It would not be baffling if people were simply advocating for changes to the gun law, but most people in these threads seem to be insistent we must have some legal way to “get” these guys. Our laws don’t work that way. If you want to ban the carrying of guns you have to pass laws to that effect–albeit it is becoming increasingly uncertain if the Supreme Court will even permit such laws.
It may not, by itself. There would probably have to be a motion in response to it, like a motion for a mistrial or for a curative instruction.
I see no one in the thread arguing this way. As far as I can tell, everyone here who thinks Rittenhouse is am odious shitbag who should face consequences for what he did ALSO recognized that under our legal code as written he will most likely skate.
I theorize he was bullied all through school, and thought that by getting a gun and swaggering through some other town, he could reinvent himself into some kind of ersatz alpha male.
Admittedly I haven’t seen the entire trial and don’t really care about it all that much.
However, I did happen to catch some discussion on Anderson Cooper last night and I’m not sure it’s as cut and dried as people think.
In the short clip I saw, it did seem to me that Rittenhouse was being attacked. First by an individual they identified as “drop kick man” (because he attempted to drop kick Rittenhouse in the face), and then next by a guy with a skateboard. In that context, sure, if I had an AR-15 and was getting attacked by a bunch of people, I might be inclined to pop off a few rounds in self defense.
Of course, regardless of the legality, I do strongly believe that it shows a criminally bad judgement to grab a semi-automatic rifle and drive several hours to a violent riot (sorry Liberals. If it has burning buildings and people throwing shit, it’s a “riot”.)
I’d be hard pressed to believe that they saw him as a credible threat.
I think Rosenbaum saw what he believed to be an easy target. His actions were more consistent with that belief than a scenario where he believed Rittenhouse to be a credible threat.
If he believed Rittenhouse to be a credible threat to his safety then his actions were straight up suicidal.
As near as I can tell Rosenbaum “fucked around and found out”.
Uh, was it “15 miles” or “several hours”?
As it happens, Rosenbaum had just been released from the hospital that day, following his second suicide attempt in as many months.
I think it’s a mistake to assume anything Rosenbaum was doing had any rational intent.
Agreed. All of you who are hijacking this thread to talk about Trayvon Martin, please stop.
I suspect Rittenhouse will also be offered a full scholarship to a pinnacle of right-wing academia. I do have one in mind. He will be to the right what David Hogg is to… normal people who don’t think the US Constitution was meant as the founding document of a death cult.
FWIW, I also suspect Rittenhouse will be found not guilty. Not because he isn’t morally culpable, and not because our laws should be structured so as to ensure someone like him is acquitted of murder, but because the law as written seems skewed towards an imagined right to make conflicts deadly while being blind to the inherently provocative nature of merely displaying a gun in public.
If I advance towards a line of protestors with a skateboard and yell “I’m gonna kill you!” those protestors might just have a case for self-defense up to and including lethal force. But if I just stand there across the street leering at them with an assault rifle slung across my chest, capable of dealing death much more swiftly and at such a range as to allow force to be dealt much faster than a skateboard-wielding maniac can advance, I’m just “exercising my rights under the law.” Until of course I raise my gun and point it at the first person who makes to hurl a bottle my way (for reasons which I’m sure none of us can fathom, as there is nothing provocative about standing across from someone displaying a gun, right?), at which point I guess it’s a wash as to whether I had a credible fear that that glass bottle might pose a risk of great bodily harm or death to me. I mean, gosh, it could have been a Molotov cocktail! Anyway, better to be judged by twelve than carried by six (or so the growing crowd of supporters putting up my bail chants all together).
If that’s what you took away from this thread I don’t know what to tell you other than you are wrong about the law.
It’s the way it seems to me, too. Sure, it’s not supposed to be that way, but that’s how these trials work out. The victim is black, after all.
Your point is not nearly as clear when you take into account that at least two people on the other “side” were also openly displaying firearms. What makes one more provocative than the other? Does it go by what side of the protest you are on?
As far as I know, no one of importance in the Rittenhouse case is black.
Did Kyle go there looking for trouble? Very likely. Is what happened to him in line with whatever he hoped or part of some “plan”? It doesn’t seem so. I agree: he’s morally a piece of shit, but *legally" doesn’t seem in the wrong for the shooting based on what I’ve read here.
Rittenhouse, Rosenbaum et al were rioters engaged in mayhem. Their mayhem resulted in injury and death for which they all bear equal guilt.
I actually have no idea. A quick Google search said he drove about 30 minutes, which is consistent with 15 miles. But the point is he wasn’t there because he was defending where he lived.
My bias is don’t go looking for trouble you don’t need.
There is actually no clear evidence Rittenhouse was engaged in rioting. Walking down a sidewalk and putting out a fire isn’t “rioting” by even the loosest definition of the word. Now it’s possible there’s things he did that night that might qualify as rioting, but if so, I haven’t seen clear evidence to that effect.
I guess I’m not even convinced he went there “looking for trouble.” I think a lot of assumptions are being made in statements like that. Look, there’s a whole weird subculture out there now of people showing up at these “riotous protests” armed, wearing tactical gear, and basically just “playing” at being a paramedic or a security guard. The vast, vast majority of big riotous protests have featured hundreds of people acting like this, the vast majority of whom have not fired their weapons or hurt anyone. That isn’t me saying I approve of the conduct or think it wise, but that most of the people that go do exactly what Rittenhouse did don’t really appear to end up doing anything violent to anyone.
Is it possible, nay likely, they have fantasies of themselves heroically defending society from evil rioters? Sure. Lots of people have fantasies. Some of them join the Society of Creative Anachronism, but how many of those people end up raiding small towns or etc? Like there’s a difference between what a person might dream or pretend they want to do and what they actually do. I equally put very little stock in the fact that Rittenhouse was seen a few weeks earlier on video saying (in regards to some people stealing from a store or something) that he “wishes he had his AR so he could fire some shots.” If every person I’ve known–many of them not “riot play actors” but just good old fashioned rednecks, who have talked about this, that and the other situation where they’d “let some rounds fly” had actually shot someone I’d know dozens of murderers. Matter of point outside of my military contacts I know two people that have shot and killed people–one was a police officer friend of mine who killed an armed robber in the early 1980s, and the other was a guy who shot and killed a man who was trying to kill his mom.
I’m not saying there aren’t people that shoot thieves and what have you, but this talking tough about various people is rarely indicative of anything serious. To me it is little real evidence showing Rittenhouse’s intentions with showing up at Kenosha.
I don’t see clear cut evidence Rittenhouse went anywhere with an intention to kill, and I think it’s equally as plausible, and possibly even more likely, that he was just a big dumb ass who went there to “play” in the riots, and then was put into a self-defense situation. FWIW I don’t think Gage Grosskreutz went there to kill anyone either, and his actions very closely mirror Rittenhouse’s with the exception being he wasn’t assaulted and chased, but rather pulled a gun on someone another person was trying to attack with a skateboard, Gage thought Rittenhouse was an active shooter so fair enough. If everyone doing what Rittenhouse did was there to shoot people there’d have been hundreds of shootings that night, ergo just strapping on a rifle and going to play act as a security guard at a riot isn’t clear evidence to me of intention to murder.
Once the riot starts, all of the non-official people in that area are rioters.
Nope.