"Protest" is an incomplete characterization. The night he was there was the second night of wanton destruction. It was something between a riot and a protest. I have a hard time grasping the racial justice achieved by destroying property owned by people of color.

Even so, J Random Citizen getting tooled up and travelling to do something about it... it's very alien.

That's a law enforcement role in most of the rest of the western world.

Agreed.

The problem is that when the government is derelict in it's duty (or, if critical mass of people believe so), this is the expected outcome. If people lose faith in the government to protect them, they're not going to roll over and die, they'll take whatever measures they deem fit to defend themselves and their property.

Law Enforcement exists for a reason. Maintenance of a degree of order keeps the populace happy while professionalism and codification of enforcement moderates the response (at least in the general case). Ideally, it's the "win-win" scenario where the perpetrators get to be treated well enough, while the populace is confident that violations of their safety and rights will be addressed.

I agree, as do many of the level-headed takes I saw in threads following the live trial. It's been rumored that the police department pulled out of a large part of the community based on instructions from the mayor's office [0]. Hence, if the rumors are true, the real fault here lies with the local administration.

[0] I have no source, but it seems consistent with the police behavior observable in the videos.

I see you have missed the 5th Amendment rationale memo.

>That's a law enforcement role in most of the rest of the western world.

Might want to take a step back and realize what they were protesting.

I'm aware what was being protested. I'm not sure that makes any of it any better.

Do you think the police would act proactively in a protest like that?

> It was something between a riot and a protest.

When the destruction starts, it stops being a protest, and there is no between.

He took a gun to a small business at the owner's request, per police investigation, photo and video evidence, and the sworn testimony of numerous witnesses. The riot came to him.

He is studying nursing. He was making sure people stayed safe and had first aid with him.

Uhhhh, why is a teenager who isn’t legally allowed to drink in charge of armed protection of capital?

It’s fine, you can say out loud that you don’t value the lives of people you disagree with.

I surely don't value the life of a convicted pedophile very much.

say that when a group of violent individuals are chasing you down saying they will kill you.

He took a gun to a protest because he had the right to do so. He can take a gun to home depot if he wants to. Doesn't matter if he was "looking for trouble", he had the constitutional right to do that.

I didn’t know that Home Depot allows guns, but I just checked, and apparently Home Depot allows even open carry in jurisdictions where it’s legal. Nice, I like Home Depot even more now.

That is clearly fucked up.

Clearly not since it saved his life.

Bit of a chicken and egg there, to be fair.

Laws against guns don’t affect criminals that show no regard for following the law.

Laws: who needs 'em.

Did the DMCA prevents you from ever pirating?

Wow, shooting that bear at the zoo really saved my life.

... view that someone can keep a guard dog on a property and not be looking for trouble is a very interesting one.

That's IMO essentially the same statement. Why shouldn't you have deterrence?