Kyle Rittenhouse abruptly departed the stage during an appearance at the University of Memphis on Wednesday, after he was confronted about comments made by Turning Point USA founder and president Charlie Kirk.

Rittenhouse was invited by the college’s Turning Point USA chapter to speak at the campus. However, the event was met with backlash from a number of students who objected to Rittenhouse’s presence.

The 21-year-old gained notoriety in August 2020 when, at the age of 17, he shot and killed two men—Joseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, as well as injuring 26-year-old Gaige Grosskreutz—at a protest in Kenosha, Wisconsin.

He said the three shootings, carried out with a semi-automatic AR-15-style firearm, were in self-defense. The Black Lives Matter (BLM) protest where the shootings took place was held after Jacob Blake, a Black man, was left paralyzed from the waist down after he was shot by a white police officer.

  • CileTheSane@lemmy.ca
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    8 months ago

    the shooting of Jacob Blake which was 100% justified as it turned out the dude was abusing his girlfriend and pulled a knife on the police when they tried to arrest him.

    And the legal punishment for that is losing your legs? Cops in the UK take down assailants with knives all the time without paralyzing them for life. If they then had a jury sentence them to have their legs cut off people would call it barbaric, but again, put them in front of an American cop and “they had it coming.”

    I would not hit an old person because they used a fire extinguisher on me

    Old man or no, he was assaulting people with a fire extinguisher and got assaulted in return. Why didn’t he “have it coming”?

    I wouldn’t even fucking be looting and burning a random store to begin with.

    Oh right, because property is the most important thing and the property was in danger. “Won’t somebody please think of the property?!”

    • Samueru@lemmy.world
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      8 months ago

      And the legal punishment for that is losing your legs? Cops in the UK take down assailants with knives all the time without paralyzing them for life. If they then had a jury sentence them to have their legs cut off people would call it barbaric, but again, put them in front of an American cop and “they had it coming.”

      Poor guy. Also you’re starting in a very bad place if you are comparing US cops to UK cops, US cops constantly shoot people armed with knives and no one goes around “protesting” because of it, this case was because a very short video of only the shooting were the knife could barely even be seen was posted on twitter and misinformation about it spreaded instantly.

      Old man or no, he was assaulting people with a fire extinguisher and got assaulted in return. Why didn’t he “have it coming”?

      Oh right, because property is the most important thing and the property was in danger. “Won’t somebody please think of the property?!”

      Insane that you would defend such person that would sucker punched an old guy. While at the same fucking time having a problem that kyle defended themselves from being attacked. amazing.

      Also I don’t know what drama you have with property when the people that were killed were killed because they attacked someone that was armed. So yeah stop whining about that.

      • CileTheSane@lemmy.ca
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        8 months ago

        I don’t know what drama you have with property when the people that were killed were killed because they attacked someone that was armed. So yeah stop whining about that.

        If we could go back to my original post, I was not complaining about the people who got shot, I was pointing out Rittenhouse’s own stated reasons for being there:

        he was at the demonstration to “protect businesses and provide medical assistance.”

        He brought a gun to an area he had no business being in to protect property. With his gun. What did he think he was going to do with it if not shoot people (take lives) to protect property?

        • Samueru@lemmy.world
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          8 months ago

          Oh yeah, what kyle did is very stupid. But what the others were doing is orders of magnitude more stupid.

          He brought a gun to an area he had no business being in to protect property. With his gun. What did he think he was going to do with it if not shoot people (take lives) to protect property?

          Not really, usually just having people armed is enough to deter others from looting, that’s more likely what they expected to happen.

          And it doesn’t matter because no looter was shot here.

          So yeah if you shoot at some people simply because they were looting you’re in big trouble, or maybe you are, in the end in the US trials are by jury and most likely than not if you are the owner of the place it is very likely that the jury would not found you guilty, don’t test it out though lol.

          • CileTheSane@lemmy.ca
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            8 months ago

            usually just having people armed is enough to deter others from looting

            So the plan was to threaten people with a gun and people are surprised he got attacked?
            What do you think the plan would have been if someone ignored the gun and went after damaging property anyway?

            in the end in the US trials are by jury

            Unless they’re by a vigilante or a cop giving someone a death sentence. Then they “had it coming.”

            • Samueru@lemmy.world
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              8 months ago

              So the plan was to threaten people with a gun and people are surprised he got attacked?

              Did kyle threatened people with their gun? Open carry =! brandishing

              What do you think the plan would have been if someone ignored the gun and went after damaging property anyway?

              They yeah they would have fucked up if they fired on that person.

              Unless they’re by a vigilante or a cop giving someone a death sentence. Then they “had it coming.”

              k

              • CileTheSane@lemmy.ca
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                8 months ago

                Did kyle threatened people with their gun? Open carry =! brandishing

                usually just having people armed is enough to deter others from looting, that’s more likely what they expected to happen.

                And why does having a person with a gun deter looting? Because it’s an implicit threat that they will get shot. Hence, “threatening”.

                • Samueru@lemmy.world
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                  8 months ago

                  Are you for real arguing that armed people protecting a place are a threat to you and therefore you can use that as justification of self defense if you attack them? lmao.

                  “Yes your honor, this guy with a gun was a threat to my looting therefore I attacked them and because they fought back I killed them in self defense, yes they tried to flee but I still killed them anyway”

                  • CileTheSane@lemmy.ca
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                    8 months ago

                    I am arguing that only an idiot points a gun at someone they don’t intend to kill.
                    In the same vein I am arguing that only an idiot brings a gun somewhere to “protect property” if they don’t intend to use it. (Whether they “want to” or not is irrelevant, if whatever situation they consider appropriate arises, they intend to shoot somebody.)

                    For someone to bring their gun somewhere they have no good reason being in order to “protect property” they need to be ready and willing to use it or they are too fucking stupid to be allowed to have a gun.

                    Which goes back to my original point: “you can take lives to protect property. You can not damage property to protect lives.”

                    The property of complete strangers was more important to Rittenhouse than the lives of the complete strangers he would be shooting in order to “protect” it.