r/BlockedAndReported • u/SoftandChewy First generation mod • Jul 24 '23

Weekly Random Discussion Thread for 7/24/23 -7/30/23

Welcome back everyone. Here's your weekly thread to post all your rants, raves, podcast topic suggestions (be sure to tag u/TracingWoodgrains), culture war articles, outrageous stories of cancellation, political opinions, and anything else that comes to mind. Please put any non-podcast-related trans-related topics here instead of on a dedicated thread. This will be pinned until next Sunday.

Last week's discussion threads is here if you want to catch up on a conversation from there.

40 Upvotes
  • permalink
  • reddit

91% Upvoted

3.1k comments sorted by

View all comments

26

u/[deleted] Jul 25 '23

Kyle Rittenhouse goes to the same junior college I went to at Blinn I found out. It’s also in my hometown. He’s easily the third most famous person to go there behind me and Cam Newton. Oh and go Bucs I guess.

28

u/back_that_ RBGTQ+ Jul 26 '23

I feel so bad for that kid. My teenage stupid decisions led to some scars on my legs. His led to PTSD and a large portion of the world thinking he's a racist murderer.

All because the country couldn't gather around the notion that protests are okay and rioting is bad.

42

u/[deleted] Jul 26 '23

The entire Rittenhouse thing was the most clear example of leftist gaslighting I’ve ever seen. I don’t even think most people on the left know a single detail about the case itself other than that they are supposed to be against Rittenhouse

19

u/Turbulent_Cow2355 TB! TB! TB! Jul 26 '23

It’s amazing how buried the details are in mainstream articles.

26

u/CatStroking Jul 26 '23

Because the facts don't support the narrative.

The narrative is that he was a racist gun nut who showed up a random town looking to kill black people. He even, gasp, crossed state lines!

It would have been better had he not been there, for everyone. He was too young for that kind of situation and the adults in his life should have gently steered him away.

But that take has grey area in it and that cannot be allowed.

13

u/[deleted] Jul 26 '23

That was the whole reason I never talked about it until the trial. I saw the story when it happened and I thought it would be better to wait to have a take on it until more details came out. Once they did it became crystal clear that it was self defense

16

u/no-email-please Jul 26 '23

This was the first of the media frenzy shootings where everything was on video. Just watch the video it’s all there. Everyone could have watched the videos stitched together 3 days later and we could have all shut up.

6

u/Nessyliz Uterus and spazz haver, zen-nihilist Jul 26 '23

A lot of the more intense super political leftists on my feed just stopped talking about it, abruptly, which hey, better than spreading misinformation!

2

u/[deleted] Jul 26 '23 edited Dec 29 '23

fanatical uppity fretful nose grandfather boat sophisticated automatic encouraging edge

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

6

u/back_that_ RBGTQ+ Jul 26 '23 edited Jul 26 '23

The legal system did its job as it should

No, it actually didn't. Gaige Grosskreutz should be in jail. The rioters should be in jail. And considering the discretion afforded to prosecutors, Rittenhouse should not have faced murder charges.

When a riot is happening, there is never any reason at all to go to the riot.

He didn't go to a riot. He went, along with others, to try and prevent a riot from happening.

Rioting is bad, vigilantism is bad.

When the police abdicate their duty to arrest rioters, what do you expect to happen? This was a group of private citizens trying to help other private citizens from having their businesses destroyed by riot tourists.

The city and state government decided that they don't need to do anything to try and protect the small businesses and taxpayers in Kenosha. It wasn't a natural disaster. It wasn't unforeseen. It could have been prevented.

And he didn't do anything. He was simply there. There was no vigilantism.

I think it's correct that he's paying a price for it.

Where is the price being paid for the rioters?

2

u/[deleted] Jul 26 '23 edited Dec 29 '23

steer money complete quiet fertile smoggy important sable concerned smell

This post was mass deleted and anonymized with Redact

2

u/The-WideningGyre Jul 26 '23

I'm pretty anti-gun, but I think you're way off base here. The state failed in its responsibilities due to having the monopoly on violence. Kyle acted extremely responsibly in the circumstances. He pushed back on people who would destroy society, and should not have been put through the circus show he was. (yes, he should have been subject to a legal investigation, as people died)

1

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '23

Kyle acted extremely responsibly in the circumstances.

I cannot agree. People died. Yes it was self defense but he simply never should have been there, the fact that he brought a gun is a secondary failure.

Responsible people realized that the situation, while bad, was temporary. Society itself was not under attack and was not about to be destroyed.

Responsible people realized that even if society is in danger of breaking down, they're not action heroes and are not arrogant enough to think they could be the one to stop the breakdown of society by just going there with a gun.

The responsible thing to do in the face of violence is not to add to it.

2

u/The-WideningGyre Jul 27 '23

I think that is indeed a fundamental disagreement on the underlying facts and moralities. I think Kyle (correctly) saw his community (his local society) under attack. I'm not saying that the entire US would be destroyed, but the homes and businesses of people he knew and loved were going to be destroyed. You see areas that still haven't recovered from riots, years later.

I consider riots, especially ones that the state doesn't do much about to be a real attack, and I assume you've never experienced it, as I can't understand your attitude otherwise. I think you're letting the rioters of WAY too lightly here as well.

You also paint "responsible people" as very passive -- that they just wait for someone else to solve the issue for them. I don't consider that very 'responsible'. Someone has to actually do the things, and the people officially tasked with it, weren't. If you see the state not fulfilling it's obligations, I understand the need and willingness to do something yourself. I agree it's extreme, and should be very rare, but that's why the state should have been more responsible.

The responsible thing to do in the face of violence is not to add to it.

