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PaperclipPerfector  8mo ago (text post)   25744 thread views

Culture War Roundup for the week of May 20, 2024

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It's interesting because the guy with the rifle was in some sense doing a right wing coded thing. Open carrying a rifle, which in Texas is legal. It's been a left wing talking point that this in and of itself should be considered a threatening act (see Rittenhouse, K). Which means in other circumstances it could quite well have been the case that the right was outraged by the shooting, as open carrying a rifle in and of itself should not be grounds to be seen as threat of violence, that justifies self-defence. In fact if Foster had shot and killed Perry as he was driving a car towards a protest he would have been in the Rittenhouse position! Arguing he brought a rifle to the protest to defend against just such an attack.

Which is why (as with Rittenhouse) the case hinged on whether the rifle was pointed at someone and if this itself constitutes a threat. Only without clear video in this case to show one way or another.

There is a narrative here where Rittenhouse was found not guilty (correctly) because he did not point his gun at someone and therefore was not threatening, and Foster also did not point his gun at someone so was not threatening and was thus murdered by Perry. In that case the left would have a case to argue that they did indeed play by the rules more than the right. Rittenhouse was acquitted. The jury set aside all the political stuff and acquitted him. Perry was found guilty then a political intervention happened. That's how I would contrast the two stories if I were still going to bat for the left in a political sense at least. The left left (hah) it up to the judicial system to decide the right (hah!) outcome, the right refused to do that and blatantly freed a convicted murderer. Might have some bad optics for squishy moderates. But of course plays well with those already convinced. Unlikely to make a difference in Texas, but might have some play if pushed nationally, perhaps.

I suppose to turn the discussion back to you, if you had clear video that Foster did not point his gun at Perry, and was just walking around, would you accept that he like Rittenhouse did not actually threaten someone and thus Perry shooting him was murder?

Open carrying a rifle, which in Texas is legal

Open carrying a rifle in a sling is legal. Open carrying a rifle in your hands is not.

This is a perfectly reasonable schelling point. It’s a different schelling point from the majority of first world countries, but Foster holding the rifle in his hands instead of leaving it slung was technically a serious crime and if this had been tarrant county instead of Travis would probably have been enough for Perry to avoid indictment.

This is a fair point. But presumably the idea in carrying the gun is that at some point you may have to actually unsling your gun and use it legally. So there must be some circumstances in which that is legal. Self-defence being one I would assume. Trapped in a room with a bear?

So holding the rifle can't always be a serious crime?

Yes. In point of fact, intelligent people have already thought about this and brandishing is a crime even if openly carrying is not: https://california.public.law/codes/ca_penal_code_section_417

(1)Every person who, except in self-defense, in the presence of any other person, draws or exhibits any deadly weapon whatsoever, other than a firearm, in a rude, angry, or threatening manner, or who in any manner, unlawfully uses a deadly weapon other than a firearm in any fight or quarrel is guilty of a misdemeanor, punishable by imprisonment in a county jail for not less than 30 days. Every person who, except in self-defense, in the presence of any other person, draws or exhibits any firearm, whether loaded or unloaded, in a rude, angry, or threatening manner, or who in any manner, unlawfully uses a firearm in any fight or quarrel is punishable as follows:

Self defense, yes, but Perry wasn’t pointing a gun at him.

But he may have been driving a car at the crowd right? If Perry drives car at crowd, then Foster can hold unsling his rifle and presumably open fire and Perry can't claim self-defence because he provoked. Unless of course by blocking the road Foster was provoking Perry.

Its why I think all self-defence shootings should have to to trial. Because most of them hinge on who was reasonable to fear what. And the people best suited to decide that is a jury of peers. But the trial should have to be expedited.

I suppose to turn the discussion back to you, if you had clear video that Foster did not point his gun at Perry, and was just walking around, would you accept that he like Rittenhouse did not actually threaten someone and thus Perry shooting him was murder?

I think there is a higher standard to convict someone of murder when they have a legitimate self-defense claim, compared with the standard of having a legitimate self defense claim in the moment.

The standard for self defense is: Would a reasonable person have felt like their life or limb was threatened in that moment? So lets look at an alternative, what if Rosenbaum actually got his hands on Rittenhouse and killed him? Would Rosenbaum have had a legitimate self-defense claim? I don't think so, because of how far he chased Rittenhouse. But if it was a shorter distance, then maybe.

And both those things can be true, that both the killer and the slain could have had a reasonable fear for their life.

And both those things can be true, that both the killer and the slain could have had a reasonable fear for their life.

This is a good point, and I agree! Not all situations are clear cut.

It's interesting because the guy with the rifle was in some sense doing a right wing coded thing.

Only in the barest sense. It is very important to note he was carrying while committing a crime that crime was false imprisonment and every "protestor" that stops traffic and begins to surround a vehicle should be so charged.

In fact if Foster had shot and killed Perry as he was driving a car towards a protest he would have been in the Rittenhouse position!

Again no. While some jurisdictions would charge you with manslaughter or murder for ramming an illegal protest I think this is a genuine misapplication of prosecutorial discretion and we should probably have a federal civil rights banning such prosecutions. IMO any one whos car is stopped or is being threatened to be stopped by a riot is rightfully in fear of death or great bodily harm. See: https://youtube.com/watch?v=CCtoRHcyirs

I suppose to turn the discussion back to you, if you had clear video that Foster did not point his gun at Perry, and was just walking around, would you accept that he like Rittenhouse did not actually threaten someone and thus Perry shooting him was murder?

Nope, like I said. He Foster forfeited his life rightfully when he join a mob attempting to intimidate and functionally imprisoning people.

