This Video of a Student Stealing a MAGA Hat Is Your Depressing Dose of Reality Today
"She took my hat."
Are you feeling chipper? Happy about the state of the world, for some reason? Maybe the Trump administration's (belated) decision to let Puerto Rico off of the Jones Act hook put you in a good mood? Well, sorry.
Watch and weep as two students at the University of California-Riverside fight—like children—over a MAGA hat.
It all started when a presumably leftist female student stole the hat from the head of a conservative male student and immediately marched to the campus's student life building.
"Look at the kind of shit he's wearing?" she said. "You know what this represents? Genocide."
The hat-owner began filming the altercation as the hat-taker implored administrators to punish him for wearing it. "This is mine," he said. "You do not get to take other people's property that is legally theirs in this country."
"Man, fuck your laws," was her reply.
And so it went for another 10 minutes, as the administrators watched helplessly. The students traded barbs: freedom of speech allows me to wear that hat—I swear to God I could burn this shit—it's mine, give it back—Make America Great again, America was never great—if you don't like it you can get out, go to Mexico, go wherever the hell you want—you don't know shit about me. And on and on.
These were adult college students. Not preschoolers. Not toddlers. We repeat, adults. One saw something she didn't like—a hat—and thought the best thing to do was steal it, and tattle to mom and dad (the administration) assuming their obligation to protect her from hats she doesn't like. His response was to tattle to the entire world— with his phone.
Campus Reform obtained the video footage, but did not provide any additional context, so we don't know whether there was some kind of confrontation prior to the seizing of the hat. The female student is particularly irritated that the male student would walk into a conference dressed as a he was, so it's possible he was looking to provoke, and succeeded.
Again, to be clear, people get to walk around a public university campus wearing whatever hats they want. If this makes you want to set something on fire, you're in for a rough life.
But if someone takes your MAGA hat because they fell for the trap you set, maybe you don't have to be such a whiny little snowflake about it.
(Related.)
