History is replete with examples of bigotry and prejudice corrupting acts of “justice,” such as women being forced to demonstrate their innocence by accepting death during horrific witch trials, or men jailed (or even executed) simply because of their skin color.

Meanwhile, despite these acts of clear injustice, the mob cheered, and cheered for more.

To argue that racism hasn’t been a feature of the American justice system throughout much of its history would be to grossly distort reality. But two things can be true at once: we can acknowledge the racism of the past while also acknowledging that the racism of the past is in the past.

Today, while the racism of the past has thankfully been vanquished, there remain too many who have built lucrative careers on convincing the public that there is no difference between the United States in 2024 and the United States in 1861, or even 1968.

These people are obsessed with dragging the past into the present as a political weapon of division and hate.

Because of them, the disgusting racism that was applied in the past — where white people were unquestionably innocent and black people were unquestionably guilty, regardless of facts, evidence or even context — is applied today, but in reverse.

It was applied in 2020 during the trial of Derek Chauvin following the death of George Floyd, and it is being applied today in the attempted judicial lynching of Daniel Penny in New York City that was thankfully averted.

Make no mistake: sanity prevailed when Daniel Penny walked free after defending his fellow passengers from Jordan Neely, a drug-addled schizophrenic who boarded a New York City subway car, declared that he didn’t care if he lived or died and threatened to “kill a motherf—er.” But even though justice was eventually served with Penny’s verdict, we cannot afford to ignore the underlying racism that allowed this case to even be brought to trial.

Because racism is why Daniel Penny was even arrested, let alone charged.

For so many, it didn’t matter that Jordan Neely had a long history of criminal acts, drug abuse and mental health issues, and it didn’t matter that Daniel Penny acted to prevent Neely from harming those around him.

Why? Simply because Jordan Neely is black and Daniel Penny is white.

That is why years-old pictures of Jordan Neely were used, presenting him as a street performer. That is why the leader of Black Lives Matter in New York described the dropped charge of manslaughter as “another victory” for the KKK. And that is why witnesses for the prosecution were openly permitted to refer to Penny as “the white man.”

Swap “the white man” for “the black man” and we could be reading a court transcript from Mississippi in the 1940s.

“Racism has its tentacles all over this case,” the BLM leader said.

And you know what? He’s right: he’s just got it backward.

Because if Daniel Penny was black and Jordan Neely was white, would you even know their names?

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