Dammit, Jussie...

I kept silent on social media regarding the Jussie Smollett incident up until now, mostly because I saw how some of the folks who expressed skepticism on the matter got handled. Chris Hernandez posted on his author page on Facebook, and had people losing their fecal matter in the comments almost immediately.

"Yes, there is an *allegation* of a racist, anti-gay attack by Trump supporters. No, there is no evidence supporting the allegation. No video thus far shows an attack, or attackers matching the suspect description, despite numerous cameras in the area. No container for the bleach allegedly poured on Smollett has been located. No witnesses corroborate Smollett’s allegation.

Not only that, but the attackers tied a rope around Smollett’s neck and he left it on as he walked home after the attack, then left it on for forty more minutes after arriving home, then still had it on when the police arrived however many minutes later? Really?
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If some conservative icon like Ann Coulter claimed Antifa had attacked her in a heavily-surveilled area but no video or witnesses supported her claim, and parts of her story didn’t add up, I’d call shenanigans and demand evidence before I believed her."

As a matter of fact, several friends with actual police detective experience independently used some variation of the line "If you take a report and the events sound implausible, it's probably because it didn't happen that way."

What pisses me off about this whole thing is that yes, there are still plenty of overtly hateful, racist assholes. There are even ones bold enough to curb-stomp a gay black man if they thought they could get away with it. But the number of those lurking inside the Chicago Loop on a freezing January night, waiting to tie a symbolic noose and cackle "THIS IS MAGA COUNTRY!" cartoonishly as they run off is statistically zero.

Even leave off the part about Jussie never mentioning the attack to the doorman/security at his building, never dropping his Subway sandwich, still having the "noose" around his neck when the police arrive... the attack scenario itself doesn't pass the smell test, let alone the irregularities in the aftermath.

The whole thing reads like some "ripped from the headlines" Law & Order episode, which is unsurprising since Jussie's been an actor since he was in elementary school, went to a $10,000/yr Catholic High School in suburban New Jersey, and has probably never seen an actual bedsheet-wearing Klansman in his life.

I don't know what drives a dude to feel like he has to generate some drama like this in his life, and it saddens me, in that it just makes it harder for the guy who isn't an actor, who didn't go to an expensive private school, and who actually does get curb-stomped by a couple of racist, homophobic assholes to be believed.

The lesson of The Boy Who Cried "Wolf!" isn't that there aren't any wolves, after all.
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