Amid nationwide protests against a cascade of police violence, President Obama has offered a response to police critics and a black community that feels he has been stoically indifferent to black death: police body cameras. He’s not alone. The Congressional Black Caucus, the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, the American Civil Liberties Union and even George Zimmerman’s attorney, Mark O’Mara, support the proposal.

But with the non-indictment this past week of Daniel Pantaleo, the officer who choked Eric Garner to death on camera this summer, many are skeptical of Obama’s proposal. I am too. The Garner case and the torrent of recorded black killings demonstrate the folly of thinking that body cameras are the magic potion to a four-century problem of state-sanctioned violence against racial minorities.

I’m not completely opposed to body cameras, which are already in place in some cities. Anything that’s going to protect people from being brutalized and killed by police has my support. Body cameras can help resolve the conflicting accounts that often bedevil claims of police violence. Authority figures to which most defer, the accuracy of police are often assumed to be correct, especially if the other person is not alive. More clarity would be a boon.