I follow a little on the trial of Kyle Rittenhouse.
From the start it looked like “Big Tech” (inc. facebook, gofundme, twitter) want to silence any support for him, and followed the “big media” narrative.
I saw some video from a Romanian guy, saying why this case important even outside USA - The silencing and banning of any non approved thinking, the blocking of any media and social links that are against the CNN talking points (b/c WhItE SuPreMaCiStS) - It is important that people have a voice, and blocking without any legal case is extremely dangerous.
It show me why alternate communications - like this forum, like the social network Minds, and other places not part of FAANG (and twitter) should exist and be also used.
What do you think, is it important, or I just becomming blackpilled? Also, do you use any non mainstream sites?
In the end “NOT GUILTY” verdict, it was self defense. (personally I hope he sue the dirty smear merchants)
I don’t use social media generally (is this social media we’re doing now?). Your post is useful, yes. I wasn’t paying a whole lot of attention to this story. Like some of the topics Fab covers (e.g. whether there really is much of a frenzy to use ivermectin to counter SARS-CoV-2) I would have seen the headline in a Guardian feed or maybe on Democracy Now with Amy Goodman, not been that interested, but possibly assumed whatever slant the short summary took. Because of your post I at least took the time to read to the court testimony parts of this AP article, which seems not too bad in its later parts: Jury finds Rittenhouse not guilty in Kenosha shootings
I’m not sure of his guilt or innocence (in a moral sense now that the legal case is done). With the facts presented the verdict doesn’t sound outrageous, certainly. I skimmed some transcript of the defense lawyer and see where the self defense arguments could come from. For now that’s as far as I’ll take it, leaving it partly unsettled in my appraisal, but at least, from you pointing this out to me, when I hear or read left wing coverage, I’ll not take the claim of injustice at face value. Thanks.
I do look at alternative news sites. Quite often Amy Goodman’s Democracy Now. I’m not expecting good coverage of this story there, but I think I may check it out tomorrow to see how they handle it. You have to go to primary sources with them, well, a lot more than I get around to doing. But I like them cause they cover international stories in their headlines (hard to get enough of that in the U.S. or Canada) and have interesting interviews with people I wouldn’t see in mainstream outlets (e.g. Jeremy Scahill, Noam Chomsky). And to be honest I do have a left bias, so like with the guardian it’s a kind of “home base” (have to watch out for that, the podcast is teaching me that). Sometimes I’ll read Reason (libertarian in the U.S. sense) to balance it out some. Also sometimes read the Bulwarck but that’s not alternative at all, just to the right of the stuff I’ve gravitated to in the past.
What do you mean by blackpilled? I see something on wikipedia under its article about “incel” (ugh, one of these topics in modern popular culture that make me feel old and tired), but I don’t follow how you’re using it.
There’s an interesting angle to it concerning the limits of a self-defense plea involving the idea of provocation. It’s referenced in court transcripts (I could only find the defense statements somehow) and explained here: Opinion | How a Vaguely Worded Wisconsin Law Could Let Rittenhouse Walk - POLITICO
If anyone has a link to legal opinion about the provocation limit on self defense not under a title along the lines of “how the wrong decision was made and the guilty went free” I’d appreciate it.
One more thing on this… yesterday I looked for video. This warning is particularly for Fab, since he’s mentioned he’s sensitive to seeing pain and blood. There is video online of one of the young men’s final seconds. He bleeds out as other young people frantically try to find his wound to staunch it with a t-shirt only to find that it’s a head wound. The wound is quite visible in the footage.
My views are a little different today, but I’ll leave it for others to comment further if they wish, since I’ve written a lot here already.
Not sure what about the photos was bad, but construction is criticism is always welcome
Regarding the trial, I don’t think it’s as binary as any leaning media outlets colour it. I’m not a witness to the shootings, but it’s insane to me that in a country with this high a police budget it should be necessary for civilians to carry guns to protect property or themselves.
To me it’s just lives lost to meaningless violence and that sucks. I also wouldn’t underestimate how much of a “Look, it’s after all a good kid with a gun” the right is spinning of this, so I wouldn’t off the bat dismiss everyone that disagrees with them as the new mind control world order.
