Jussie Smollett and the coveting of victimhood

At first glance, the Jussie Smollett trial looks like one of the maddest things taking place in the Western world right now. Here we have an actor accused of giving wads of money to two Nigerian brothers in 2019 in return for them beating him up and racially insulting him. Apparently it was all part of a dastardly plot by Smollett to secure the sympathies of the celebrity set and possibly become more famous to boot. He allegedly encouraged the burly bros to shout ‘MAGA’ slogans at him and to hang a noose around his neck. Make it look as racist as possible, this black actor allegedly advised the black brothers. Oh, and he had previously masturbated with one of the brothers, in a bathhouse, and on another occasion they also did some drugs. Allegedly.

And yet, take a closer look at this simultaneously hilarious and deranged affair and you might see that, in this era of wokeness, it kind of makes sense. It kind of makes sense that someone would allegedly go to such extraordinary lengths to depict himself as a victim, as a bruised, bleeding recipient of racial hatred, as yet another target of the white supremacy that had apparently been turbo-charged in the Trump years. After all, ours is a time in which a great many people covet victimhood. In which it’s the in thing to suffer. In which nothing guarantees you speedier access into the hallowed pages of the liberal media and the bleeding hearts of the new clerisy than claiming you are a casualty of hatred, an oppressed being at risk of moral-majority spite, violence or, best of all, ‘erasure’. When victimhood is the dominant currency among the cultural elites, would it really be shocking if even a well-known, well-paid actor had spun a tale of violent victimisation?