Why Is It So Hard To Believe That ‘This Is MAGA Country’?!
Suspiciously enough with all the misplaced and malafide skepticism
The hate crime that put actor Jussie Smollett in the hospital is like any other reported and mostly unreported hate crime, in that it establishes the harm and volatile threat to inalienable rights with the sole intent or motive to express a sentiment that is mired in intolerance and hate — of which is revealing of inimical character with inappropriate reasoning.
“As MediaMatters noted, many “MAGA” accounts on social media have been theorizing that the attack was a hoax, thereby affecting social media search algorithms for those looking for further information on the story”
On January 29, TMZ reported that Smollett was attacked by two men in ski masks who allegedly put him in a noose while spewing racist and homophobic slurs. According to TMZ, the attackers also reportedly yelled, “This is MAGA country” during the assault. The Chicago Police Department originally denied the “MAGA country” remark, but later said Smollett did tell them about the comment in a follow-up interview.
On January 29, TMZ reported that Smollett was attacked by two men in ski masks who allegedly put him in a noose while spewing racist and homophobic slurs. According to TMZ, the attackers also reportedly yelled, “This is MAGA country” during the assault. The Chicago Police Department originally denied the “MAGA country” remark, but later said Smollett did tell them about the comment in a follow-up interview.
Really!
[…]Smollett says he’s working with authorities and has been 100 percent factual and consistent. He says, “Despite my frustrations and deep concern with certain inaccuracies and misrepresentations that have been spread, I still believe justice will be served.”
His family responded in this statement, which is unprecedented when the victims are white.
“Jussie has told the police everything from the very beginning,” the actor’s family said. “His story has never changed, and we are hopeful they will find these men and bring them to justice.”
There is verifiable evidence of bias when hate crime victims are Black and the response leads to the fostering of distrust of law enforcement.
According to the Chicago Tribune, “In 2017, according to FBI statistics, Chicago police documented 41 hate crimes — 16 based on race or ethnicity, eight because of sexual orientation or gender identity and 17 regarding religion.”
Many victims of hate crimes are reluctant to report them to the police. And reported crimes do not always lead to arrests, prosecutions or even a record of hate crimes. Two-thirds of the victimization survey respondents who suspected they were targeted because of hate were unable to cite tangible evidence, such as hate speech, that could be used by law enforcement. Authorities could confirm only 2.5 percent of the reported crimes were motivated by hate.
What the victimization survey found has not been reflected in the FBI’s national hate crime data. In the same five-year period ending in 2016, the FBI counted only 30,000 hate crimes reported to them by local police. Only 12 percent of the nation’s police departments reported any hate crimes at all to the FBI.
There are a few contributing factors to this nonreporting or underreporting of hate crimes and it fundamentally starts with the police.
This is not a novelty with the Chicago Police Department. It is a recurring theme among most police departments nationwide. In the aftermath of the fatal shooting of Laquan McDonald in October of 2014, a black teenager, killed by Jason Van Dyke, a white police officer, who emptied his service weapon at the teen who was moving away from police as the judge determined from video footage, and not moving towards them as police alleged that the threatening teen was doing with a knife in hand. The Department of Justice issued a 2017 report that did determine that the CPD does engage in a pattern of practice of unlawful conduct that results in a breakdown of community trust —most notably fabricating accounts, mishandling statements and or evidence and using a code of silence to justify either 1) police homicide, or in this instance 2) invalidating those time honored fidelities to minority communities or more so Blacks in particular with disproportionate serve and protect duties.
So on the flip side, the lack of vigor and urgency initially seen with a Black victim of a racial and homophobic hate crime is not unusual. The racialization and adherence to the racial hierarchy submits to a double or invisible standard of worthiness in the pursuit of justice in these instances.
Race, unfortunately, is one of the biggest predictors of how victims of crime are treated in the justice system.
Black victims are less likely to have their perpetrators brought to justice and less likely to even be seen as crime survivors.
Some news outlets compound this bias by incessantly publicizing crimes against white, female middle-class victims, while publishing information less frequently about crimes against people of color.
It wouldn’t surprise me one bit that the police instead seemingly would like to have Mr. Smollett arrested for filing a false police report, turning him from victim to perpetrator in this case. Maybe this is farfetched or maybe this warrants some skepticism, or maybe this example can provide some context.
Nationwide this is far more pervasive than the CPD has come to exemplify in their policing efforts. The events that took place last year in Austin are aclear example of incompetence coupled with willful bias.
Anthony Stefan House, captioned above, received a package on March 2, 2018, and when he opened it the device in it detonated leaving Mr. House in critical condition dying an hour later during treatment for his injuries at a hospital. The Police in Austin Texas issued this statement based on their preliminary “investigation”.
Actually, the victim did not deliver to himself this package, nor did he construct it and accidentally detonate it. We have come to find out after some unbiased policing that this was the work of psychopathic killer.
The Austin bomber was involved in a teenage Christian “survivalist” group that discussed weapons and dangerous chemicals, according to a childhood friend.
Mark Anthony Conditt reportedly took part in a conservative outdoors club called Righteous Invasion of Truth (RIOT), in which home-schooled young people studied the Bible and were taught gun skills.
Police in Texas are hunting for clues about what drove the 23-year-old to embark on a bombing spree which killed two people and terrorised the state capital for weeks.
Another thing about hate crimes is that it becomes an arduous experience and exercise and rather difficult to prove.
Proving a crime was motivated by bias is not an easy task. The prosecutor must show that the perpetrator had a biased state of mind, using evidence such as epithets and symbols of hate. Case in point: Over the decade ending in 2012, local Texas law enforcement agencies reported that about 200 crimes per year were motivated by hate. Only 10 resulted in hate-crime convictions — less than one per year. Hate crimes are notoriously tough to push through the legal system. But certain hate-crime victims face unique challenges on the path to justice.
When and if they find the suspects, who go beyond the threat to commit and carry through heinous atrocities, they might be treated first to McDonald’s or Burger King by the police.
It is clear that MAGA Country only react and respond to the stigma and not the sympathy of hate crime victims who happen to be Black.
When asked by reporters about Jussie Smollet’s incident, the President stated “horrible” and “doesn’t get any worse”
Yes, it is horrible, but no sir, like it has before it does get worse.
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