I respect the legal verdict, that’s what judge and jury decided. I don’t think that represents the full spectrum of intent (which is incredibly difficult to prove) or events (which obviously have a much larger relation to the US, gun culture and so on).
I didn’t say they were bad. They were very fascinating. Just too bloody for me. Which has nothing to do with the photos. I was merely saying it’s funny/weird that a birth is much harder to watch for me than Someone getting shot with a rifle.
Well, it’s a very big country. As someone who has lived in a very sparsely populated area (in Australia) I can tell you that the country’s police budget can be enormous but that doesn’t help you much if you live 20 km outside a town with a dozen coppers and two cruisers. A twelve gauge can be very useful and prudent to have in this situation.
What seems insane to me is that in a country like the US, people continue to think they won’t get shot if someone points a gun at them. As I said, I know next to nothing about this case. I’m thinking of that woman in the Capitol. You storm a door with federal agents with Glocks on the other side, what did you think was gonna happen? Same when you trespass on someone’s property in Texas. It doesn’t take a genius to forsee acute lead poisoning in these situations…
I’m thinking of that woman in the Capitol. You storm a door with federal agents with Glocks on the other side
I understand that you think of that, but comparing civilians in public with (hopefully) trained government agents is a huge leap in my eyes.
Well, it’s a very big country. As someone who has lived in a very sparsely populated area (in Australia) I can tell you that the country’s police budget can be enormous but that doesn’t help you much if you live 20 km outside a town with a dozen coppers and two cruisers.
Sure, but here somebody travelled into a 100.000 people city with his rifle. It’s not like he was defending himself at home.
Is it? There are a hell of a lot of civilians better trained than the government agents in my country. Half of the German police is very badly trained and can’t shoot for shit.
The only government agents in Germany I’d trust with a gun are SEK or maybe the BPol special forces.
I wasn’t referring to the case in question. I’ve stated several times that I haven’t read up on it. I was refuting your blanket statement because I thought it was a bit too general.
Not Kyle Rittenhouse though. In the clips you see police or maybe state guard – there were numerous armored personal carriers but these days those could be police owned, surplus sales, that sort of thing. The thing to notice here or in most any protest is that the police organize themselves in a Roman Phalanx sort of way. They don’t put themselves in a situation where they’re isolated and out of control. That way they don’t end up sitting on their ass scared for their life flailing their rifle around shooting in every which direction.
I don’t exactly have a problem with the self defense ruling (except I question if reasonable fear for his life is objectively justifiable with a random group of protestors – that’s basically saying anyone could be a killer – it’s not like he’s sitting alone at home and someone breaks in with a weapon with who knows what intent – however the article above says juries are supposed to judge subjective reasonable fear – since he’s obviously perfectly capable of shooting people it might be supposed reasonable to him to assume people going for his gun were planning to use it on him as opposed to only separating him from it) but Rittenhouse is definitely responsible for the deaths of the two young guys in the sense that someone who shows up in a hospital claiming to be a surgeon would be responsible for people he kills. Some of the people showing up with AK-47s to defend gas stations or whatever may well have had capabilities or experience but not this chubby little kid. Plainly he was out of his depth.
This case was on my radar since it happened during the BLM riots, and I’ve seen some videos of the shooting, but not with the shot person bleeding (that you referenced).
When I saw those videos, I was honestly surprised how he was mostly composed in this chaotic situation: he was being attacked, but he didn’t shoot blindly. He shot only twice against the persons attacking him.
He later clearly surrendered himself.
For me personally, I might question what he was doing there in the first place, but I have to say, he didn’t overreact in a very difficult situation.
Yeah, I would tend to agree. I still don’t understand people who get the idea to mess with a guy armed with rifle ammunition. I don’t understand how you can live in a country where this kind of weaponry is that mainstream and not know the effects of it.
“What? You’re telling me .223 Remington actually really hurts? No way??? Far out!”
I think we just have really different angles here. If the German case was the norm, it wouldn’t be in the news. I’d take a German cop with a gun over a US one any day, because they are less likely to use it.
