MAGA-hatted teens, a Native American and the peril of instant judgment

In an age of instant communication, quick responses usually take precedence over careful deliberation. Hot takes are valued; “cold takes” are not a thing. But truth can be a casualty when social media hordes leap to vent anger at bits of information that look offensive.

All this became apparent, not for the first time, when a video went viral showing a face-to-face encounter at the Lincoln Memorial between a 64-year-old Native American veteran and a high school boy wearing a “Make America Great Again” hat.

The impression left by the clip was of an arrogant white teenager harassing a person of color for the amusement of his rowdy classmates. The Native American man, Nathan Phillips, told reporters he felt threatened by the crowd of teens and heard chants of “Build the wall.”

The storm of outrage that followed was something to behold. The students, a group from a Catholic boys’ high school in Covington, Ky., who were in the capital for the March for Life, were denounced on Twitter as racist bullies who had no respect for their elders. Calls went out for the boy and his friends to be expelled and shamed. The archdiocese of Covington condemned the students’ conduct, and the mayor disavowed it.

But the reaction turns out to be a cautionary tale about jumping to conclusions. Other videos of the gathering showed the students being subjected to nasty slurs by black protesters known as the Hebrew Israelites; the teens eventually countered with chants. It was Phillips who strode up close to the boy in the MAGA hat, singing and beating a drum. Robby Soave of Reason watched two hours of footage and didn’t hear a single “build the wall.”