Right after Christmas on the night of Saturday, December 27th, there was a riot at the mall in St. Matthews, Kentucky. Did you hear about it? Odds are that you did not if you were relying on the usual cable news outlets. It’s not the type of story that the mainstream media likes to cover for reasons which should become obvious shortly.

It all began when groups of youths simultaneously began causing disturbances at several stores in the mall. That’s the word the media likes to use… “disturbances.” Of course, what they really mean is looting and vandalism. There were only a limited number of security personnel in the large mall, but they responded quickly. That didn’t help much, though, as NBC news reported.

Chain-reaction brawls involving up to 2,000 people erupted in one of Kentucky’s largest malls Saturday night, forcing the entire mall and businesses in the surrounding area to shut down, police said.

The hours-long chaos at Mall St. Matthews began about 7 p.m. ET when the six St. Matthews police officers assigned to the mall for the holiday season began responding to “disturbances,” said Officer Dennis McDonald, a police spokesman.

“As they were responding to those disturbances, others were breaking out. … Disturbances started to feed on themselves.” McDonald said. “They were just overwhelmed with a number of calls for service and reports of disorder.”

The officers on duty at the mall called for backup, and 50 officers from five different agencies responded, according to police.

Reporters were describing it as “a series of brawls” which involved anywhere from 1,000 to 2,000 “young people” ranging in age from 13 to their early 20s. It soon engulfed the entire mall, shutting down business entirely. Watch the video below and see for yourself the great lengths that both the police and the reporters on the scene to go in order to avoid saying what’s really going on here.

Here’s the next thing to note: despite all of the wreckage and lost property, not a single person was arrested. Not one person. How can we possibly explain this? Were all 2,000 of them modern day Batman style superheros who swung out of the building on steel grapples? Not hardly. And did it seem strange to you that a lot of very specific details about the “youths” were missing from the NBC report? If so, you’re probably on to the underlying story already. But for a better explanation, I’ll turn it over to Mike Mcdaniel at Bearing Arms. (And please do read his entire piece.)

What NBC did not mention is the racial makeup of the thugs. Considering the location, it takes no imagination to realize a significant portion of them were black. It also takes no imagination to understand that no police officer wants to be involved in an altercation with any politically favored minority. That’s a fight they can’t win, and the chances are at least 50/50 that being in the right and scrupulously following the letter of the law wouldn’t be a defense.

Were some of them white? Surely, but that doesn’t matter. People will do things in mobs that they would never do individually. They draw energy–and not positive energy–from the worst intentions and excesses of those surrounding them, and they know that in the crowd, they’ll likely be anonymous.

And so the officers were reduced to running here and there, using their mere presence in a desperate attempt to keep some kind of order. If the crowd wanted to rape, could they easily have drug women into bathrooms, dark hallways and other convenient, out of the way places without the police having the slightest idea what was happening? Of course. Murder would have been as easily accomplished. It’s amazing none of these crimes occurred, or perhaps we just don’t know about them yet.

What Mike is talking about is the Ferguson Effect, which we are continually assured does not exist on cable news. The cops were overwhelmed by a massive group of lawless thugs and didn’t have the resources (or more importantly the respect and support of the community) to get it under control. This isn’t a question of the race of the perpetrators in terms of who is breaking the law. (So have a seat, race baiters, and spare me the usual accusations.) It’s a question of the cops being handcuffed in certain areas by fear of the media and SJW backlash. And as a result they made little progress in stopping the crime and arrested nobody.

To go any further, they would have needed to draw weapons and put some serious fear into the hearts of the criminals. But they did not. Why would they? Odds are that local politicians wouldn’t have backed them up and they would have been made out to be villains. And since this group got away with it, you can rest assured that you’ll see more in the future. The basic fabric of social order is breaking down in too many places.