Blocking roads has been part of American discourse for a long time. Legalising just ploughing through the crowds seems a little over the top.

  • -10

Sorry, your comment is not right enough. Automatic downvotes! Only running down protesters is approved behavior.

Eh, if being downvoted bothered me, I'd have been gone years ago. I'm content that most people here wouldn't actually be mowing down protestors.

Some certainly imagine that they want to.

So has installing "self-defense cannon" in a structure as an anti-mob measure. But law has, for better or worse, evolved on that question.

Blocking roads is turning the public property into private. It is wrong and shouldn’t be seen as “American discourse”

I would ask you to imagine what side of the Boston massacre you think you would have been on in 1770.

This sounds similar to Jordan Peterson's statement on if you were born into Post WW1 Germany you probably would have been a nazi, or at least wouldn't have actively gone against the regime. But I think the circumstances between being a German citizen during WWII and a colonist in the 1770s are different enough that the same line of thinking doesn't apply.

Analysis of the American Revolution suggests 40% of whites were Patriots, 20% Loyalists, and the rest neutral. So just based on probability, one is twice as likely to have been for independence than side with the British government.

It's very likely at the moment of the Boston massacre the percentage of colonists that wanted independence was much lower, but it was exactly events such as the massacre that pushed many colonists to become Patriots.

I think part of what is muddying the discussion is that the people who are using these protest tactics (such as blocking the road) are advocating for the most insane things and it's hard to feel any sympathy for them. People would be more tolerant of these actions such as roadblocks if the protests were about things that mattered to the general population. Instead, these protestors are protesting first-world problems that only a rich, privileged society would have time to support a population that would care about such things. A poor person in Africa doesn't care about climate change, they would be rather happy to burn coal to generate electricity. A starving person doesn't care about animal rights and veganism.

Furthermore, these protest tactics have almost no actual risk to the protestors. Nobody protesting by blocking the streets is actually expecting that there is a chance a car will just plow through them. If they really had the conviction to die for a cause they should strap themselves onto railway tracks, because that would actually get some attention. When they do something dangerous, all the protestors start to panic as if dying wasn't a possibility of their action.

So these protestors masquerade as potential martyrs of what they claim to be the most pressing point of concern in the world, yet in reality they argue for things most people don't care about and pretend to engage in activity that would make them appear as if they are putting something on the line when they aren't by taking advantage of the goodwill of their fellow citizens, so in the end all they do is serve as a public nuisance. And when the state refuses to take action against this type of behavior, people will eventually lose all that goodwill and will be forced to take action by their own hands.

I mean you do have the extreme folks burning themselves alive still...or have we already forgotten that airforce guy? I agree that a lot of the protests are performative, or not relevant to the culture that the protesters occupy. I disagree that it is an illegitimated form of expression. It has been here from the start and even if it is a poor copy at least they are out there doing it. More than I can say for most of us.

Aaron Bushnell is already out of the public consciousness and his actions did not have the impact he was hoping for.

I will agree that he at least had the conviction to do something, as stupid as it was. Stupid in the sense that it did very little to push his supposed cause of freeing Palestine.

I drafted a post of around 3700 words about Bushnell the week he self-immolated looking into the history of self-immolation and its most prominent and impactful examples and how Bushnell's action relates to it but I never posted it because I never finished it as I got busy and now it's not a relevant event anymore. My prediction was that it would have little to no impact on the public discourse or opinion on Palestine and I think so far that prediction has held true. His actions, in the end, were just a minor net negative outcome to the world. Maybe we might see something happen. But probably not.

I'm actually in agreement with you that the willingness to fight for a cause is something many people lack, and if applied properly can be an admirable quality in a person. The difference between the colonists rebelling in the late 1700s versus a vegan protestor blocking the road on the streets is that the colonists were fighting for a cause a large portion of the population itself cared for, and the colonist was actually putting his life in danger by engaging in literal warfare (or standing up to actual British soldiers pointing guns in the case of the Boston massacre).

The goal of the protestors should be to get people to join your cause so you get the desired end result you want. If someone is going to be a public nuisance to protest for a cause, at least have it be a cause that people actually care about. Otherwise, all it does is make people hate the cause. It's worse than just screaming on the internet or even doing nothing, now you have people who actively go against the cause you want to advocate for. The protests over insignificant things in a manner detrimental to the public is why these discussions are happening in the first place. I think there are a lot of people who say they are against roadblocks as a form of protest but would be willing to condone or at least not be vocal in opposing it as a tactic if it was an issue of enough public importance and significance that it impacted them. But the point is that it's not, these protests in America have been about climate change, veganism, Palestine... all things that ultimately don't matter to your day-to-day American citizen.

Too many of these protests over insignificant things and society will decide it's enough and find a way to just stop them outright. I think I can agree with you that protests can serve a cause and push society in a better direction... but it needs to be used for things that people care about, and in a manner that impacts the people that can make actual decisions. Blocking roads is actively detrimental to a cause, if these people want to protest they should pick a more effective tactic.

Well said. I agree. I don't think that most modern protests are effective because they don't actually have the actual consent of the majority of the people and therefore they fail or turn into riots or disturbances. That being said, even protests that most people endorse will still quelled by the authorities. How do we know when we cross that line. Do we all just feel it?

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@Supah_Schmendrick is correct. The "Boston Massacre" was absurd propaganda, and the troops involved were successfully defended in court by one of our founding fathers.

It was great propaganda! The troops and all of England lost in the court of public opinion and the propaganda helped inspire the revolution. The protesters of today are also, often if not almost always, legally in the wrong, but they are hoping for the same result.

The same one as John Adams, thank-you-very-much.

So a non-participant also willing to provide a defense to the much maligned accused parties while actually being sympathetic to the protestors' cause?

