Here’s a hot take: Kyle Rittenhouse wouldn’t have needed a gun to defend himself if he hadn’t brought a gun to the Kenosha riots in 2020. His life was in danger only because he was carrying an AR-15, not because he was being chased by an angry mob.
This load of gibberish comes courtesy of Tali Farhadian Weinstein, a New York prosecutor who penned an op-ed for the New York Times this week titled, “Kyle Rittenhouse, Travis McMichael and the Problem of ‘Self Defense.’”
“Because [Rittenhouse] had a gun, he found himself in a situation where he needed to use it,” Weinstein explains. “In other words, the gun he carried was not a deterrent, but the very reason for the escalation to violence.”
You see, if Rittenhouse hadn’t been carrying a firearm, Joseph Rosenbaum never would have reached for it. And if Rosenbaum had never reached for Rittenhouse’s gun, Rittenhouse never would have shot him, and he’d still be alive today.
SEE ALSO: Rittenhouse Riot Roundup: New York, San Fan, Chicago Erupt in Looting, Vandalism Following Verdict
Rittenhouse might be dead (or worse, given Rosenbaum’s history of pedophilia), but that’s beside the point. The point is that guns are bad.
To solve this problem, Weinstein first suggests that we might narrow self-defense laws, but she rejects that solution as “missing the point.” Instead, she recommends (you guessed it!) restricting Second Amendment rights. Here’s the money quote:
If we start to think of guns only as a problem in the hands of the Other (white supremacists, the far right, criminals), we will miss the simple fact that unregulated guns escalate violence across ideological lines. Their presence tends to create a need for self-defense on both sides of the trigger, about which the law has very little to say. If Mr. Rosenbaum… did indeed reach for those guns, weren’t they, no doubt, acting in self-defense? More guns, no matter in whose hands, will create more standoffs, more intimidation, more death sanctioned in the eyes of the law.
Guns, in no matter whose hands, cause violence, according to Weinstein. In fact, someone reaching for a gun with the intent of harming the gun owner could also claim self-defense.
The problem is not that a bunch of rioters burned Kenosha to the ground. The problem isn’t that politicians and law enforcement were unable (or unwilling) to stop it. The problem isn’t that Rosenbaum threatened to kill Rittenhouse and chased him down a dark street. The problem is that Rittenhouse had the audacity to carry a firearm to defend himself, others, and the businesses in Kenosha.
SEE ALSO: Hollywood Actress Reese Witherspoon Calls for Gun Control Following Rittenhouse Verdict
This is the logical endpoint of “more guns, more violence.” If the gun is the problem, the person holding the gun is immaterial. Good guys and bad guys don’t exist. We’re all at the mercy of the all-powerful firearm.
This has been a mainstay among anti-gun talking points for decades, but it may be reaching the end of its life. Millions of new gun owners have flocked to gun stores in recent years, and as the country grows more dangerous, Americans understand that they need a way to defend themselves.
Applying this mantra to the Rittenhouse scenario, as Weinstein tries to do, makes it all the more ridiculous. Rosenbaum would have killed Rittenhouse whether or not the 17-year-old was carrying a gun. He said so himself.
Fortunately, Rittenhouse was prepared, and justice was served during his trial. Weinstein fears that the gun rights case before the Supreme Court will give more Americans the same opportunity for self-defense. If all goes well, she’ll at least be right about that.
Cain killed Able with a rock. Guns don’t kill people, evil hearts kill people. Planned parenthood kills people every day.
Does a pencil misspell words?Does a spoon make you FAT? Does a car drive drunk?
WAKE UP AMERICA!,,
An idiot NY lawyer, who wouldn’t know a sear from a primer, has the audacity to spout her stupid babble about a subject she plainly knows nothing about. Typical.
If someone was drinking a bottle of Jack Daniels and got into a car accident, is it Jack Daniels fault?
People who use this ideological concept to justify the removal of firearms are incapable of rational thought.
Civilians are prohibited from holding firearms in most of these third world countries. That’s why you see molative cocktails instead, (petrol bomb.) You don’t need a background check to buy five gallons of gas and you don’t need a concealed carry permit to load it in a glass bottle, stuff a rag in the top and put a match to it.
Motive is the true killer but that is a concept that is beyond rationale thinking for the liberal mind.
Interesting how the 2nd Amendment is in hard, black print but abortion is “interpreted” in the 14th Amendment even if not specifically mentioned.
The left enshrines and interpretation as Constitutional and ignores hard printed truth.
“This is the logical endpoint of “more guns, more violence.”
All one has to do is read detailed accounts of battles like Cannae or Yarmuk River to know that absence of guns does not mean an absence of violence.
If someone is texting and has an accident, was it caused by the driver or the phone?
If someone was drinking a bottle of Jack Daniels and got into a car accident, is it Jack Daniels fault?
Ah, yes…..the old “guns cause violence” canard. Again.
Perhaps we can also cure obesity by restricting access to silverware.
Where in reallity, the NY politicians are actually the problem.
The one guy died doing what he loved. the other guy appeared to club a person with a skate board and then try to grab the barrel of a rifle and pull it toward himself causing it to fire. The guy trying to shoot the kid in the head, simply appears to not know how to operate/fire his illegally possessed pistol
One need look no further than the video from the Lubbock shooting story to see a first hand depiction of precisely how the presence of a firearm escalated an already tense situation. Farhadian Weinstein is correct that firearms can escalate already tense situations and escalate what would have been a fight to a murder but I don’t think that the Rittenhouse situation fits that mould. Rittenhouse put himself in the middle of a very tense protest and had the misfortune of encountering several individuals with histories of mental health issues. There are few things more fickle and wicked than a crowd of people to begin with, when you mix in mental health issues that just makes the situation all the more dangerous. Had Rittenhouse been in that situation unarmed, it does sound like he could have been severely hurt or killed in a couple different encounters that night – but of course, he would have been even safer at home in another state.
tl;dr Yes, firearms can escalate situations by their mere presence but probably not in this case,
Blue Boy, so reasonable sounding! If only Rittenhouse would have done nothing and stayed away! For evil to flourish, it only requires good men to do nothing. You and your leftist team’s outfight lies and justifications, now THAT is something systematically dangerous.
I contend that the situation in Lubbock was a complete setup by the wife (who was also a judge). She knew that he (the victim) was there to pick up his kid and she intentionally made sure their child was not there, and by the argument this was not the first time this scenario played out. I’m certain she also knew that her husband would be agitated at this fact and that coupled with her assumed knowledge of the Texas law… after the events unfolded the (assumed) home owner stood there and told the woman videotaping that he told her this was going to happen. I just think the whole scenario was all too “convienent”