the police officer at the time of this writing remains undisclosed.) They rightly questioned whether race played a role in the officer’s behavior. But some American commentators went further and blamed the incident on France’s colorblind approach to government institutions. One commentator on CNN even called this approach a myth. Indeed, France does not collect data on race as in the US. Nor can it apply laws or policies differently based on race, at least not legally.

The French government views its citizens as equal regardless of race. Its citizens are right to be upset when the government does not uphold that equality. Little wonder then that there has been no call in France to end the constitutional right to equality based on race. Instead, the French demand a reinforcement of this right. There has also been no demand to collect data on race in order to undo institutionalized racism, as some American commentators suggest is necessary. Those same commentators neglect to provide evidence that data on race helps reduce racism in the US.

Death by police is something both Americans and French struggle with, as the more moderate PBS flatly stated. And race is but one factor, sometimes a major factor, in that struggle. But Americans are mistaken to equate the French government’s colorblind approach with racist ignorance. Data on race is different from data on racism. According to latest polls, most Americans supported the recent Supreme Court decision to disallow race as a factor in college admissions. Many Americans admit that racism persists and should end. What they are increasingly asking for to achieve that goal is something closer to the colorblind French model.