"On that night, the foundation of American Independence was laid,” wrote John Adams. “Not the Battle of Lexington or Bunker Hill, not the surrender of Burgoyne or Cornwallis, were more important events in American history than the battle of King Street on the 5th of March, 1770.”

Sympathy to a cause has very little to do with analysis of the behavior of that cause's partisans in a particular instance.

Very few people think that way. John Adams was exceptional. Also, I doubt you are defending people that are fighting for the "enemy" here. Do your sympathies actually lie with the protesters blocking the road and are you defending the driver out of a principled stance for representation and fair play?

Civil disobedience is is a well worn use of public power in the West. Though I think the French may be the champions at it.

I am not sure it is quite as American as apple pie..but rebelling against authority through acts of civil disobedience were right there at the dawn of the Republic.

  • -10

Mobs blocking streets and harassing motorists is civil? If they were more civil he'd probably still be alive.

Blocking streets would be almost a textbook example of civil disobedience yes. Harassing motorists less so, but probably still covered, depending on the motorist and the level of harassment, particularly if they were trying to break the blockade. Whether civil disobedience needs to be peaceful is debated. Civil relates to citizens and their relationship with the state, not civil as in polite or peaceful necessarily.

Civil disobedience doesn't mean they are correct of course, it just means publicly breaking laws in service of some goal. Refusing to pay your taxes can be civil disobedience (a la Thoreau) and so can illegal marches and protests (a la Gandhi).

Thoreau, yes. Gandhi and MLK also. All examples of peaceful civil disobedience. Equating their work and the the BLM lawlessness is grotesque.

Blocking roads and harassing motorists is not spinning cotton or mining salt. There's no nexus between the 'demands' and the disobedience.

Much of the effect of civil disobedience is forcing the state to arrest and prosecute you for your violations. The greater the nexus of the violation to your complaint the better. Frequently leading them to appear petty and vindictive, rallying others to your cause.

Thoreau's version was very different. Thoreau was breaking the very law he objected to. Same with Rosa Parks. But in many other cases, the protests were breaking other laws which the protestors had no objection to (except when used against themselves). Blockading streets is not Thoreau's version of civil disobedience.

Much of the effect of civil disobedience is forcing the state to arrest and prosecute you for your violations. The greater the nexus of the violation to your complaint the better. Frequently leading them to appear petty and vindictive, rallying others to your cause.

It hasn't been that for a long time. The state figured out the counter -- just make the penalties very severe, the way it was for the Charlottesville torch-carriers or January 6. Can't run your cause while in solitary in the D.C. jail or incommunicado in a Federal rape camp. And if the media is on the other side, this will all look deserved.

Instead, "civil disobedience" nowadays is theatre. Groups nominally outside the government demand unpopular stuff, and groups inside the government who want that stuff but know it is unpopular pretend their hand is forced.

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Civil disobedience properly is directed at the governing authority; not random citizens.

It is one reason why the J6 narrative is so funny to me. Here you had a group of rioters attacking the government. That is the worst attack since Pearl Harbor according to some. But the summer where thousands of people burned cities and harmed regular every day people? Well that was mostly peaceful civil disobedience. Who, whom.

Civil disobedience properly is directed at the governing authority; not random citizens.

In a democracy, particularly one as deeply run by small-scale voluntary and communal organizations as the US used to be, there often wasn't much of a difference between the two.

Of course, the U.S. hasn't been that kind of democracy for a long time.

This is a 'Hamas was justified killing Israeli citizens, because some used to be IDF' tier justification.

Also the justification for aerial bombing, total war, etc. long history.

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How about a "right to retreat"? If you decide to leave and there isn't a safe route, that's the blockade's fault. They're still free to block the road, but they can't surround and attack vehicles.

I completely agree protestors should not surround and attack vehicles. Those who do should certainly be arrested and charged.

Or if they're not being arrested, they may be shot / run over.

It is necessary in the face of increased violence of the protests as well as the bizarro world prosecutors that bring cases against people being kidnapped.

Essentially, the reality is this article, but using the same stats to say the opposite: https://apps.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2021/10/vehicle-rammings-against-protesters/tulsa/

This is also not "blocking roads" (although I oppose that as well and would defend criminal and civil immunity for rammers) the guy in this present case was carrying a rifle, the person in the "sob story" in that Globe article was part of a group that was throwing bottles and significantly damaged the truck in question. Its not that peaceful protests dont exist anymore, its that they cannot be a reasonable presumption, so the BOP needs to be shifted. And because prosecutors cant be trusted (the ABA and the profession as a whole are heavily partisan) places like Oklahoma and Florida are correct to protect drivers.

What we have right now is near total lawlessness in many states with regards to these riots. People have taken the peaceful protest meme/loophole from the media and attempted to turn it into the Chicxulub crater. My proposed pushback isn't even extreme, its temperate given the problem we are facing.

I suppose to turn the discussion back to you, if you had clear video that Foster did not point his gun at Perry, and was just walking around, would you accept that he like Rittenhouse did not actually threaten someone and thus Perry shooting him was murder?

Yes. See here. As @Capitol_Room loves to quote, "what profits a man if he gains the whole world, but loses his soul?" Tribalism may be an inescapable reality, but it is not the foundation of Justice, and Justice cannot be denied.

I'm not sure how much that's worth, and I'm not sure how much worth it will retain as things continue along the current trajectory.

Also, in before a million arguments with your hypothetical.

Fair and a good answer!

I do think Arbury, Rittenhouse and Perry show that things are not as bad as they may seem judicially at least.

