What does it mean when the children get involved?
Nature abhors a vacuum, so that gap was going to be filled by something. The only question is, “What?”
Now that a few days have passed since the Kyle Rittenhouse verdict has been rendered (acquitted on all counts, in case you weren’t paying attention), it’s time to focus on what it all means for America moving forward.
Declan Leary had this to say on behalf of The American Conservative. His thoughts echo mine:
This points to another big-picture concern. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the same system that left Kyle Rittenhouse feeling like he had to defend his streets with a rifle also failed to prepare him to do so very competently. When society collapses because the men are all too soft to maintain order, neither those men nor the sons they’ve raised can really be expected to put it back together again.
Some are inclined to lionize Rittenhouse because he felt a noble instinct to defend his community. He tried, and he did it when others would not. This impulse is certainly laudable. But the hard truth of the matter is: If the only thing standing between you and anarchy is a lone Kyle Rittenhouse, your best option is to reach for your rosary. He got lucky once; we will not get lucky every time.
The great tragedy of Kenosha is that, in a matter of days, civilization collapsed so fully that the only people willing to stand against chaos were teenagers and twenty-somethings who barely knew how to shoot, much less how to fight, and not at all how to establish or maintain control. That is the reason people died, and the reason Kyle Rittenhouse will spend the rest of his life with the weight of having killed them: the wholesale dereliction of basic duty by an ineffectual government, and the inability of the whole society to form men as capable as they are willing to step into the breach. Once the regime finally crawled out of its bunker, with whole sections of the city turned to ash, the best it could manage was to send some effeminate mediocrity to prosecute the youngest of the LARPers for killing a pedophile and another violent criminal in ham-fisted self-defense.
[bold mine]
Rittenhouse deserved acquittal. There was never any reason to charge him in the first place. But the fact that such a trial ever took place is an unsettling sign of the times. The more I think about it, the more I feel people are missing the point. Consider what David French had to say about the case in The Atlantic days before the verdict was rendered:
I am a longtime supporter of gun rights and believe that the Second Amendment’s guarantee of a right to “keep and bear arms” is grounded in an inherent right of self-defense, both inside and outside the home. As a person who’s been threatened more than once, I exercise those rights myself.
But there is also an immense difference between quiet concealed carry and vigilante open carry, including in ham-handed and amateurish attempts to accomplish one of the most difficult tasks in all of policing—imposing order in the face of civil unrest. And there is a dramatic difference between the use of weapons as a last resort, when your life or the lives of others are in immediate danger, and the open carrying of weapons as an intimidation tactic or as an intentionally disconcerting display of political identity and defiance.
What French and others like him seem to miss is that a power vacuum existed at the time of the Rittenhouse incident in Kenosha, WI. Nature abhors a vacuum, so that gap was going to be filled by something. The only question is, “What?”
Would it have been people like the three men shot by Rittenhouse? Three men who were clearly bent on chaos, destruction, and mayhem? Or by Rittenhouse and others like him, who, despite any poor judgment they may have displayed, were otherwise there to oppose the chaos, destruction, and mayhem? What would French prefer, when the state is clearly not in play?
More:
Most of the right-wing leaders voicing their admiration for Rittenhouse are simply adopting a pose. On Twitter, talk radio, and Fox News, hosts and right-wing personalities express admiration for Rittenhouse but know he was being foolish. They would never hand a rifle to their own children and tell them to walk into a riot. They would never do it themselves.
I can’t disagree with French here. But:
But these public poses still matter. When you turn a foolish young man into a hero, you’ll see more foolish young men try to emulate his example. And although the state should not permit rioters to run rampant in America’s streets, random groups of armed Americans are utterly incapable of imposing order themselves, and any effort to do so can lead to greater death and carnage. [bold mine]
French is very good at explaining why something shouldn’t be. But times like these call for viable alternatives and he offers none. He can’t, on the one hand, say “the state should not permit rioters to run rampant in America’s streets” and then criticize ordinary Americans for daring to step up and defend the defenseless. What are we as a people and as a society if we cannot step in and fill existing power vacuums that could just as easily be filled by the forces of anarchy and nihilism?
After everything that’s happened in 2020 as well as 2021, people are starving for “normalcy.” I get it. But, if things were normal, would Kenosha, along with so many other cities across the country, have been lit ablaze like they were in the summer of 2020? Would anarchists and rioters be able to run roughshod over communities the way they’ve been able to? Would you see a literal convoy of thieves empty the shelves of a department store in a low-crime city with little resistance? Why are San Franciscans suddenly going all-in on private security and self-defense classes, in a city whose ethos claims that love and openness for anyone and anything overcomes all obstacles?
At some point, reality bites and even the most idealistic and tolerant among us hit their breaking point. When authorities are unable or unwilling to fulfill its most basic commitment to the citizenry, things aren’t normal and expecting people to simply cower in fear or run for their lives, as French seems to expect, is insanity. On some level, ordinary Americans have to possess both the capacity and will to defend their lives and property and the Rittenhouse verdict, rendered dutifully by the jury, reinforced that core tenant of life in a civilization, if only temporarily.
Finally, much has been made of the relative youth of Rittenhouse by both his supporters and his detractors. A 17-year-old shouldn’t be patrolling the streets armed with a rifle, they say. And, as I’ve said previously, I’m inclined to agree. But, again, if times were normal, what was the likelihood 17-year-olds would be getting involved to this degree, in the first place? Better yet, if you think 17-year-olds getting involved in such situations is awful, then get ready, because you’re in for a shock.
Recently, in a safe Chicago neighborhood, a child who was less than five-feet-tall and appeared no older than 10 years old participated in an armed carjacking:
Meanwhile, in Florida, a nine-year-old girl fought off a violent man who attempted to steal her mother’s purse and threatened to kill her if she didn’t give it up:
Ask yourself - when the nine- and 10-year-olds are getting in the thick of it, are we living in normal times? These stories are hardly uncommon, with both criminals and victims increasingly being reported as those under the age of 18. For anyone paying attention, it should be clear that there’s no exemption from crime. Your age will not save you and living in a “safe” neighborhood doesn’t mean what it used to.
I’ll say it as many times as needed - with our children already in the line of fire, why worry about a civil war?
Speaking of civil war, the relative calm that seemed to be holding in Wisconsin in the wake of the Rittenhouse verdict seems to have fallen apart in a very bad way:
