>Had he not posed with an assault rifle in the first place two people would not be dead today
Had the victim not defended himself the offender could still offend today. I don't understand this victim-blaming, I really don't. If I see a guy with a rifle protecting his property, somehow its his fault I get shot after I charge at him?
In those scenarios the state no longer has a monopoly on violence.
Also assault rifle isn’t a thing. The term is a made up classification of a weapon.
The ISSUE in this microcosm of the discussion is the CONFLATION of the terms Assault Rifle" with "Assault Weapon", which a a made up term by people trying to vilify firearms, especially scary black ones.
Yes, caliber does not make an Assault Rifle.
No, it's not a, "made up term."
Shotguns, hunting rifles and pistols are optimized for specific activities and generally become less effective as the circumstances diverge from that optimized range or shooting position.
This makes them less ideal for killing humans everywhere we are found.
Assault rifles are optimized for human to human combat.
They are optimized to deliver a large number effective rounds down range, from a variety of positions at a variety of distances.
These tools are far more effective and efficient at killing human beings over an extended duration firefight in arbitrary circumstances.
It's the shape, flexibility and effectiveness of the platform that we're referring to when we say, "Assault Rifle."
Please don't muddy the waters here simply because the US legal system isn't able to overcome NRA bullshit.
>They are optimized to deliver a large number effective rounds down range, from a variety of positions at a variety of distances.
This is precisely where a blanket term like “assault rifle” becomes pretty impossible to specifically define, and consequently regulate.
>large number effective rounds down range
Based on this comment, you’re referring caliber? And capacity? And perhaps action? So what about a semi-auto 5.56 with a pencil barrel and a 5 round magazine? Still an “assault weapon?”
>from a variety of positions at a variety of distances
How would you interpret this into characteristics of a rifle? Does this mean it has to have a folding bipod? It has to be under a certain weight? *Any* rifle can be more or less effective at a variety of ranges. The cartridge and shooter have more influence over that criteria than the rifle.
>It's the shape, flexibility and effectiveness of the platform
This is feels territory. Because none of these are concrete characteristics inherit to this claim. Define “effective”, or define “ineffective”. Tell me how the “shape” would designate or exclude one specific rifle over another…
In the US, there are something like 3-400 rifle shootings compared to 40-50,000 pistol shootings. When you look up mass shootings, you'll see pistols used all the time because 20-30 rounds in a tiny pistol are about as lethal as 20-30 rounds in a rifle at close range against unarmored targets while being TONS more maneuverable.
Tavor x95 is 26.4" with a 15.5" barrel. The M1 carbine (already cut down from the M16) is 7.5" longer despite having a shorter 14.5" barrel and although the weight is technically the same, the Tavor seems 2-3x lighter because the weight is right next to the body rather than a foot away.
Tavor x95 Carbine (22.5" long) is almost a foot shorter and 3/4 lb lighter than the M4 carbine. The M4 CQRB blinds the shooter in dark rooms and loses tons of stopping power with the 10" barrel, but is still a quarter-pound heavier and 3.5" longer. Those inches have a huge impact on time to target which is critical indoors.
Despite this, countries like Canada which ban the "assault rifles" like the AR-15 still allow the Tavor. It's not about the style of rifle.
I'd also put forward that if efficiency were the goal, 6.5 Grendel would be used instead of 5.56 as it has almost 2x the momentum, 20% more kinetic energy, and 4x lower ballistic coefficient while only increasing weight 10-15% (still half the weight of 7.62).
The US has tried to move away from the AR-15 platform numerous times (and a ton of special forces who have the option already have). Each time, they run into the issue where the training costs (hundreds of hours for millions of people), rifle costs, and cost to replace billions of rounds of ammo are just too high despite the efficiency increases.
AR isn't the best. It's just the most pragmatic at the moment.
So basically Rittenhouse 'morally accountable' for not foreseeing the unforseeable. How silly.
Rittenhouse attended a protest while legally carrying a firearm. 2020 had seen tens of thousands of people do the same. How many people were forced to fire their guns in self-defense at a protest? I can't think of a single one. Any risk he was incurring would have been remote and purely hypothetical. For that you hold him morally responsible for these men's deaths?
What about the actions of those men who he killed? Unlike Rittenhouse's attendance at the protest, their decision to attack Kyle Rittenhouse was decidedly not legal. Unlike Rittenhouse's choice to attend the protest, which carried only hypothetical danger, his attackers would have had no doubt that attacking a man with a gun carried risks that were neither remote nor hypothetical.
Remember, when conflict seemed imminent, Rittenhouse ran away, attempting to avoid conflict. His attackers chased him down and forced the issue.
He called his friend who owned the gun. No need to call the police when they were less than a block away. I'd also imagine that 911 was swamped given how so much of the city was being destroyed.
The protests were about perceived police brutality.
Cop's view:
A guy had a knife in the seat that they'd seen previously. He was wanted for raping his a woman and was in the process of stealing her van and kidnapping her kids. Even if there were no knife, you don't allow the rapist to get into the deadly weapon and take kids as hostages.
To them, the riots were unjust and a lot of them probably wanted to stop the city burning, but they were told to cordon off the area and basically forbidden from doing anything. At the same time, if they had to use force against a violent rioter, it would be all over the press and that officer would probably be fired. This leaves the armed citizens as the only line of defense (and a line without the police politics). This seems like the reason why they praise them in their interactions.
Politician's view:
The city is run by one family of Democrat politicians. Their party officially supported the riots with the now current Vise-President actually raising funds for the rioters. Going against the mob would not only go against the party, but it would cause the mob to show up at their houses (this happened in other cities) and might even throw their family's dynasty out of power. They didn't care about the part that was burning because it was the poorer parts of the city.
Citizen's view:
The politicians ordered the police to abandon them. They had signs like "we have little children here" in an attempt to keep their families safe (it seems that even having BLM support signs wasn't enough). The businesses were generally either not insured or under-insured. Lots of people worked at those places and were looking at not having a job. Everyone's cars were being demolished or burned. For many of them, everything they spent their entire life working on was ruined in a few hours.
Amed Citizen's view:
We've been hiding in fear for two days now as the police do nothing. If they won't, we will. Today, we're putting a stop to this.
Rioter's view:
I just did what I do best. I took your little plan and I turned it on itself. Look what I did to this city with a few drums of gas and a couple of bullets. Hmmm? You know... You know what I've noticed? Nobody panics when things go "according to plan." Even if the plan is horrifying! If, tomorrow, I tell the press that, like, a gang banger will get shot, or a truckload of soldiers will be blown up, nobody panics, because it's all "part of the plan". But when I say that one little old mayor will die, well then everyone loses their minds. Introduce a little anarchy. Upset the established order, and everything becomes chaos. I'm an agent of chaos. Oh, and you know the thing about chaos? It's fair!”
Humanity is the same everywhere and looking at history shows this to happen every time a local power vacuum is created and mobs begin to rule.
The two police in the vehicle testified during the trial.