The justice sysyem agreed with you on Arbury (admittedly after significant publicity to actually bring charges), agreed with you on Rittenhouse (i think?), and presumably disagreed with you on Perry, though at least that one wasn't as clear cut, and Texas being much more ok with carrying rifles around makes it an interesting one, and it was still able to be corrected within as you point out the rules of the system.

I know it is said the process is the punishment, but if the system were hopelessly skewed against you and yours, the outcomes would also be worse, I think.

It's a minor thing, but I wonder about the coding of AK-pattern rifles (this case) versus AR types. I know right-leaning folks who own AK patterns, but every example of the right bringing guns to a protest seems to prefer ARs. I assume the American-designed AR is more 'patriotic' than a foreign platform? The AK specifically has all sorts of 'adversary' connotations.

But I suspect there are some here far more familiar with the thinking.

The AR is the American gun. Domestic design, often domestic manufacture. Long history as our service rifle. Strong competition for making both weapons and ammunition.

There’s also a “build your own” factor which gets more people into the ecosystem. This is exemplified by the common top rail, which makes it much cheaper and easier to mount all sorts of optics. But it extends to the stock, handguard, more or less every part. Combined with the hordes of manufacturers, and any gun show becomes a flood of garish polymer customizations and overpriced accessories. While such things are available for the AK, the market is much smaller.

As a mottizen put it, the AR-15 is the Wayne Gretzky of guns.

Are you familiar with Brandon Herrera? I don't think there's any connotation there. AKs used to be the "cheap" option, now they're sorta exotic/cool and impractical, but still generally beloved. ARs are slowly pushing them toward extinction, along with all other species of automatic rifle.

Have any of the non-AR successor platforms taken off? Last news I heard was Germany (partially?) ditching their replacement to go AR. Did the IAR project for the Marines ever happen, or did it get shelved to buy them more anti-ship missiles?

As far as AR alternatives out on the market, I think most only have any success in their country of manufacture (examples: VHS-2, Howa Type 20, MSBS), and any country without enough of a home industry to draw on (e.g. France) will probably just buy AR-15s, HK 416s, or maybe CZ Bren 2s.

I think most only have any success in their country of manufacture

Yeah, because they're hilariously overpriced. When you can buy 6 ARs for the cost of one (in the VHS-2's case) and it's only marginally better it's not a surprise they aren't flying off the shelves.

People give HK shit all the time for this but all the European manufacturers do it with their military rifles (Beretta and CZ are better than average, or at least Beretta would be if they actually still sold the ARX-160). Sure, that strategy works in Europe where AR-15s cost just as much or more than the indigenous options, but expecting that to apply everywhere?

Oh, Beretta abandoned the ARX? I know they have the NARP now (surprise, it's an AR!), I didn't realize they had given up on the ARX.

Have any of the non-AR successor platforms taken off?

Not to my knowledge. I think the Army is still claiming they're gonna retire the m4 and standardize on Spears, but I'll believe it when I see it. There was a really good writeup I found once, talking about the "Glockpocalypse" that wiped out like 90% of variation in the handgun market, as everyone gave up on their bespoke designs in favor of various flavors of Glock clone. The Glock 17 was just straight-up better, cheaper, more durable, more reliable, and most previous designs simply couldn't compete. The AR15 has done pretty much the same thing, both because it's an amazingly good design, and because it hit critical mass such that the design has been perfected to an absurd degree as a result of network effects. At this point, it's hard to imagine it ever going away, or why there would even be competing designs in another few decades.

Did the IAR project for the Marines ever happen, or did it get shelved to buy them more anti-ship missiles?

Last I heard they were still gonna get IARs, but those were going to be piston AR derivatives from H&K.

At this point, it's hard to imagine it ever going away, or why there would even be competing designs in another few decades.

The only real thing wrong with the AR is that it doesn't lend itself as well to mass production (read: aluminum/plastic extruded upper, polymer lower) as the AR-18-based designs, and that if you're on a rifle replacement schedule that exceeds 50 years, you want a gun with slightly-beefed-up parts whose wear surfaces you can change out so that you don't have to do what the US does and replace bolts every 10,000 rounds because getting any kind of military spending in most Western countries is like pulling teeth.

Which is why all the modern rifles that kind-of-but-not-really compete with the AR all do the things that you'd do to an AR if you weren't constrained by its existing design, like:

  • Replaceable cam tracks (that part held in by external screws on the top left side of the Spear; that's internal on the SCAR and Brens) and stopping the cam pin from being driven into the receiver (which happens on the AR)
  • Bigger bolt, which means it stops being as much of a wear part like it is on US Military ARs; also allows for a better extractor and a more long-lasting spring within
  • Making the upper an aluminum extrusion, and attaching the stock to the upper rather than the lower so it can't break off (which lets you make the lower a polymer extrusion); ARs can crack their upper receivers at the threads holding the barrel nut on at high round counts and these guns won't do that (traditional-style AKs eventually develop similar cracking problems at the front trunnion, as it bends there every time you fire)

And then the tactical considerations, which is that because these guns are a bit heavier up front, they can stand up to more use as ersatz automatic rifles; as far as I'm aware, you can dump your entire combat load in one sitting without destroying the gun or making it catch on fire (it'll sure cook your hands, though; hope you brought gloves!). If your nation is small, why not just give everyone slightly heavier RPK-equivalents so they're still perfectly serviceable in 50 years?

The HK416 is notable in that it does literally none of these things. Granted, it was the first real attempt to make the AR-15 a serious automatic rifle, but it fails to improve in any way on the original design and even makes some problems worse (it's heavier and the carrier tilts; contrast the MCX, which is a significantly better design).

