Not Guilty.

On Friday, a jury in Kenosha, Wisconsin, found Kyle Rittenhouse not guilty on all five counts: first-degree intentional homicide, attempted first-degree intentional homicide, first-degree reckless homicide, first-degree recklessly endangering safety, and first-degree recklessly endangering safety.  Two other counts the judge dismissed before the jury started deliberations.  

For the families of Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber, this verdict will likely deepen their existing wounds of loss and suffering and trigger the pain and tragedy they experienced the night they learned of the death of their loved one.

The purpose of this essay is not to relitigate the facts of the case, judge Rittenhouse, or to place blame solely on our criminal justice system. Rather, my goal in writing this essay is to compel readers to pause on a central point that undergirds this entire ordeal.   Rittenhouse was not dehumanized; instead, we've seen a teenager on trial who perhaps made a mistake or who is or was radicalized into vigilante gun violence.

We'll unpack this in more detail, but first, let me point out there is a larger question that I will explore in a forthcoming essay on the second amendment, gun control policy, and its impact on Black people in this country. It's important to note because I think this case is instructive, especially to the question of who can "legally" have a gun in this country and tease out what it means for Black people to say we're carrying a gun in self-defense.

More on that later, but for now, I want you to think critically about two things. First, from the moment of his arrest, Rittenhouse was never dehumanized by authorities or even the mass media.  I would argue that the judge, Rittenhouse's attorneys, and perhaps to somewhat a lesser extent, the prosecution did everything to ensure that his humanness was never in question.

Before moving on, I want to highlight my initial takeaway.  I do not think a 17-year has the discipline or the emotional intelligence to handle a military-style weapon.  While we'll never be able to get a clear picture of the events from that day, but for his mother dropping him off at the protest, I think we would be having a very different conversation.  

Second, let's juxtapose my point on grace or humanness that Rittenhouse was given with how Black boys are treated in the criminal justice system. Again, we don't have to look far for a good example. But, first, I need to provide a short timeline of how Rittenhouse ended up at the protest with a loaded AR-15 killing two protestors.

Only a few months after the brutal murder of George Floyd in Minneapolis, Minnesota, protests broke out in cities around the country. People were exhausted from seeing unarmed Black men die at the hands of the state – police officers.

Well, it happened again, this time, in Kenosha, Wisconsin, another unarmed Black man was shot by police! While the victim did not die, he was left fighting for his life.  The victim, Jacob Blake, is a father and a Kenosha resident.  He was shot multiple times in the back by Kenosha police, and today he's partially paralyzed.

The shooting prompted protestors to flood the streets of Kenosha. But quite honestly, I did not know where Kenosha was until a scurry of press inquiries came into my job at a large social media platform last year.

Enter Rittenhouse.

The phantasmal line drawn in the sand was suddenly blurred when chaos erupted the third night of the protests.  As chaos broke out,  Rittenhouse discharged his weapon not once but multiple times – I'll let you consult the court transcripts, video footage, or the numerous news articles about what happened leading up to the murder of the two protestors.

So, what happened next?

Rittenhouse went back home to Antioch, Illinois, and was allowed to turn himself into his local town police department.  According to media reports, those police records noted that Rittenhouse looked visibly upset and told police he ended a man's life.  He was extradited to Kenosha, Wisconsin, to face charges as an adult.

Think about that; a 17-year-old white kid, who at a protest carried an AR-15, killed two white men (older than him) and wounded another, turned himself into authorities unharmed. Still, the initial person writing the report describes him as showing emotion.

At trial, Rittenhouse's attorneys likely knew that he would burst into tears. So while there were memes, tweets, and pushback about his time on the stand, but to the juror who is trying to remain unbiased, close your eyes and try to imagine a time when you messed up and how afraid you were.

I do not have to think far.  I was an awful teenager, and the decisions I made were not ones I would make today. I am grateful for a solid family and God's grace, but here is where my mind is stuck.

When we juxtapose the humanness or grace we see expressed for Kyle Rittenhouse, why can't the larger society use that same grace and humanness expressed for Michael Brown, Tamir Rice, or Elijah McClain?   Quite frankly, why wasn't George Floyd given more grace in death instead of being painted as some freak of nature, junky? The question that is always asked after the murder of an unarmed Black man is, what did they do wrong? Weren't they criminals?

If Kyle Rittenhouse was, say, Kenyon Randolph, I wonder if he would have made it down the street with an AR-15, let alone back home to turn himself into the local police.

The fact is that the dominant culture has painted Black men as violent, rapists and conditioned white people to remain fearful of these beasts.  The news we see, the entertainment we watch, even the sports we love all show powerful, muscular men who can out jump, outrun the status quo but who are likely to rape, rob, or gun down each other.  So, if a white person sees them walking down the street, they should clutch their pearls and pocketbooks.

The police officer who shot and killed 12-year-old Tamir Rice could not see a human because, to him, he wasn't human. Instead, he was some freak of nature, who posed a danger, even with a toy gun.

There are undoubtedly other facts in the case that we can discuss and debate, but the one question I want us to think hard about is, why more Black boys cannot have more grace? Aren't they human?