The 15 minutes of JP Staples

It has been a sad epoch and it's not yet over

During a pro-Palestine protest at the University of Mississippi on Thursday, at least one student — see above — confronted a Black protester by monkey noises and gestures as the protester was speaking.

I’m not posting the video because it is so very ignorant. The still above is from one of the videos, which went viral.

Say hello to JP Staples, the young man imitating a monkey. As his face became infamous, Staples appeared to have deleted most if not all of his social media accounts, but the internet is forever and some people have nothing to do but track down information about people (and their families) who step outside the boundaries of decent behavior.

Looking at you, JP, little buddy.

The student was rather quickly booted from his fraternity, and the campus NAACP has asked that he be expelled from school. University administrators announced they had opened an inquiry, and the famous M Book — the university’s code of conduct — will guide them.

Meanwhile, Rep. Mike Collins, R-Georgia, took to social media to praise the racist nonsense.

Hmm. “Taking care of business.”

The NAACP has asked Congressional leadership to look at Collins’ response. From the linked The Hill article, an NAACP spokeswoman said:

“Black America refuses to accept blatant racism from any representative sworn to uphold our constitution. Rep. Collins’ decision to publicly condone, and perhaps even celebrate these racist taunts is not only shameful, but also reprehensible.”

As Chris Hayes said:

This is not Collins’ first rodeo, nor is it his first time to wade in and show his ass. Here’s CAIR-Georgia’s response to racist nonsense that fell out of Collins’ mouth in February. Here is Collins doubling down on his support of an antisemitic, racist Xwitter account.

The world will deal with Mr. Staples as the world deals with young men like him. Since he bubbled up from the ooze, there have been several references to Kyle Rittenhouse, who was acquitted of shooting and killing two Black Lives Matter protesters in 2020, and is now broke and being booed off stages. No, that does not replace the punishment the courts should have meted out, but it is what we have to work with.

As for Mike Collins, and I say this with love, a (legal/ethical/moral) comeuppance cannot come soon enough.