horrifying attack on Jussie Smollett

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Puppycow said:
It makes no sense that his lawyers might want to negotiate a plea deal or it makes no sense that a prosecutor would recuse herself?

Because the latter is a fact.
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It makes no sense that a prosecutor would recuse herself because the defense lawyers are negotiating a plea deal. Since negotiating plea deals is part of the prosecutors job it doesn't make sense to suspect that is a reason for recusal.


ETA: Looking back I see it was you who wonder that, did you type what you meant to ask?
 
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dudalb said:
Well, I was wrong.
I despise Smollett now. He just made things tougher for any real victim of bigotry.
But before TBD crows too much, his great God Trump was taken in just like most people.....
My mistake was in thinking "No way would somebody fake this and make so many mistakes. Just a case of really stupid attackers".
And Smolett has pretty much destroyed his career with this stunt.
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The only thing this proves is that actors are weird. But we knew that.
 
So here's a take on this in The Atlantic, from John McWhorter, a professor at Columbia who also happens to be black:

What the Jussie Smollett Story Reveals

There was someone who posted several times early in this thread but apparently lost interest in the topic after a few days, who opined that it made no sense that it would be a hoax because why on earth would someone in Smollett's position risk his whole career to do something like this? It made no sense. No rational person could think it was worth the risk. (I actually agree that it isn't rational, but maybe he underestimated the true likelyhood that he would be caught; if you get that part of the calculation wrong, it throws off your whole risk/benefit equation.)

So what's the benefit? McWhorter explains:

Smollett doesn’t need the money he would get from a court settlement, and he isn’t trying to deny someone higher office. So why in the world would he fake something like that attack—if he did indeed fake it? The reason might be that he has come of age in an era when nothing he could have done or said would have made him look more interesting than being attacked on the basis of his color and sexual orientation.

Racial politics today have become a kind of religion in which whites grapple with the original sin of privilege, converts tar questioners of the orthodoxy as “problematic” blasphemers, and everyone looks forward to a judgment day when America “comes to terms” with race. Smollett—if he really did stage the attack—would have been acting out the black-American component in this eschatological configuration, the role of victim as a form of status. We are, within this hierarchy, persecuted prophets, ever attesting to the harm that white racism does to us and pointing to a future context in which our persecutors will be redeemed of the sin of having leveled that harm upon us. We are noble in our suffering.
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alfaniner said:
Sir is correct.

And I read dudalb's response as saying, "Smollett won't be getting any forgiveness from dudalb."
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Just go on the internet and see how the bigots are jumping all over this,and you will see why I'm not in a forgiving mood.
Ah well, I will at least get some joy out of watching his career go down the drain.
 
RecoveringYuppy said:
It makes no sense that a prosecutor would recuse herself because the defense lawyers are negotiating a plea deal. Since negotiating plea deals is part of the prosecutors job it doesn't make sense to suspect that is a reason for recusal.
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Sorry, my statement earlier was poorly worded.

At the beginning of the investigation he was the alleged victim. I think she recused herself around the time when they decided he was the primary suspect.
 
Brainster said:
I was just thinking that this thread had gone on far too long without somebody mentioning the bad orange man.
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Orange Man is racist. If we are going to put things on a scale though, not nearly as racist as Jessie Smollett.
 
theprestige said:
Depends on one's flavor of bigotry, I suppose. There's some bigots who'll be gutted by the revelation that the whole thing was a hoax. Chief among them: Jussie Smollett, probably.
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I believe you're correct but it also sickens me further that people like that would rather a hate crime actually be committed because it helps their narrative.

Hopefully not too many people are like that.


Puppycow said:
So here's a take on this in The Atlantic, from John McWhorter, a professor at Columbia who also happens to be black:

What the Jussie Smollett Story Reveals

There was someone who posted several times early in this thread but apparently lost interest in the topic after a few days, who opined that it made no sense that it would be a hoax because why on earth would someone in Smollett's position risk his whole career to do something like this? It made no sense. No rational person could think it was worth the risk. (I actually agree that it isn't rational, but maybe he underestimated the true likelyhood that he would be caught; if you get that part of the calculation wrong, it throws off your whole risk/benefit equation.)

So what's the benefit? McWhorter explains:
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Collective Munchausen

https://areomagazine.com/2017/01/23...-an-academic-and-evolutionary-psychology-101/
 
Puppycow said:
Sorry, my statement earlier was poorly worded.

At the beginning of the investigation he was the alleged victim. I think she recused herself around the time when they decided he was the primary suspect.
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OK. Got it.

I'm curious as to why people think this was a political move on her part or that the timing is suspicious. As far as I understand how these things work this only became her office's case just a couple days ago. She's a prosecutor and up until a couple days ago there has been no one to prosecute.

To me it seems it would have been inappropriate to recuse earlier because people would read things in to that.
 
RecoveringYuppy said:
It makes no sense that a prosecutor would recuse herself because the defense lawyers are negotiating a plea deal. Since negotiating plea deals is part of the prosecutors job it doesn't make sense to suspect that is a reason for recusal.


ETA: Looking back I see it was you who wonder that, did you type what you meant to ask?
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She recused herself from the negotiations, then. There was nothing to recuse from before the negotiations started. Once they started, she was had to recuse because of that.

tl;dr - She recused because of the negotiations.
 
theprestige said:
She recused herself from the negotiations, then. There was nothing to recuse from before the negotiations started. Once they started, she was had to recuse because of that.

tl;dr - She recused because of the negotiations.
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It sounds like we may agree but I would phrase it differently. As far as her office is concerned, there wasn't even officially "a case" until just recently. To my understanding this because a case for her office when CPD requested a grand jury. That was just a few business days ago AFAIK.


