I will say this much about Jussie Smollett and his false claim that white guys wearing MAGA hats assaulted him out of the blue at 2 AM in Chicago, beat him, put a noose around his neck, and poured bleach on him… it inspired some really good comedy:

CHIZ 🇺🇸 @CHIZMAGA

Dave Chappelle destroys Jussie Smollett. 😂😂😂🔥🔥🔥

8:03 AM ∙ Feb 25, 2020

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Now that Smollett has been found guilty of faking a hate crime, it begs an obvious question. Why did a successful actor, who is reportedly a millionaire and was making somewhere between $65,000 and $125,000 per episode on a successful TV series fake a hate crime? In a very real sense, Smollett was living a lot of people’s dream. So, what did pretending he was attacked by racists add to it? Here are some hints:

Joe Biden @JoeBiden

What happened today to @JussieSmollett must never be tolerated in this country. We must stand up and demand that we no longer give this hate safe harbor; that homophobia and racism have no place on our streets or in our hearts. We are with you, Jussie.

The New York Times @nytimes

Jussie Smollett, one of the stars of the television show “Empire,” was attacked in Chicago by 2 assailants who yelled racial and homophobic slurs. The incident is being investigated as “a possible hate crime,” according to the police. https://t.co/lsKiPiKYBa

1:31 AM ∙ Jan 30, 2019

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Kamala Harris @KamalaHarris

.@JussieSmollett is one of the kindest, most gentle human beings I know. I’m praying for his quick recovery. This was an attempted modern day lynching. No one should have to fear for their life because of their sexuality or color of their skin. We must confront this hate.

9:30 PM ∙ Jan 29, 2019

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Being the supposed victim of a hate crime is enough to get more national attention than being a CELEBRITY. It’s enough to get the future President and Vice-President to speak your name. It’s also enough to spur all sorts of false claims about Republicans:

Libs of Tik Tok @libsoftiktok

Incredible stuff

12:25 AM ∙ Dec 10, 2021

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Let’s say that improbably, EVERYTHING Smollett had said was true and that he was assaulted by two MAGA hat-wearing, noose, and bleach-carrying racists looking for a celebrity victim in Chicago at 2 AM in the morning. Would it have really been an example of “surging hostility toward minorities” in America or would it have been an isolated incident? Are there people on the Right encouraging hate crimes or are they actually encouraging black Americans to “walk away” from the Democrat Party and join them in the GOP?

The Bubba Wallace case was arguably even more ridiculous than Smollett’s “this is MAGA country” hoax, even though Wallace didn’t fake it. Not exactly anyway. Basically, at some point, someone retied a door pull on a garage, Wallace and his team were eventually switched into that garage, and they decided the door pull looked like a tiny noose. In a sane country, this would have produced laughter and eye rolls, but as everyone knows, we don’t live in a sane country. Instead, the FBI WAS CALLED IN to investigate a door pull and NASCAR made a big show of letting the world know they supported Wallace. Wallace played the victim card to the maximum by milking every drop of publicity he could get out of the incident while insisting that it really was a noose, even as he simultaneously tried to claim the whole ridiculous affair wasn’t his fault because he wasn’t the one who originally reported it.

Again, here we have a millionaire who was on TV regularly, and yet he got more publicity out of making a big deal over a door pull than he was getting out of his NASCAR career. Doesn’t it seem strange that the best thing that ever happened to Bubba Wallace’s career was publicly pretending to be the victim of a hate crime over a DOOR PULL on a garage?

Is it any wonder that hate crimes hoaxes have become so common? Speaking of which, if you were wondering exactly how common they are, the answer is “very.”