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It’s Good to Be a White Murderer in America
The Kyle Rittenhouse verdict re-establishes a dangerous precedent—and sends a terrifying warning to the rest of us
It must be nice to know that you can carry an AR-15, shoot three people, claim self-defense, and then be acquitted by a nearly all-White jury of your peers that also features “a Black, the Black, the only Black” jury member.
Kyle Rittenhouse, now 18, exited a courtroom today as a free man, acquitted on all counts for murdering two people at a 2020 BLM protest in Kenosha, Wisconsin, incited shortly after White police officers shot Jacob Blake, a 29-year-old Black man, nine times. Blake survived, but unlike Rittenhouse, he cannot currently walk, because he is now partly paralyzed.
“It’s good to be the king.”
That line uttered by Mel Brooks playing the French king in the movie History of the World: Part 1 has been in my head this past week. In the movie, Brooks portrays an obnoxious, uncouth vulgarian who indulges in all of his sexual whims and tantrums without fear or shame. At one point, he turns directly to the audience and defiantly declares, “It’s good to be the king.”
In 2021 America, it’s good to be a White murderer.