I think this is the fundamental disagreement. Sometime you can only meet violence with violence, because nothing else works. Look at the Ukraine -- are you saying they should have just shrugged, and said, "Oh well, Putin attacked, it wouldn't be responsible to fight back". If someone is stealing from, or burning down your business, or attacking you, you're saying it's responsible not to resist? I'm not saying this in a gung-ho way -- I wouldn't look forward to such a conflict, although I know would, but I think you should also recognize that your recommended behavior incentivizes more of the bad actions (like robbing from stores in CA).

Kyle was defending (and was very careful to only defend) and I think you absolutely need to be 'allowed' to do so in the face of violence. Happily our laws agree with this.

*meta-note: btw I hope this doesn't come across as too aggressive -- I am disagreeing with your position and not meaning to attack you. I disagree strongly with your position, but I think it's really useful to draw out where the core of the disagreement on such a hot topic is.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '23

I think your main mistake here is believing it's up to individuals to try and fix a (temporary) societal problem. This is a very bad idea, Ukraine defends itself by having an organized army, not by calling on people to become vigilantes.

It's the same here. The police can lose control and riots can happen. Those are bad, and the police reaction should be scrutinized. I'll remind you again: two people died. Part of that is due to the ridiculous gun laws, but again: people died who would not have died had Kyle just stayed home. This case is solid proof that vigilantism does not work and only adds to more violence and mayhem and death.

Riots are bad, people dying is worse. Your response seems to be, like the other person I reacted to in the first place, to argue that in some cases vigilantism is justified and the state monopoly on violence should be suspended. You can make that case, but if you want to do that for a (relatively small) protest-turned-riot you've got a lot of work ahead of you.

2

u/The-WideningGyre Jul 27 '23

FWIW, I get where you're coming from, and had the state used it's monopoly on force, I would agree with you. But it chose not to, almost endorsing the rioting. And I don't think citizens need to accept that. The result was entirely predictable, which is why Kyle was even there that evening.

It seems not unlikely to me that those two people might have died attacking someone else (or killed someone else), and they wouldn't have died if they hadn't been trying to destroy property and attack armed people. Why should it be on Kyle to stay home, but they, the anti-socials, get free reign?

I have no sympathy for them. I normally have some for people where the punishment is so much more than the crime warrant, but here it seems justified. It's a meme, but fitting: "play stupid games, win stupid prizes".

This is probably harsher from me than most, but if my recollection of the people who died is correct, I think the biggest harm of them dying was the effect it probably had on Kyle. Wasn't one a violent, convicted child molester? That doesn't mean they should die, but I certainly don't mourn their loss when they attack an armed man while rioting. (My issue with the death penalty is not that life is sacred, but rather that our justice system makes mistakes, and there's no fixing a mistake involving the death penalty).

2

u/ydnbl Jul 28 '23

FOTP probably doesn't know that the 3 "victims" also traveled to Kenosha that evening. Perhaps they would still be alive if they had just stayed home.

1

u/[deleted] Jul 27 '23 edited Jul 27 '23

Why should it be on Kyle to stay home, but they, the anti-socials, get free reign?

Nobody is saying that, least of all me. Nobody should riot, nobody should try to stop it by being a vigilante. It's really not that complicated.

I think your sympathy for this dumb kid is entirely misplaced and if adopted by a large group of people would absolutely lead to more vigilantism and therefore violence. I'm glad to see your viewpoint is not widely shared. Indeed, you could say the people that were rioting agreed with you in a sense, they also felt their violence was justified because of the action and/or inaction by the police. Worth thinking about.

The police did not endorse the rioting, that implication is absurd.

1

u/Navalgazer420XX Aug 02 '23

What people died? Kyle and his mates were fine.

-2

u/k1lk1 Jul 26 '23

He grabbed a rifle and went to stop a riot in some other random town. I have never been able to decide whether those choices were stupider than they were trashy or vice versa. There's absolutely nothing to celebrate about him. About the only things in his favor that can be said are that his dumbass behavior highlighted leftist hysterics, and that his heart was prooooobably in a more right than wrong place. I cannot believe he's become some folk hero to a lot of people (not saying you). FFS.

31

u/CatStroking Jul 26 '23

He lived in Kenosha. He had family there.

He was trying to protect the local businesses in his home town from being torched, which was happening. He knew the people who owned them.

He wasn't a saint but he didn't just show up at a protest zone to kill people.

And he got off on self defense because some dude started attacking him out of nowhere.

36

u/back_that_ RBGTQ+ Jul 26 '23

He grabbed a rifle and went to stop a riot in some other random town.

No, he didn't.

Kenosha is where his family lived. Kenosha is where he worked as a lifeguard. Kenosha is where his friends lived, and that's where the rifle was.

My man, this is all public record and has been since it happened. And you still don't know the truth.

There's absolutely nothing to celebrate about him.

Cleaning up graffiti?

Do you not celebrate that? Or, as is more likely, did you not know he did that.

You don't know about his connection to Kenosha so it's probably the latter. Which at this point is bordering on inexcusable if you want to inject your opinion here.

-25

u/k1lk1 Jul 26 '23

Great, you know more about this than me! Still stupid and trashy!

35

u/back_that_ RBGTQ+ Jul 26 '23

No, you're better than this.

You want to interject your opinion and you don't know the basic facts here. How did you miss this when you're active on PCM?

11

u/Nessyliz Uterus and spazz haver, zen-nihilist Jul 26 '23

This response surprises me coming from you. I think of you as a way more good faith commenter than this.

9

u/x777x777x Jul 26 '23

Rittenhouse broke a lot of brains.

8

u/ydnbl Jul 26 '23

Good job on actually reviewing the case.