Twelve Observations on the Covington Incident
On Jan. 18, 2019, students from the all-male Covington Catholic High School in Kentucky participated in the March for Life in Washington, D.C. That evening, a video emerged of students in front of the Lincoln Memorial after the march. They were shown doing chants as they do at their sporting events, wearing Trump hats and appearing to be in a standoff with Nathan Phillips, 64, a Native American who was standing very close to one of them (later revealed to be high school junior Nick Sandmann, 16) and beating a drum while the student stood and smiled. This video produced intense backlash from Cathedral brahmins and establishment cuckservatives alike as it was spread throughout social media on the morning of Jan. 19.
More videos were later posted online that gave more context to the situation. These showed an earlier encounter between the students and the Black Hebrew Israelites, a racist hate group who were chanting slurs and obscenities at the boys before Phillips got involved. Several of the students were doxxed and threatened in various ways. Some of those who spoke out against the boys retracted their statements and apologized, while others have continued attacking them. Twelve observations on these events follow.
1. People see what they want to see. Monica Hesse at the Washington Post described the story as “a Rorschach test,” writing, “As much as we might try to see what happened from Sandmann’s perspective, or from Phillips’s, the perspective we’re ultimately seeing it from is our own.” Julie Irwin Zimmerman at The Atlantic echoed this sentiment, writing, “tell me how you first reacted, and I can probably tell where you live, who you voted for in 2016, and your general take on a list of other issues.” Those who wanted to see a white male racist and those who wanted to see a white male victim each projected their desires onto Sandmann. This is why it is important to reserve judgment until enough facts are available to make a sound judgment, which in some cases will never happen.
2. Despite all of the establishment haranguing, Sandmann’s smile and stance are perfectly understandable. A teenage boy was confronted by a 64-year-old man who started beating a drum next to his face. Sandmann’s expression conveys the look of a young person who is observing an older person act foolishly but does not wish to confront the elder more substantively, both out of respect and out of a desire to avoid unnecessary escalation. The establishment media, however, treated his expression in an Orwellian manner:
“It was terribly dangerous to let your thoughts wander when you were in any public place or within range of a telescreen. The smallest thing could give you away. A nervous tic, an unconscious look of anxiety, a habit of muttering to yourself – anything that carried with it the suggestion of abnormality, of having something to hide. In any case, to wear an improper expression on your face (to look incredulous when a victory was announced, for example) was itself a punishable offense. There was even a word for it in Newspeak: facecrime, it was called.” —George Orwell, 1984
3. The Covington students deserve praise for their restraint. The boys stood through more than an hour of insults from the Black Hebrew Israelites and the provocation of Phillips. Though they would have been demonized much further if they had responded with more than standing their ground and performing the occasional tomahawk chop along with the drumbeat, it would be difficult for most people, including their critics, to endure so much and remain so calm.
4. Social justice ideology predictably backfires. The behavior of the Black Hebrew Israelites toward both the Native American group and the Covington students is an example of a larger problem. Social justice ideology teaches that all black people are part of an oppressed victim group that lacks institutional power, and defines racism as prejudice plus power. In effect, this makes it impossible for blacks to be racist, and when a group of people are given carte blanche, there will always be some who take advantage of the circumstance. Whether it is the Black Hebrew Israelites insulting Native Americans and whites or Louis Farrakhan calling Jews termites, the underlying ideology of social justice is to blame for holding them blameless.
5. Phillips thoroughly mischaracterized both the events and himself. He said that the Covington kids “were in the process of attacking these four black individuals” and “looked like they were going to lynch them.” He also claimed that they chanted, “Build that wall.” No evidence for the chant has been found, and the larger video shows that the Black Hebrew Israelites were the initial instigators.
Phillips’ account of himself is not much more accurate. He says he is a Vietnam veteran who served in combat, but records show that he was not deployed overseas and had several breaches of conduct at the time. He told CNN that it is “time for lies to be not accepted anymore,” and his testimony is a good starting place.
6. Those who planned the trip for the students did them a disservice. The Covington students are likely being taught the leftist, civics class, politically autistic version of how political change occurs, which only works for leftist goals that have elite support. A proper understanding of political change recognizes that public demonstrations are counterproductive for rightist purposes, and would instead have the boys focus on becoming strong members of their communities who will someday be able to assist in a restoration.