Oh yeah: foreign manufacturers could always get development on their rifle platforms too, if they felt like passing the savings onto the customer (and actually commit- Beretta actually sold the ARX-160 at a very reasonable price, and that was even before hyper-light rifles were made cool again, but none of the other promised features materialized). But they won't.

There is a narrative here where Rittenhouse was found not guilty (correctly) because he did not point his gun at someone and therefore was not threatening, and Foster also did not point his gun at someone so was not threatening and was thus murdered by Perry.

A "narrative" is all it is. It elides a bunch of significant detail in order to claim two things are far more similar than they are, and therefore make out defenders of both Rittenhouse and Perry as hypocrites.

Does it? Below someone said that because Foster had his gun angled down, but could have pointed it directly at Perry and fired in an instant that Perry was correct to have felt threatened. But we have video of Rittenhouse wandering around gun pointed low where he also could have brought it up and fired at any of the people around him.

If one of those is a threat then surely the other is, even if we removed them from protest situations and just had them standing on the street minding their own business.

Now i'd say neither should really be taken as a threat in and of themselves granted carrying the rifle around is legal. Because it would mean that we have a tension where a legal activity also grants enough of a threat to createthe right to legal lethal self-defence, which just seems problematicly circular.

Below someone said that because Foster had his gun angled down, but could have pointed it directly at Perry and fired in an instant that Perry was correct to have felt threatened. But we have video of Rittenhouse wandering around gun pointed low where he also could have brought it up and fired at any of the people around him.

I'll point to Cornered Cat for a summary that's focused on a not-lawyers-not-legal-advise, but the tripod of ability-opportunity-jeopardy is common to a much broader ethos among Red Tribers. Someone being physically able to harm you can't be a threat on its own, or everyone from a police officer to a car driver to a stick holder is cause for justifiable self-defense. Someone who says they'll hurt you can't be a threat on its own, or a trash-talking Call of Duty player would be justifiable self-defense. It's the combination of both that make for justifiable self-defense.

I think the situation for Perry is a lot more unclear, not least of all because of the low quality of all available video. But having people beating on your car doors and windows is a lot closer on jeopardy than a rando giving out bandaids (as, importantly, was Perry's driving!). Maybe not enough, and I'm disappointed that neither Abbot nor the parole board seem interested in explaining the evidence they found so compelling. But enough that it seems to be a big missing factor in a lot of the discussions and comparisons.

((That said, in turn, Rittenhouse is an obscenely good shoot for reasons that have been covered elsewhere; he set a standard that is wildly above the minimum for lawful self-defense.))

Right, its quite possible Foster was threatening Perry. Or even he was about to shoot him. It's just nowhere near as clear as Rittenhouse and just angling your gun down as you would anyway can't be as clearly dispositive.

I think Foster was stupid for bring a rifle at all, but thats neither here nor there.

@The_Nybbler is right. You are trying to tie these cases together with some sort of general principle that falls apart the second you tug at it.

Rittenhouse was running away. All his pursuers had to do was let him go.

No, before that, when he was walking around, gun pointed slightly down. That was the focus of the prosecution that he was causing people to feel threatened, which was the contention on why Rosenbaum may have felt threatened and charged Rittenhouse and thus had a self defence claim.

If that is all it takes then Rittenhouse was clearly threatening all the people he walked past. My contention is that is probably not true for either Rittenhouse or Foster.

That was the focus of the prosecution that he was cauding people to feel hreatened, which was the contention on why Rosenbaum may have felt threatened and c harged Rittenhouse and thus had a self defence claim.

The problem is the link you're smuggling in between "feeling threatened" and "charging." Not "shoving someone away from you" or "running away" or "hiding" but "charging". Actively running towards the person who you think is threatening you.

As far as I understand it from our very long threads back in the day the law in Wisconsin doesn't specify you have to defend yourself in the smartest way. If someone points a gun at you, running may well be the smart play, but if you choose to fight, you still can claim self defense. That is why the prosecution were trying to establish Rosenbaum had the gun pointed at him prior to him charging.

IF Rittenhouse had openly threatened Rosenbaum, charging him would have been legally permissible, though stupid.

That is why the prosecution were trying to establish Rosenbaum had the gun pointed at him prior to him charging.

This is a common and extremely perverse pattern in prosecutions of self-defense cases, as well as in the general discourse.

At this point in the altercation, Rosenbaum had chased a fleeing Rittenhouse a considerable distance, and then cornered him. With no further retreat available, Rittenhouse turned and pointed his gun, hoping that Rosenbaum would stop. When Rosenbaum instead charged him, he fired.

As I understand it, the prosecution's claim is that if he were legitimately in fear of his life, he would have fired immediately, rather than trying to warn Rosenbaum off. That makes his threat illegitimate and thus gives Rosenbaum a right to self-defense against him, which he exercised by lunging at Rittenhouse.

This is not how it is supposed to work. Rosenbaum chasing Rittenhouse is an illegitimate threat, and cornering him is an illegitimate threat. Rosenbaum is very clearly the aggressor, and Rittenhouse is very clearly in a position of legitimate self-defense. Pointing his gun at Rosenbaum is a threat, but it is a legitimate threat, because all three elements necessary to establish the legitimate use of self-defense very clearly exist: Ability, Opportunity, and Jeopardy. Giving an aggressor a last chance to back down or surrender before employing lethal force is not supposed to invalidate a self-defense claim, and the prosecution's attempt to do so is appalling.

Compare the Arbury case.

Screaming at people, chasing them, and intruding into their personal space are innately threatening acts... Arbury did not appear to be acting in a criminal manner, so he had no obligation to refrain from self-defense. He was presented with what appeared to be an immediate, serious, criminal threat to his life, giving him ample reason to employ self-defense. Given that he was unarmed against multiple gun-wielding assailants, his self defense options sucked, but getting attacked by multiple gun-wielding violent criminals is likely to suck even if you make no attempt to resist. Attempting to fight his way out of the situation was some extreme combination of bravery and desperation, but given the stress and immediacy of the situation it was certainly not an "obviously stupid choice".

Arbury was clearly a case of self-defense because he was clearly not the aggressor: his attackers had no reason to consider him threatening when they initiated their attack, and he retreated from them until cornered. Rosenbaum was the aggressor for the exact same reason that Arbury's attackers were, because he illegitimately pursued and forced an altercation with no plausible justification. In the case of both Arbury and Rittenhouse, assuming that they did nothing to provoke their attackers, retreat should not have been necessary, and they would have been entirely within their rights to shoot their attackers on the spot. Still, to the extent that circumstances may have been ambiguous, the fact that they retreated until their attackers cornered them and forced an altercation should make their claim to self-defense immutable.

Unfortunately, that's not the way it actually works out. Motivated prosecutors and commentators routinely play the salami-slicing game with self-defense cases. It should be obvious that if you are justified in shooting an attacker outright, you should also be justified in pointing a gun at them in warning of the impending shot, provided the situation is favorable enough to leave you the option of a pause. And yet it's common to see this game played, where anything other than an immediate shot fired is used as evidence that the shooter wasn't really in danger, because they had enough time to try for a warning. Alternatively, if the shooter fires immediately, prosecutors can ask why they didn't give a warning first. What it comes down to is that some people don't believe legitimate self defense actually exists, and will twist the facts however hard they must to achieve their desired result.

Well they claimed that Rittenhouse pointed his gun at Rosenbaum twice, once to trigger Rosenbaum's charge and then once during (after/during fleeing).

If the first was true (and this is a big if of course!) then Rosenbaum charging Rittenhouse in the first place was legitimate self-defence. Then Rittenhouse fleeing may have "reset" that, but then pointing his gun at him again again counted as a threat.

In fact its possible Rosenbaum started with the one having the self-defence right (again only if Rittenhouse did point his gun at him first with no provocation) then lost that right when Rittenhouse fled, and Rittenhouse gained it when Rosenbaum kept chasing him.

And that is why although I think Rittenhouse being acquitted was correct, I think him being brought to trial was reasonable. Whether he was the one who kicked off the encounter is potentially the matter of a couple of seconds of time based upon Rosenbaum yelling about not pointing his gun at him. And being based on what a "reasonable" person would have felt such that I think a jury of peers not DAs or cops should be making that determination. Especially when you look at cases like Arbury where they were like, no chasing someone down with guns and trucks seems reasonable to us. No charges!

Having DA's and judges and the like be elected positions and so explicitly partisan seems like a big problem to me. Not sure how you can have a blind justice when they have to keep peeking to see who is voting for them. But that horse has left the stable, won the Kentucky derby three times and retired.

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Foster was in a mob of angry people surrounding Perry's car. He wasn't just off in the distance with a gun at the time he was shot.

Each of these cases really needs to be examined on its own merits.

Even if that were so, and I can find no evidence it is the case, then by running away Rittenhouse terminated the confrontation and any justification for use of force against him.

I would agree with you. Though I think Rittenhouse did himself no favors in his testimony because he said as Rosenbaum charged him, he did point the gun at him to try and scare him off. Then ran, when he kept charging, then shot him when he was getting close. Had the jury felt he HAD initially threatened Rosenbaum, the second (admitted) threat might have been viewed to show that Rosenbaum might have believed Rittenhouse would have got more distance then turned the gun on him again. A podcast I was listening to at the time was concerned he had just given them a reason to convict. Though that turned out not to be the case of course.

Rosenbaum was i think unstable, and looking for trouble, so whether Rittenhouse did have his barrel angled somewhere near him was probably the excuse he was looking for.

This is what Rittenhouse says in direct testimony:

After he throws the bag and he continues to run, he’s gaining speed on me. A gunshot is fired from behind me, directly behind me and I take a few steps and that’s when I turn around. And as I’m turning around, Mr. Rosenbaum is I would say from me to where the judge is coming at me with his arms out in front of him. I remember his hand on the barrel of my gun.

On cross-examination he's asked about the video by the prosecutor, Binger:

(Binger) Right before Mr. Rosenbaum disappears behind that car. Did you see him jump up in the air with his hands up?

(Rittenhouse) Kyle Rittenhouse (02:19:43): No. I saw him do something like this. Like-

(Binger) That was a reaction to you pointing the gun at him, correct?

(Rittenhouse) Yes, but he kept running at me. So, it didn't deter him.

(Binger) But it slowed him down a little bit. He does this sort of jump with his hands in the air when you're pointing the gun at him, right?

(Rittenhouse) No. He continues to gain speed on me.

This was during the chase, not before it. Rittenhouse (by his own testimony, which was not contradicted by other testimony) pointed the gun at Rosenbloom once; Rosenbloom was not deterred so Rittenhouse shot him. Rittenhouse did not run, point the gun at Rosenbloom, run again, and then turn and shoot him. He ran, pointed the gun at Rosenbloom, and then shot him.

It is contradicted by what the video shows though. https://youtube.com/watch?v=BEbcLqBE-ts&t=14360

From 3:59:20 when they start, Rittenhouse is already running away. The bag gets thrown at 3:59:21. By 3:59:23 Rittenhouse has turned and raises his gun. The persecutor then asks at this point you have turned around and are pointing you weapon at Mr Rosenbaum. Rittenhouse says correct. Then they continue the video and we see Rittenhouse turn back around and continue to run. Then at 3:59:46 (because the pause the video they are watching for a bit) they reach the cars and Rittenhouse (presumably feeling boxed in) turns again as Rosenbaum lunges at him and fires.

The video is clear at this point. Rittenhouse points his gun at Rosenbaum twice. The second time is when he shoots him. Rittenhouse agrees with that series of events. The prosecution claims he pointed the gun at Rosenbaum THREE times, the first time being the movement he does with his arms after he puts down the fire extinguisher, the one that is extremely blurry and hard to see and happens before this part of the video. That one Rittenhouse claims is not correct. You can see that on the video starting at 3:55:14.

I'm not disputing here to say you are wrong about Rittenhouse in toto, but you are wrong about the specific series of events here. And that is why (referencing your other post) I am not sure Rittenhouse does give adequate notice of his withdrawal (assuming he did provoke the incident), he is running for about 10 seconds and in those 10 seconds he has the gun pointed at Rosenbaum twice. If Rittenhouse had actually threatened Rosenbaum, I think it is plausible the jury would not have felt this counted as a good faith retreat.

But I don't think the evidence did prove that he provoked the incident in the first place just to be clear. The reason the prosecution point to this is because at an earlier confrontation what set Rosenbaum off (where he yells "shoot me nigga") is he claims someone pointed their gun at him where Rittenhouse was there with another man.

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Does it? Below someone said that because Foster had his gun angled down, but could have pointed it directly at Perry and fired in an instant that Perry was correct to have felt threatened.

The comment was that Foster had his gun angled down, from a standing position, which did point it at Perry, who was sitting in a car. Foster was also advancing on him while doing this. Rittenhouse did not point his gun at anyone until immediately before shooting, and he ran away rather than advancing.

It is difficult to overstate how absurdly perfect Rittenhouse's actions were, and how minimal the ambiguity was due to the abundance of clear video evidence. The fact that he was still charged and tried for murder despite the well-established facts was profoundly radicalizing for me, and I imagine for many other Reds. Rittenhouse should not be accepted as a minimum standard for what legitimate self-defense looks like. He is an example of how even complete, obvious, absolute innocence will not be accepted by the Blues as a tribe.

If one of those is a threat then surely the other is, even if we removed them from protest situations and just had them standing on the street minding their own business.

Carrying a rifle is not a threat. Aiming a rifle at someone while advancing on them, while they are already being illegally assaulted by your companions, is a threat. If there is ambiguity here, it seems to me that it is not coming from the facts but rather from a tribal tendency to refuse those facts when they are inconvenient.

I'm given to understand that other motorists reported that Foster threatened them with his rifle previously. If that were the case, would you agree that it undermines a claim that his actions were legitimate?

But if you can't have your rifle pointed down, because that threatens a person seated below you, then that means the general freedom to open carry a rifle is severely circumscribed. In a city there will always be cars around.

In fact in the hours that Rittenhouse was walking around we have images him of gun angled down walking past an occupied car. If that is enough to trigger threat then the occupant could have shot him!

My point is that on its own should be ok. If it is ok to open carry a rifle then we must accept some people will have it angled towards them. Rittenhouse in the image has his gun pointed at the legs of the man next to him. Unless you are always pointing your gun directly vertically down, its just a statisical certainty. So if open carrying rifles is legal, then that cannot be the standard.

You can legally in Texas walk up to a car with a rifle open carried. The question is does that mean when doing the safe thing, and pointing it down, you are automatically threatening the occupant because you could shoot them in seconds? I say the answer logically has to be no, in order for the legal carry right to make any sense.

Now to be clear that does not mean Foster wasn't actually threatening Perry! He may well of been and certainly previous testimony might make that more likely. But it can't come solely from walking towards an occupied vehicle with your gun angled down. Because that is I am given to understand (and as Rittenhouse did!) the safer way to point it. Is he supposed to raise it? Because that seems more likely to trigger a response. If open carrying is legal you can walk towards people legally, you can walk past them, you can ealk up to their car window and knock on it. You can ask them for the time or pet their dog.

My point is not that Foster was not threatening Perry, but that the description of WHY it was a threat seems biased. If Perry was threatened it was not because the gun was simply angled down and he is lower, it has to be because it was actively pointed at him. That was the determination in the Rittenhouse trial, that merely turning with your gun angled down such that it is passing a trajectory where you could shoot someone can't count as being actively threatened so Rosenbaum could not have been defending himself. Whether the gun is pointing at your leg or your body because you are sitting down doesn't matter.

If we want to claim that Perry was legally threatened then it has to be because Foster was aiming at him. Not just holding the gun in his general direction. And the problem is, from the images we have we can't see that, which is why Nybbler has to fall back to the gun being angled down being a threat because that is all we can make out. He is inflating the level of evidence we have. Again to be clear it is entirely possible Foster was pointing his gun right at Perry. And if so Perry would be justified in seeing that as a threat. Likewise in a state where open carry of rifles is not permitted maybe the walking towards you carrying a rifle pointed close to you might be a threat. But if you are going to legalize open carry of long arms, they WILL be angled towards people at some point (seriously go watch the pre-shooting footage of Kenosha, particularly when some of the "militia" are standing and walking together, their barrels are angled down but pass trajectories of peoples legs all the time) and if that legally counts as a threat, there is a serious mismatch, that risks inciting incidents. (Assuming we are allowing open carry, I don't think it should count for the record.) That is true even if Foster was about to shoot Perry in cold blood (and he might have been!).

I'm not complaining that people are defending Perry. More that they are pitching certainties or potentially reasonable things as absolute proof. Such that there is no chance the jury was actually correct.

