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 collegeā€™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 Rittenhouseā€™s presence.

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

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

    • WaxedWookie@lemmy.world
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      9 months ago

      My mistake - Iā€™ll return to the question you havenā€™t answered.

      Do you consistently defend people that are clearly unqualified and incapable of doing their job as they fail woefully, or is this an edge case for you? I suppose that unlike most, the likes of Rittenhouse and Kirk arenā€™t doing anything of value - itā€™s not as though theyā€™re performing surgery, driving a bus, or flipping burgers.

      • aidan@lemmy.worldM
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        9 months ago

        Do you consistently defend people that are clearly unqualified and incapable of doing their job as they fail woefully, or is this an edge case for you?

        Iā€™ll repeat what I said, I empathize with people. They are not just their utility. He is not famous for his speaking skills, but TPUSA are clearly trying to capitalize on them, whatever not my problem. Anyone who paid to see him knew what they were getting

        • WaxedWookie@lemmy.world
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          9 months ago

          I empathize with people. (ā€¦) Anyone who paid to see him knew what they were getting.

          Youā€™re empathising with the same thing the audience went to see - the extreme rightā€™s posterchild for killing your political opponents. The analysis is super-straightforward and backed by studies - this is simply ignorant hate, fear, and disgust stoked by the likes of TPUSA. The fact that you canā€™t progress to synthesising straightforward conclusions is a massive red flag.

            • WaxedWookie@lemmy.world
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              9 months ago

              Youā€™re very empathetic - thatā€™s entirely unremarkable. One can empathise with Hitler - but only a mentally deficient or monstrous person would stop at empathy and be incapable of synthesising conclusions like he was a bad guy that did bad things. Itā€™s like reading without comprehending.

              Why canā€™t you advance past the insistence you empathise with Rittenhouse toward an opinion? Are you deficient or dodging?

              • aidan@lemmy.worldM
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                9 months ago

                What is there to have an opinion on? Heā€™s socially awkward? I said that. What more is there to draw from this? Also remember insults and uncivil behavior are not allowed

                • WaxedWookie@lemmy.world
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                  9 months ago

                  Hereā€™s mine.

                  Travelling interstate to put yourself in a position to shoot 3 people, killing two of them is incredibly stupid at best. Proceeding from that to a job for a transparently dishonest media org that has hired you primarily to celebrate your killings demonstrates a total lack of remorse, and incites similar politically motivated killings in what amounts to pretty clear-cut stochastic terrorism. If we take him at his word, heā€™s done no research into the media company that hired him, and has been on stage at events where openly racist nonsense has been celebrated without him noticing - if this is true, heā€™s deficient enough that he should be in assisted living. The reasonable conclusion is that heā€™s some degree of comfortable with the racism.

                  So we have a remorseless killer, stochastic terrorist, propagandist (or useful idiot) that doesnā€™t care about or actively embraces racism.

                  • aidan@lemmy.worldM
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                    9 months ago

                    Proceeding from that to a job for a transparently dishonest media org that has hired you primarily to celebrate your killings demonstrates a total lack of remorse,

                    It has been several years, and he did cry a lot when it happened, but Iā€™m not sure remorse is necessary if it was in self-defense. Iā€™m also not sure what other opportunities he has.

                    If we take him at his word, heā€™s done no research into the media company that hired him

                    Nobody tries to find problems with the hand that feeds them. Honestly, with everything said about people like Dennis Prager and TPUSA, from his perspective he can just think ā€œleftists hate and lie about them like they hated and lied about meā€.