The Power of Regular People

[Michie]

This Forum is a place for respectful discussion and debate of political issues, by Roman Catholics, in the context of the Roman Catholic Faith.

Like facts, juries are stubborn things.


John Adams famously said that facts are stubborn things. With recent verdicts in Wisconsin and Georgia, the media are finding out that juries are stubborn things, too. Thankfully, jurors still tend to follow the law and the facts, regardless of social pressures.

Consider the Kyle Rittenhouse case. In August 2020, a white police officer shot a black man in Kenosha, Wisconsin. The Justice Department eventually declined to pursue any charges against the officer, as the shooting was deemed justified. Violent protests and looting ensued after the shooting, while some citizens said that they would defend the local stores. One of those people was 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse, who came from a nearby town in Illinois with a rifle. Predictably, the protesters and defenders clashed; in the chaos, Rittenhouse ended up shooting three of the protesters, killing two. Charged with murder and related offenses, Rittenhouse claimed self-defense, and video evidence seemed to confirm his version of events. Yet the media painted the protesters as peaceful, Rittenhouse as the out-of-control bad guy, and the shooting as racially motivated. Press coverage was curiously silent about basic facts: the three men Rittenhouse shot were white, two of them had serious criminal records, and one had been pointing a gun at him.

Continued below.
Rittenhouse, Arbery Cases Show the Power of Regular Folks

 

[spiritfilledjm]

One of those people was 17-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse, who came from a nearby town in Illinois with a rifle.

Rittenhouse only lived part-time in IL. His father lives in Kenosha and his grandparents own a gas station, which he was also protecting from a mob who was attempting to push a dumpster on fire towards. The gun itself came from a friend, who lives in WI.

 

[Michie]

Rittenhouse only lived part-time in IL. His father lives in Kenosha and his grandparents own a gas station, which he was also protecting from a mob who was attempting to push a dumpster on fire towards. The gun itself came from a friend, who lives in WI.

There has been so much spin and outright lies on this event people tend to forget about the facts.

 

[spiritfilledjm]

There has been so much spin and outright lies on this event people tend to forget about the facts.

That's just the media doing its job. It's like Fahrenheit 451, firemen burned books and the homes that contained them instead of putting out fires and putting out fires was something that they didn't believe ever happened. Now, the media spouts lies instead of truth and calls them editorials.

 

[Wolseley]

The Rittenhouse case has been a polarizing one. My sister, who has always been lefty-leaning, sent me a private message on Facebook after I'd expressed approval of the verdict, saying "That kid is nothing but a murdering criminal, and he is guilty as sin! Period! End of story!"

Now, I did not provoke her; I did not goad her; I did not go off the deep end with her. I merely pointed out that Rittenhouse was trying to prevent a dumpster fire, and the three thugs went after him. I pointed out that regardless of what some witnesses may have said, the video that was shot that night doesn't lie: they attacked him first. In addition, all three of the thugs had criminal rap sheets a mile long, and Rittenhouse had none: not so much as a parking ticket. I asked her if she was living right next door to somebody, who would she rather have as neighbors: Rittenhouse, or the three thugs?

I've butted heads with my sibling before on various issues; but this time the truth brought out in the trial was evidently more than she could handle, and she blocked me on Facebook....cut me right off. I was surprised that she would actually go to the length of cutting communication with me, but I am not surprised by her reasoning. She soaks up the 6:30 news every night, and she firmly believes every last word they say to be solid, golden truth. She grew up in an era where news broadcasters were guys like Eric Severeid and Chet Huntly and David Brinkley, guys who took pains to obtain the facts, and to reveal them accurately, no matter how ugly they were. She is incapable of seeing how much things have changed in the last thirty years, how the mainstream media has degraded from being an accurate information source to a Soviet-style propaganda arm of progressive liberalism. She still thinks it's 1965, and it most definitely is not.

It's too bad, I guess; I have no idea what might transpire at the next family gathering. Since my other sister and my niece (who usually host such events) lean more in her direction than in mine, it's possible that I may not even be invited, I don't know. But this little disagreement between the two of us is merely a reflection of the country at large, I believe. We are two completely different nations existing side-by-side in the same space; we have different viewpoints, different backgrounds, different goals, different agendas, even different perceptions of reality. Conflict is bound to occur. Whether that conflict will eventually become severe enough that we will spiral into a civil war over whose vision of America will eventually prevail, is anybody's guess at this point.