7. Rightists consistently lose ground partly due to perfidious leaders. When leftist activists get into trouble, their elites back them up even when they are obviously guilty. But when rightist activists get falsely accused, they also get betrayed by their own elites, who cannot kowtow to the opposition quickly enough. In a joint statement issued on Jan. 19, Covington Catholic High School and the Diocese of Covington apologized to Phillips and said they were investigating. “We will take appropriate action, up to and including expulsion,” the statement said. Nicholas Frankovich of National Review Online penned a blistering hit piece on the Covington boys, saying,
“They mock a serious, frail-looking older man and gloat in their momentary role as Roman soldiers to his Christ. ‘Bullying’ is a worn-out word and doesn’t convey the full extent of the evil on display here. As for the putatively Catholic students from Covington, they might as well have just spit on the cross and got it over with.”.
Both have since been taken offline. The Archdiocese of Baltimore also rushed to judgment and had to apologize once the broader context was revealed. Many other cuckservatives failed the Covington test as well. But apologies are not good enough. Even if one receives the sacrament of penance, there is still an earthly penalty for one’s sins, and theirs should be to lose their standing in whatever movements or communities they purport to lead and speak for.
8. Never apologize to the left. In a Jan. 23. interview on NBC’s “Today” show, Savannah Guthrie tried to get Sandmann to apologize and admit fault on his part. Though Sandmann had the uncertain demeanor of a teenager about him, as one might expect, he defended his actions well. It is important to avoid caving when dealing with a leftist mob, as apologizing only emboldens them to escalate their attacks. As Vox Day explains,
“Normal people seek apologies because they want to know that you feel bad about what you have done and that you will at least attempt to avoid doing it again in the future. When [social justice warriors] push you for an apology after pointing-and-shrieking at you, what they are seeking is a confession to bolster their indictment. They are like the police down at the station with a suspect in the interrogation room, badgering him to confess to the crime. And like all too many police these days, the SJWs don’t really care if you did it or not, they’re just looking for a confession that they can take to the prosecutor.
Be aware that once they have launched an attack on you, they will press you hard for an apology and repeatedly imply that if you will just apologize, all will be forgiven. Do not be fooled! …The SJWs are simply looking for a public confession that will confirm their accusations, give them PR cover, and provide them with the ammunition required to discredit and disemploy you. Apologizing will accomplish nothing more than hand them the very weapons they require to destroy you.”
9. Whether by legal or extralegal means, doxxing must become a punishable offense. Though it is unlikely that Sandmann and his classmates will face much lasting damage from the efforts of doxxers against them, doxxing has become a serious threat to the life, liberty, and prosperity of anyone who deviates from Cathedral orthodoxy. Unfortunately, legal repercussions for doxxing are currently lacking in most jurisdictions, so protecting innocent people from the antics of misguided and/or unscrupulous activists and journalists requires direct action as of this writing. This may take a variety of forms, from counter-doxxing to extralegal violence, but the goal should be to criminalize the release of another person’s information without their consent.
10. Most of those who call for violence do not understand violence. Following the short, out-of-context video, many leftist celebrities and pundits expressed a desire to punch the Covington kids, including SNL‘s Sarah Beattie, CNN contributor Reza Aslan, and The Daily Show‘s Trevor Noah. Disney producer Jack Morrisey went further, calling for Sandmann to receive a Fargo-style woodchipping. Threats against Covington Catholic resulted in the school being closed on Jan. 22 and opening under heavier guard on Jan. 23. It is unlikely that any of these people have any real knowledge of how violence works, either at the personal level or the broader political level. They risk provoking a response that they cannot possibly handle.
11. Freedom of the press should not mean freedom of the lügenpresse. When freedom of the press first became part of the Anglo-American legal tradition, it generally applied only to people who owned one and was far more limited than today. But the offense of libel has steadily become harder for civil plaintiffs and criminal prosecutors alike to prove in court, while the press now consists of anyone who communicates to the public in a manner other than direct spoken word. We have now reached a point at which it is possible to abuse freedom of the press to destroy innocent people by spreading malicious lies about them without suffering any significant sanction, unless the aggrieved party decides to step outside the law and resolve matters the old-fashioned way.
During his presidential campaign, Donald Trump said, “I’m going to open up our libel laws so when they write purposely negative and horrible and false articles, we can sue them and win lots of money.” The Covington incident is an excellent pretext for taking such action.
12. The incident is rooted in the problem of the commons. A national monument, like any other common space in a statist society, is said to belong to everyone. But that which supposedly belongs to everyone really has no clear ownership. That which is unowned and valuable will be sought by various people and groups, some of whom will eventually be at cross purposes. When this happens, a conflict will occur that could have been prevented by clear, strong property rights.
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