Kyle Rittenhouse & the Kenosha Shooting

1,174 words

Two days ago, 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse was charged with murder in the deaths of two people shot during the Tuesday night riot in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Mainstream media outlets jumped on the story and denounced Rittenhouse, an upstanding young white man who clearly acted in self-defense, as a homicidal “white supremacist” and a “domestic terrorist.” The press coverage of the incident illustrates why white nationalists should stay away from BLM/Antifa riots. White men who enter into confrontations with Leftists will inevitably be portrayed as violent terrorists, regardless of their actual motives and actions.

In the days before the shooting, BLM/Antifa rioters set fire to several local businesses, homes, and more than 50 cars and municipal vehicles in Kenosha. The destruction caused by the “mostly peaceful [1]” riots has taken a toll on the town. On Wednesday, the Kenosha County Board requested [2] the deployment of National Guard troops: “Our county is under attack. Our businesses are under attack. Our homes are under attack. Our local law enforcement agencies need additional support to help bring civility back to our community.”

The mainstream narrative is that Rittenhouse, who is from Antioch, Illinois, went to Kenosha to hunt down innocent protesters and kill them for sport. This could not be further from the truth. Rittenhouse wanted to help the residents of Kenosha and protect the town from further damage. Before the shooting, he was spotted cleaning up BLM graffiti. He told the Daily Caller that he was there to protect people and small businesses and offer medical assistance: “If there’s somebody hurt, I’m running into harm’s way.” These are not the words of someone who is out to kill people.

There is no evidence that Rittenhouse was a white nationalist or white supremacist. Based on the available evidence, he appears to be a pretty typical Trump-supporting conservative who believes it is possible to restore order by working within the system. Perhaps he is beginning to see the futility of this position.

Rittenhouse shot three people, two of them fatally. Mainstream accounts of the incident give the impression that he walked up to rioters and randomly began shooting at them unprovoked. In each [3] case [4], however, he did not shoot until they attacked him.

The chain of events began when Joseph Rosenbaum — a 36-year-old Jewish pedophile and a registered sex offender — began chasing Rittenhouse, threw something at him, and lunged at him. Rittenhouse turned around and shot Rosenbaum. The man beside him tried to use his shirt to stanch the bleeding while Rittenhouse pulled out his phone, likely calling 911 to get medical help. He fled the scene when people started chasing him shouting “Get that motherf***er!”

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Based on the evidence, the rioters were planning to torch a car dealership they had looted the previous day. It is possible that Rittenhouse verbally confronted them and that this prompted Rosenbaum to attack him.

As Rittenhouse was running from his crazed pursuers, he tripped and fell in the middle of the street, at which point they shouted “Get his a**!” and charged at him. One man, 26-year old Anthony Huber, hit him on the head with a skateboard and tried to seize his gun. Rittenhouse shot him while lying on his back. Like Rosenbaum, Huber had a criminal record: in 2012, he was arrested on charges of domestic violence, strangulation and suffocation, use of a dangerous weapon, and false imprisonment. (Despite this, he is being hailed as a “hero” and a “peaceful person [6].” You can’t make this up.)

The third casualty was Gaige Grosskreutz, who charged at Rittenhouse with a handgun. He was shot in the arm and is expected to survive. Grosskreutz, a 26-year-old man who is connected with the far-Left “People’s Revolution Movement,” has a criminal record that includes burglary, theft, and violation of probation. Because he is a felon, his possession of a handgun was also illegal.

The victims are representative of the sorts of people who are attracted to Antifa ideology: namely, psychologically disturbed, deviant men with criminal pasts. Many of them are pedophiles or transsexuals. They are also disproportionately Jewish.

The victims’ criminal histories are consistent with the aggressive behavior they display in the videos of the incident. Given their behavior, it was fair for Rittenhouse to assume that they were about to violently attack him. The victims also should have known better than to manically charge at someone with an AR-15. Their strange behavior could be a function of their mental disturbance.

Unfortunately, Rittenhouse’s actions were not entirely legal. Under Wisconsin state law, one can use force in self-defense if one has reason to believe it is necessary to prevent injury or death. However, minors are not allowed to legally carry weapons except under certain circumstances. There is a statute exempting minors who belong to the armed forces or police and are armed in the line of duty, but it would not apply here.

Sure, Rittenhouse could have handled the situation better. He is young and inexperienced and did not understand what he was getting himself into. But it does not take a genius to see that the media’s portrayal of him was manufactured out of thin air. Rittenhouse is fundamentally a good guy, an idealistic young man who wanted to protect people and emulate his boyhood heroes. His profile picture featured the motto “Duty, Honor, Courage.”

Needless to say, the media are indifferent to Rittenhouse’s violation of Wisconsin’s gun ownership laws. They are demonizing him solely because he is a white man who defended himself and stood up to Leftist intimidation. Any white male who defends himself is automatically a terrorist, even if he is a kind-hearted, naïve kid.

It is ironic that the people who advocate defunding the police and replacing traditional policing with community policing are the same people who have condemned men like Rittenhouse and George Zimmerman, and Gregory and Travis McMichael, who all engaged in a form of community policing. For his 16th birthday, Rittenhouse asked for donations to Humanizing the Badge, a non-profit whose mission is to strengthen ties between police officers and the communities they serve. The Left really are not in favor of community policing as such — they only support it insofar as it gives free rein to black criminality.

As Greg Johnson commented [7], the only thing Kyle Rittenhouse did wrong was to think it was worth risking his life to confront the rioters. This is not our fight, and engaging in conflicts with BLM/Antifa merely gives our enemies ammunition. Our best bet is to remain above the fray for now and swoop down when the time is right.

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