Kneecap, Coachella, and the cowardice of the age

It is a singular misery of our time that brutishness, masquerading as virtue, is now applauded as courage. The recent antics of the Irish rap group Kneecap at Coachella — one of the grand carnivals of Western self-congratulation — ought to serve as a final exhibit in this ongoing farce.

Standing before a sea of adoring and mindless faces, Kneecap chose not to challenge power, but to flatter the basest instincts of the mob. Displaying a “F–k Israel, Free Palestine” banner, accusing Israel of “genocide,” and invoking the imagery of Hezbollah — a gang of sectarian murderers recognized internationally as a terrorist organization — they congratulated themselves for their supposed bravery. In truth, they were no braver than a lynch mob, and not nearly as original.

One wonders if Kneecap paused, even for a moment, to consider the irony: that survivors of the Nova music festival — where Hamas jihadists raped, mutilated, and burned alive concertgoers — had pleaded with the world to resist precisely this type of smiling antisemitism. But reflection is unlikely. These are the garden variety reactionaries of the modern age, confusing the tired slogans of blood and soil for acts of “resistance.”

It must be said — and said without apology — that Kneecap’s behavior is not mere political protest. It is the degenerate regurgitation of ancient hatreds, lacquered over with the buzzwords of human rights. When you glorify Hezbollah, when you call for the destruction of the world’s only Jewish state, while waving the flags of those who have sworn themselves to exterminationist ends, you do not get to hide behind the mask of solidarity. You have planted yourself squarely among the inheritors of the worst instincts humanity has ever produced.

What is more contemptible still is that Kneecap’s members are being celebrated as bold truth-tellers. The fawning applause they receive from the organs of culture, who style themselves as defenders of the marginalized, speaks volumes. They are not brave for saying “F–k Israel” at Coachella; in the fashionable salons of the West, such sentiments have become not only acceptable, but fashionable. The hatred of Jews, so long consigned to the poisonous fringe, now parades itself across festival stages and university campuses in broad daylight, rebranded as an act of liberation.

The deluge of sympathy for Hamas since October 7 is not, as some would claim, an accident of misplaced humanitarian concern. It is the inevitable outcome of years of moral cowardice, where antisemitism has been slowly repackaged as anti-imperialism. It takes no courage to shout “Free Palestine” at Coachella. It takes courage to stand against the lynch mob, to say that Hamas are butchers, not freedom fighters, and that those who celebrate them are not allies of justice, but dupes — or worse, collaborators.

Those who once sang songs of peace now chant slogans of extermination. Those who once gathered in fields to celebrate life now cheer for those who worship death. There is no moral high ground in glorifying murderers. There is no liberation in championing those who use women and children as human shields.

What Kneecap and their apologists fail — or refuse — to understand is that they are not defying power; they are serving it. They are the house band for the new orthodoxy: an orthodoxy where Jews are stripped of their humanity, where Israel is cast as the cosmic villain, and where the most grotesque acts of terror are rebranded as legitimate “resistance.”

It is essential to recognize that freedom of speech, precious as it is, does not shield one from moral scrutiny. One can defend the right of Kneecap to broadcast their ignorance while still exposing them for what they are: useful idiots for a fascistic ideology that despises the very liberties that allow them to perform. They are not radicals. They are not rebels. They are collaborators — collaborators with a cause that, if it ever triumphed, would obliterate every value they claim to hold dear, starting with free expression itself.

The decadence of our cultural class lies in precisely this: that they are willing, even eager, to celebrate those who would, given half a chance, destroy them. It is not solidarity. It is suicide.

History is littered with the bones of those who thought they could ride the tiger of fanaticism. Kneecap and their admirers may soon learn — too late, as all fools do — that the tiger always eats its rider.

Until then, let us not be silent. Let us say, without hesitation or apology, that to stand with Hamas is to stand with barbarism. To cheer for Kneecap’s bile is to cheer for the destruction of every ideal we once had the courage to cherish.

And let us, above all, remember that there is no virtue in hatred, no matter how fashionable it may become.