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 collegeās Turning Point USA chapter to speak at the campus. However, the event was met with backlash from a number of students who objected to Rittenhouseās presence.
The 21-year-old gained notoriety in August 2020 when, at the age of 17, heĀ shot and killed two menāJoseph Rosenbaum, 36, and Anthony Huber, 26, as well as injuring 26-year-old Gaige Grosskreutzāat 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.
@CharlesDarwin @Flax_vert I like how people argue about this as if US self defense law condoning people executing their neighbors and shit makes anything right lol
He put himself into harmās way, intentionally, because of right-wing feels, and then claims āself defenseā. Carrying around a brandished weapon. What was he even doing there?
It so happens that I do think self-defense is a valid defense. Under the right circumstances, of course. If, for instance, someone breaks into my house and I shoot them on the spot, I wonāt exactly be jumping up and down that I was pushed to kill someone (the manly macho posturing on this kind of scenario is one I always find curious; the fact of the matter is that any normal human being would not - and should not - come away mentally unscathed from ending another human beingās life. If I were forced to end someoneās life because they broke into my house, I imagine that is something Iād wrestle with for the rest of my days), but I donāt think I should be charged with anything. However, if I go to a protest, waving around a firearm, and then feel āthreatenedā by someone throwing a plastic bag at meā¦
@CharlesDarwin Unfortunately the majority of marketing for small arms has gotten people jumping up and down at the thought of getting to kill a home intruder to the point that they were all cheering on a guy for shooting a pregnant woman and a guy running away.
Thereās morality and legality. I agree what he did was morally wrong and was murder in the biblical sense, but not the legal sense under U.S. law.