To be clear, just as I think it was dumb of Rittenhouse to be wandering around a protest with a rifle regardless of whether he did anything legally wrong, then Foster was just as stupid, possibly more so. I don't think its a huge loss he got shot. Though I am sure as it always is it is a loss to his family. Attending protests has risk, attending openly armed inflates the risk that someone will take exception. Possibly Rittenhouse is only alive because Rosenbaum was not armed. And in the US, that is not a good gamble, as Foster perhaps learned...well briefly.

Also I keep typing Genosha instead of Kenosha, so if any made it through, I apologise.

It is difficult to overstate how absurdly perfect Rittenhouse's actions were, and how minimal the ambiguity was due to the abundance of clear video evidence. The fact that he was still charged and tried for murder despite the well-established facts was profoundly radicalizing for me, and I imagine for many other Reds. Rittenhouse should not be accepted as a minimum standard for what legitimate self-defense looks like. He is an example of how even complete, obvious, absolute innocence will not be accepted by the Blues as a tribe.

I really really don't want to engage in 'chan' behavior, so I'm going to try to write something more than just pointing at your paragraph and saying 'this'. But seriously, this.

The more I found out about the Rittenhouse case, the more I felt that someone really needed to give that kid a medal. Running away from attackers at every turn, only firing in the last possible resort, firing the fewest number of shots possible to end the threat, with nigh-immaculate aim at every step (e.g., shooting the bicep of a man pointing a handgun at him), and with precisely zero bystander casualties. He did everything right.

Personally, I felt that Rittenhouse would have been a prime example for progressives to use, to persuade conservatives towards a greater skepticism of police and especially of prosecutors. Something like:

The prosecutorial misconduct was so brazen, against a baby-faced defendant whose innocence was confirmed by every angle of every video taken that night... how do you think police or prosecutors would have treated an innocent man with a more ambiguous case, or a less immaculate background, or a less appealing face?

That's a lay-up, and now we can have a conversation about prosecutorial discretion, qualified/absolute immunity, and 'anarcho-tyranny' -- reforms far more palatable and meaningful than 'defund the police'. But no, we had to have a conversation about how Rittenhouse crossed state lines (seriously, how was that the major talking point?) or how he shot three black guys (two of the three were white, and the third's identity only became public knowledge months later).

Personally, I felt that Rittenhouse would have been a prime example for progressives to use, to persuade conservatives towards a greater skepticism of police and especially of prosecutors.

The point has never been skepticism of police, and especially of prosecutors. The point, at least for the largest bloc of the Democratic coalition, was that the police hate black people. I suspect many on the center-left who boosted these ideas, especially the elite ones, would be shocked to encounter police in a negative interaction. Many middle-class+ white people have no fear of police. And somewhat ironically, it was these types who boosted "defund the police."

Because their history of no or positive interactions with police contrasted with the stories they hear from civil rights activists about black interactions with police, they assumed the problem really must be racist police. They assume it was not a broader problem of police misconduct, necessitating the racially-sensitive reforms they were told were necessary by activists. (And there's also a reason these were the people who turned immediately from defund the police as soon as even the slightest crime problem emerged.) This is why something as mainstream as Family Guy had the skin color police chart as a gag. This is "common knowledge," really a common belief.

There is a contingent of further-left people who hate police more generally, from anarchists to activists. This comes either from ideology or experience. And there's also a group of white conservatives and libertarians who are incredibly skeptical of police, and hate things like no-knock raids. This could form a coalition for real, enduring police reform if reform were made as a government power issue, not a racial issue. But it's been massively polarized along racial and tribal lines, and I now know people with thin blue line stickers on their trucks who hate the police and think they're bumbling idiots who are having a good day if they're just being stupid, not malicious. You had natural allies and you alienated them, making them believe your reform proposals were a call for literal anarchy. The "fiery but mostly peaceful" protests didn't help one bit. And I'll say one thing about libertarians, at least they aren't anarchists.

I read an article by a black activist once, who was frustrated that, despite cases in which white people were mistreated by police, there was no large contingent of white people won over to the police reform cause. "Don't you care that police are going after you guys too?" I recall him asking, to paraphrase.

And I wanted to scream at him: this is because for seven million years you've been screaming at the top of your lungs: "This is a Black Issue! This is a Black Issue! The racist cops hate us! Our equal rights are being violated! This is a legacy of slavery! White people could never understand what we're going through! You can never understand how it is to be mistreated by the police as we have been!"

And white people, especially those inclined to sympathy for the plight of African-Americans, took you at your word. Negative white interactions with police don't register to them, because the civil rights movement has spent forever describing the problems with policing as a racial issue, not a broader issue with police misconduct. The bailey of BLM, or at least the cry from terrified activists on Twitter, was "Black people are being hunted down like escaped slaves by police and systematically murdered." This is decidedly not a message conducive to expressing police reform as a cross-racial issue, especially when the rallying cry was "Black Lives Matter" and not "Police Misconduct Matters," and even "All Lives Matter" was considered an insult. The goal was "centering the Black experience of mistreatment," not talking about the issue as something that could, even in theory, impact whites. What has been sowed is being reaped.

Police reform and accountability would be a winning issue in the US if the left would stop making it exclusively a racialized issue and the right would acknowledge that at least some police corruption hits black people worst.

But hey, at least we have more body cams.

The fact that he was still charged and tried for murder despite the well-established facts was profoundly radicalizing for me, and I imagine for many other Reds.

Any time during before, during, or after the trial the Blues would smear Rittenhouse as stupid or immature my eyes would pop out of my skull. The boy handled himself in a crisis situation with outstanding discipline. Those who criticized him would rather our young men be locked in their rooms playing xbox and masturbating than defending their communities from outside invaders.

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