Editor's Note, 2/22: In the original version of this piece, published January 29, before allegations that actor Jussie Smollett had perpetrated a hoax, GQ made two errors in editorial judgment. We failed to clearly present the post as an opinion piece. And we regret applying unfounded political motivations to then-breaking news with the original headline: "The Racist, Homophobic Attack on Jussie Smollett Is Far-Right America's Endgame." We have altered the headline, but have otherwise left the original post unaltered.

Update, 2/21: Jussie Smollett was arrested this morning on charges of falsifying a police report.

Update, 2/20: This story is fast-moving and we're keeping an eye on the news as it develops. Read a complete timeline of events here.

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.

Whiteness in 21st century America has an endgame, and it is this: to divest itself from the shame of its power, while working to revive the fear it needs in which to thrive. And there is work being done, work done by panels of respectable-seeming men and women on cable news networks dismissing the red MAGA hat as innocuous, work done by politicians who continue to openly lie about the danger immigrants pose to Americans while choosing to ignore that almost all violent extremist crime is committed by right-wing terrorists, by the refusal to acknowledge that bigotry is alive and well, perpetrated by racists and homophobes targeting people like Smollett, criminals who have no qualms in sharing what motivates them. Hate needs to sign its work. That's how hate persists.

The assault of Jussie Smollett is not an isolated incident. Americans who do not fit the white, straight, male, or Christian mold of the ruling class are being targeted with concerning regularity, in synagogues and churches and nightclubs. The perpetrators are not all white, but they are cultivated in a culture built to reward the narrow slice of Americans that have lives that mirror those of the powerful and largely disregard the misfortune of those who do not.

At this late stage, the message is clearer than it has ever been. Jussie Smollett is a successful actor on a popular television series, one of the most famous black and gay men in America, and even he is not safe. A rope was put around his neck because he dared to be a person who did not hide who he was. You don't put a rope on a person of color in America unless you're interested in sending messages—one to the people you hate, and another to those you think will agree with you.

A still-disputed aspect of the attack on Smollett is a line shouted after his attackers fled the scene: "This is MAGA country." While its veracity isn't confirmed, its sentiment needs no fact-check. America's choice to embrace the blind rage of late-stage whiteness in decline is an explicit longing for this kind of crime, a version of America in which those who do not assimilate to the satisfaction of their white, straight, and Christian betters are subject to the impunity of law enforcement, the scorn of the media and the fury of racist homophobes stalking the streets of your city, who want you to know that they could lynch you if they really wanted to, and maybe get away with it too.