It’s only been a couple of weeks since The Mugging Heard ‘Round the World, so the search for actor/singer Jussie Smollett’s attackers is still in the early stages. The Chicago Police Department has put a dozen cops on the case, with help from the FBI, so they’re bound to crack it sooner or later. Assuming, of course, that anything happened to Smollett at all.

I won’t go so far as to affirmatively state, as some have, that Smollett is lying. It’s possible that it happened the way he said it happened. But it certainly isn’t plausible. The area where he claims he was attacked is blanketed with security cameras, yet there’s no footage of it. He claims his attackers recognized him from his TV show, Empire, and yet he also claims they yelled MAGA slogans at him. MAGA-heads who watch Empire? Really? And he claims it happened at 2 in the morning on one of the coldest days in Chicago history, and that his attackers just happened to be carrying a rope and a bottle of bleach.* Sorry, but it all smells as fishy as the tuna sub Smollett managed to hang onto throughout the ostensible ordeal. And the more outraged he gets that anybody could possibly doubt him, the more I doubt him.

Here’s Smollett on camera for the first time since the alleged assault, getting angry that you don’t believe his outlandish story with no evidence to back it up:

Jussie Smollett says he’s angry not only at his attackers but also at those who have questioned whether he’s telling the truth about alleged attack. pic.twitter.com/bRr1n4TO3J — TODAY (@TODAYshow) February 14, 2019

Smollett also said: “It feels like if I had said it was a Muslim or a Mexican or someone black, I feel like the doubters would have supported me much more.”

And I feel like this says a lot more about Jussie Smollett than it says about people who aren’t obsessed with identity politics. He could’ve said it was a Muslim or a Mexican or someone black or a transgender Eskimo lesbian with a wooden leg, and I’d still wonder why there’s no evidence to support it whatsoever.

And isn’t that an interesting way to phrase it? It’s not: “If I’d been attacked by a Muslim or a Mexican or a black person.” It’s: “If I’d said that.”

If this actually happened, I hope the attackers are brought to justice. If it didn’t happen, I hope Smollett is brought to justice for perpetrating a hoax. More likely, it will remain an unsolved mystery. That’s the best-case scenario for Smollett. He can always claim there’s no evidence that it didn’t happen, and the people who need to believe it will continue to believe it. He can continue to be a martyr, and he and his supporters can keep painting skeptics as racist homophobes who probably love that racist homophobe Trump.**

And keep in mind that Smollett has had it out for Trump since long, long before anybody even dreamed Trump could get elected POTUS:

Which one is more likely: Jussie Smollett was attacked by invisible, noose-wielding ninjas who love Donald Trump? Or Jussie Smollett hates Donald Trump so much that he staged a fake assault by MAGA-heads to draw attention to himself? To “raise awareness”?

Uh-oh. You’d better keep that to yourself. Occam’s razor is racist.

*Some people are also pointing out that Smollett refused to turn over his phone to police, but the libertarian part of my brain can’t blame him for that. I can’t decide if that’s the sort of thing a guilty man would do. Maybe? I just know I don’t want the cops poking around in my damn phone…

**People will believe what they want to believe, evidence be damned. Just ask a feminist about Brett Kavanaugh. Hell, ask any leftist about that kid in the red hat who smirked at an Indian. The truth is an afterthought, if not an outright impediment.