It's not specifically the plea deal that she can't be involved in, it's the whole case.
 
Brainster said:
I was just thinking that this thread had gone on far too long without somebody mentioning the bad orange man.
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TBF, I took a shot at him over on #2266. Don't worry, I'm not jealous that you didn't notice ... :sulk:
 
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It is worth noting that the cast members of his show are walking around with armed guards because of this mope.

Is it ok if people from Chicago are jumping all over this, or are they bigots too?
 
Some Op-Eds that didn't age well:

I Believe Jussie Smollett. You Should, Too.
The sentiments of doubt cast at Jussie Smollett since he says he faced a homophobic and racist attack is disappointing, to say the least. Somehow, I thought, or at least hoped, society at large was at the point of believing victims, what with the enduring impact of the #MeToo movement. But what these seemingly malicious and unfounded rumors, criticisms, and allegations of deception lodged at the Empire actor tell me is that those of us perpetually at the bottom of the socio-cultural stepladder — Black LGBTQ+ people — still aren’t granted the apparent, simplest of luxuries afforded our counterparts: the benefit of the doubt.
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(Tre'vell Anderson, Out magazine)

The Racist, Homophobic Attack on Jussie Smollett Is Far-Right America's Endgame

Early Tuesday morning, Jussie Smollett, the 36-year-old star of Fox's Empire, left a Chicago restaurant and was reportedly accosted by two men who proceeded to shout racial and homophobic slurs before beating him, pouring an unknown chemical substance on him, and wrapping a rope around his neck before fleeing the scene. According to a statement issued by Chicago police, the incident is being investigated as a "possible hate crime."

The cautious wording is one last wound inflicted on Smollett's battered body, a careful hedging of bets that don't need hedging—a crime scene involving a corpse is not discussed as a "possible death." But the stodgy apparatus of law enforcement isn't particularly interested in acknowledging social ills—and neither is the news media when it goose-steps around the truth of the matter with shallow euphemisms like "racially charged" used to describe open, proud bigotry.
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(Joshua Rivera, GQ)

I also looked to see if the people who penned these pieces had written any follow-ups. In the case of Rivera, not yet. Other than retweeting another person on Twitter, he seems to have gone fairly silent on this subject recently and has moved on to other topics.

Anderson on the other hand did write a subsequent Op-Ed, which seems to move the goalposts:

Op-Ed: The Vast Majority of Hate Crime Victims are Telling the Truth

But no matter what happens in the still-unfolding investigation, we should not allow the circus that this case has become to call into question our moral obligation to believe people who say they are victims.
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He goes on to cite various crime victimization surveys and other data and comes to this:
All of this is to say that for the comparatively few people who do choose to publicly disclose that they are victims of any sort of violence, the likelihood that they are not being forthcoming is slim. The FBI estimates that between 2% and 8% of hate crime reports are hoaxes, “a tiny number,” according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, in comparison with the many instances even the federal government contends goes unreported.
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The FBI estimate is, of course, an estimate. An educated guess. It could be wrong but let's posit that these are reasonable numbers. Still, the odds in the aggregate are only really important if you know little or nothing about the details of the case, or at least, what's being reported about it. Once we have specific information about a case in question, those odds become much less important and the specific information about the case is the best information to look at to determine if it is true or not.
 
Puppycow said:
Some Op-Eds that didn't age well:

I Believe Jussie Smollett. You Should, Too.
(Tre'vell Anderson, Out magazine)

The Racist, Homophobic Attack on Jussie Smollett Is Far-Right America's Endgame

(Joshua Rivera, GQ)

I also looked to see if the people who penned these pieces had written any follow-ups. In the case of Rivera, not yet. Other than retweeting another person on Twitter, he seems to have gone fairly silent on this subject recently and has moved on to other topics.

Anderson on the other hand did write a subsequent Op-Ed, which seems to move the goalposts:

Op-Ed: The Vast Majority of Hate Crime Victims are Telling the Truth



He goes on to cite various crime victimization surveys and other data and comes to this:


The FBI estimate is, of course, an estimate. An educated guess. It could be wrong but let's posit that these are reasonable numbers. Still, the odds in the aggregate are only really important if you know little or nothing about the details of the case, or at least, what's being reported about it. Once we have specific information about a case in question, those odds become much less important and the specific information about the case is the best information to look at to determine if it is true or not.
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Exactly. Also, I wouldn't consider the upper bound of 8% a "tiny number" either. 1/12 isn't all that rare.
 
dudalb said:
Well, I was wrong.
I despise Smollett now. He just made things tougher for any real victim of bigotry.
But before TBD crows too much, his great God Trump was taken in just like most people.....
My mistake was in thinking "No way would somebody fake this and make so many mistakes. Just a case of really stupid attackers".
And Smolett has pretty much destroyed his career with this stunt.
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Looking at it like a screw up on your part, but then defensively saying is okay because someone on the other side fell for it will not help the situation.

It is not a failing on your part, it is a flaw inerrant to picking being nice over being fair. Learn from that instead of blaming your more than adequate mind.
 
Marcus said:
Orange Man is racist. If we are going to put things on a scale though, not nearly as racist as Jessie Smollett.
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Your mistake is defining this as an act of racism when it clearly is an act of self promotion. How do the Orange Man and Jussie compare then? Who comes out on top in that category?
 
Elagabalus said:
Your mistake is defining this as an act of racism when it clearly is an act of self promotion. How do the Orange Man and Jussie compare then? Who comes out on top in that category?
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Orange Man Bad has self promoted himself into the presidency of the United States.

Jussie Smollett has self promoted himself right out of a job.

How is this even a question?
 
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