The loss of life is the tragic thing which many fail to acknowledge and if your only option is to use lethal force, you may have fucked up.
You have a point, though he shot more than twice: four times into Joseph Rosenbaum, two misses at the guy who kicked him in the head, one killing Anthony Huber, and one in Gaige Groskeuz’s bicep. My saying flailing his weapon around (subconsciously carried this over from a quote from Jacob Blake’s father maybe) and every which way is inaccurate. I was still feeling revulsion from the clip of Rittenhouse with McCinnis early on where he’s milling about with his AR-15 and explains that he intends to provide first aid but will need the gun to protect himself when doing so. At some point he struts off saying, “we don’t have non-lethal force.” So my words were sloppy cause I had that emotional reaction.
As far as whether Rittenhouse’s assessment of his personal danger is concerned I’m still a bit doubtful. The ruling is fine. They need to err to innocence when there’s uncertainly like this. But it still strikes me as unlikely that the ones going after him would have killed him if they got his gun away from him. Not that many people are murderers even those with spotty records who will light fires during the after dark part of protests.
But my primary point in writing that he was out of his depth was not that he didn’t have the ability to shoot accurately or even to not shoot when it didn’t seem necessary. The problem is him being there in the first place and his self appointed missions. He was at once trying to protect property via intimidation and provide first aid (yah, wielding an AR-15 – sure he had lots of takers for that). For the prior he’s not physically imposing or strong, so his only means of self defence is super lethal, with a gun that’s banned in the state I live in btw. At best he could have been part of a group holding the ground there at the gas station. He says some words about trying to correct it in his testimony, but he got himself caught by himself, which no police officer doing crowd control would do (what I meant by phalanx, him being unqualified like someone posing as a surgeon). I should have written that he shared responsibility for the deaths, since Rosenbaum (apparently released from mental care after a suicide attempt) obviously didn’t have to chase after him and Zaminsky didn’t have to go firing his gun escalating matters.
Part of Rittenhouse’s error was maybe from lack of awareness (he claimed not to know the Proud Boys or the okay symbol so maybe he’s not up on that state of the world, to be charitable to his explanation over that incident). He’s clearly a gun guy so maybe wasn’t thinking about how crazy it looks to open carry an assault rifle at a protest/riot to some of us, having this idea it’s reasonable 2nd amendment protected behavior, every merican’s right or whatever. But what he maybe overlooked is it’s plainly advertising yourself as taking a side, whatever your true intentions or beliefs, to be open carrying assault rifles at BLM protests (unless you’re black and doing some kind of Black Panther retro move), so he’s going to be viewed as an armed counter protester. Counter protesters and main protesters frequently tustle – the hate each way in summer 2020 was especially hot. He was saying up front the purpose of the weapon was self protection, since he knew some protesters were packing (everybody’s packing now it seems – last week a woman here in Massachusetts carrying a baby in a shopping mall parking lot accidentally fired her pistol rummaging around in her purse for keys). He’s remained consistent afterward in this, no regrets for having it since he believes he’d be dead otherwise. If he was so certain the threat was that great why did he go? His wish to protect private property or help the hypothetically wounded was enough he’d put himself in a place he might need to kill someone? If shit happens well, they should have known better than to mess with his big gun, he has to do what he has to do for self-preservation? This is what I find disgusting about him.
I get your point, and this is also what I meant when I said I question what he was doing there in the first place.
But as you said, the situation during the protest was of anarchy.
I tend usually to take a non-confrontational stance, that’s why I would not put myself in a similar position if I don’t have to. But I also understand that this is a personal strategy, and I don’t expect everyone to take the same position.
During the riots one side was clearly making a point, and I can’t honestly judge someone who would choose to take a counter position.
I don’t like the escalation, but unfortunately it’s only natural.
Just noting that with NewPipe you do not have to (maybe even can’t) login to Google. Just enabe age-restricted content in the settings, and your’e good to go.
Which reminds me - we should have the OTG category here.
Well, I don’t see it as tragic. If you charge a guy with a rifle and expect not to get shot, that isn’t tragic. That’s really an extremely dumb thing to do that deserves a Darwin Award.
