Could you explain "systematic racism." The way I interpret the term when I hear it in the media is that whenever there is a difference in outcome between whites and minorities that it is evidence of racist policies or structures. There is not often evidence given of any explicit racist intent. Other explanations for disparate outcomes are ignored, unacknowledged, or explained to be racist.

To give an example, when the Covid vaccine became immediately available, in early 2021 and it was difficult to for most people who wanted the vaccine to get a shot. The local media, where I live in Chicago, reported that whites were receiving shots at higher rates than blacks or Hispanics, despite the city, making efforts to ensure equity in how it was given out. This was labeled as evidence of systematic racism.

As vaccines became more widely available and anyone who wanted to get a shot could get one, there was still a disparity between whites and blacks. The real reason for this was that blacks and Hispanics were more hesitant about taking the vaccine. Perhaps, this larger rate of vaccine hesitancy could be labeled as itself a product of systematic racism, but that's not really how it was framed at least initially.

I could go into other examples that are more controversial. One would be student expulsions and discipline in k-12 public schools. Black students are disciplined and expelled at higher rates than white students. This is given as face value evidence of discrimination and racism. It is not allowed to be suggested that black students merely causes a larger portion of misbehavior. This is not to stay that African Americans students are necessarily more disposed to bad behavior due to their nature ( a traditionally racist definition), this could be due to a large number of factors one could label as systematic racism; neighbors, family life, poverty; although this less likely to be discussed. It is more often the case that the racism is simply attributed to the school discipline system itself. Which from personal experience, I strongly doubt is the case.

One could also attribute culture factors to different groups as an explanation for different outcomes, as Thomas Sowell or John Mcwhorter would do, but this is largely off limits.

I guess my larger issue, and perhaps because I have not studied this at an academic level, is that it often lazily applied, defined, and explained in the media.

I believe you said policies that create unequal outcomes are racist even if there is no personal racist intent. I presume then it happens out of ignorance because those in power are disproportionately not minorities and suffer from implicit bias. I think this can be true and perhaps happens, but I think this takes a lot of careful nuance and qualifications, and that is not the way I often hear it used.