Everything they told you was a lie

They don't want "justice." They just want what they envy in others.

Everything the social justice crowd has said for the past 15 years has been a lie.

The movement gained a foothold in the United States around 2008, riding a wave of popular reexaminations of race relations, political divisions, and systemic disparities. It styled itself as an honorable call to right the wrongs of society, both historical and contemporaneous.

The past four weeks, however, have served as definitive proof that the benevolent emperor is a naked tyrant. The warriors for the oppressed are not so noble and selfless as they claim. Neither are they singularly motivated by the ideals of “inclusivity,” “equity,” and “diversity.” They’re as greedy, vicious, prejudiced, and hateful as the oppressors they accuse.

The “social justice” crowd has only ever cared about acquiring power and influence, creeping toward this goal via emotional blackmail, intimidation campaigns, and even occasional violence. Theirs is not a cause for justice, but for self-enrichment; a relatively bloodless conquest for dominance and treasure. They simply disguise their self-interest in the language of “justice” and altruism, all the while plotting new ways to seize for themselves the “privilege” and power they envy in others.

Nothing has done so fine a job of laying bare this reality as Hamas’s Oct. 7 slaughter of 1,400 Israelis, mostly civilians, including children. Since that day of mass murder, self-described champions of “social justice” have flooded city streets and college campuses across the West, cheering terrorism and calling for the destruction of Israel.

They chant explicit calls for ethnic cleansing, including “From the river to the sea, Palestine will be free,” “There is only one solution, intifada revolution,” and “We can’t wait for the caliphate!” They proudly display signs showing the Star of David in a wastebasket, accompanied by the caption, “Please keep the world clean.” They tear down posters featuring the faces of Israeli adults and children held hostage by Hamas. They use projectors to display messages such as, “GLORY TO OUR MARTYRS,” a reference to the Hamas terrorists killed during the Oct. 7 massacre.

This is the same crowd that claims rhetoric can be “violent” and “traumatizing.” This is the same crowd that claims it’s “genocidal” to assert that there are only two genders. This is the same crowd that turned terms such as “safe space” and “trigger warning” into everyday clichés. This is the same crowd that ruthlessly enforces DEI policies and ideology in the name of protecting marginalized peoples. These aren’t conservatives or right-wingers. They’re left-wing academics, students, activists, and bureaucrats, and they proudly endorse violence and terror.

They’re having an effect.

Jews in New York City have been told to avoid certain areas for fear of targeted violence. Some Jewish schools in the United States closed on Oct. 13 after Hamas leadership called for a “Day of Rage.” At America’s institutions of higher learning, some Jewish students are going into hiding as their classmates hold vigils for the Palestinian “martyrs” of Oct. 7. College administrators have been slow to condemn the pro-terrorist demonstrations that have descended on their campuses. They’ve been even slower to offer protections for Jewish students.

The team that claims it cherishes “inclusivity” and “diversity” more than anything else has embraced Hamas and its mission to annihilate a marginalized group. They’ve effectively become acolytes for Hamas.

Yet these students, academics, and activists tell us they stand against “violent” language. They tell us certain rhetoric should be punished and even outlawed. They tell us they hear racist dog whistles every time the Right criticizes Democratic governance. They hound private citizens for perceived “microaggressions,” including the wearing of “offensive” Halloween costumes.

They call anyone who hints at disagreement a literal Nazi. They endlessly accuse the Right of promoting antisemitism and antisemitic tropes, gorging themselves on news and media commentary that alleges the same.

Given these stated values, how are they cheering acts of terrorism perpetrated against Israeli civilians, holding vigils for actual terrorists, and engaging in the most stridently antisemitic and fascistic behavior and rhetoric this side of World War II? When it comes to Jews, where are those “safe spaces”? The attic? What happened to all that “Hate has no home here” pablum? In this house, do we not defend the Jewish people from calls for their extermination?

For the people who’ve berated the country for the past 15 years about inclusion and diversity, the answer is clearly a resounding no.

The Jews do not count. Jewish lives don’t matter.

The secret to understanding these contradictory positions is this: The “social justice” types don’t actually oppose hateful language and dangerous rhetoric. They don’t care about genuine equity and inclusivity. Attempts to censor speech, dogpiling nobodies for even the most banal “microaggressions,” physically intimidating ideological opponents — these are nothing more than exercises in raw power, some pointed and some simple exertions of control. These are the methods by which they elbow out, shut down, and eventually destroy altogether those with whom they disagree and those whose destruction could provide them and their kind with more opportunities and “privilege.”

To the left-wing social justice activist, Jews are just a subset of “white oppressors.” And it’s both right and just to strip the “white oppressor” of his “power” and “privilege” “by any means necessary.” This is the stated goal of the social justice movement, as expressed in increasingly explicit terms over the years. The rallies in support of Hamas aren’t surprising, then, when one understands the stated aims of the “social justice” movement. For the movement, Hamas presents yet another opportunity for the tearing down and marginalization of an “acceptably” hated group and the reassignment of its “privilege” to better and more deserving stewards.

Everything the “social justice” crowd has told us about working for a more peaceable and inclusive tomorrow has been a lie. And nothing has revealed this so clearly as the spectacle of them standing shoulder to shoulder with a hyperviolent antisemitic death cult.

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Becket Adams is a columnist for the Washington Examiner, National Review, and the Hill. He is also the program director of the National Journalism Center.