The Rittenhouse Case and the Ways We Think
Almost everyone has weighed in on the verdict that found Kyle Rittenhouse “not guilty” in the shooting deaths of two men and the wounding of another. Some insist it was a just verdict, others that it was a miscarriage of justice. Whether you liked the verdict or not, it was the product of the rule of law, and for that bedrock feature of American justice, we should be grateful.
Beyond the verdict, there are things to learn – about how we think and act - from the case and reactions to it. For starters, we should realize that it may be easy but is also precarious to be an “armchair juror.” We don’t sit in the courtroom or the jury box and we don’t hear all the evidence. We are not sworn to be impartial nor do we refrain, as jurors must, from news accounts and opinions during the trial. Yet many remain convinced they can adequately decide Rittenhouse’s guilt or innocence. Human nature perhaps, but hubris as well.
We are all prone to thinking traps and biases, and this case should give us pause on how they impact our certainty. Some pounced on reports that his mother drove Kyle Rittenhouse to Kenosha and dropped him off, weapon in hand. How could a mother do such a thing? Why wasn’t she charged? Yet if we checked out those reports we’d have learned they were wrong. He went there on his own the night before and stayed with a friend. Some firm supporters of the right to bear arms seem to accept without question that vigilante behavior is an effective and appropriate way to police our cities. Look where that got us.
Our thinking about the case is also stunted if we only ask whether what Rittenhouse did was legal. What’s legal is not necessarily what’s ethical – just ask anyone subject to de facto segregation in American history. A 17-year-old at the time, Rittenhouse could not legally purchase a gun. So he gave money to a 20-year-old friend, Dominick Black, who bought it and held it for him. Rittenhouse broke no law in doing so, but that does not excuse his unethical skirting of the law.
Neither did anything compel Rittenhouse to leave his home in Antioch, Illinois in late August or go down to Black’s basement and retrieve the gun and carry it onto the streets of Kenosha. If he feared for his life that night, the right thing to do would have been to stay home and let law enforcement handle the protests. If he wished to offer medical aid, as he claimed at trial, he could have offered his services to medical staff rather than walking the streets with a weapon over his shoulder. Neuroscience shows that teenagers are prone to engage in risky behavior because their logical decision making is still immature. Rittenhouse’s claim of self-defense was only necessary because he put himself in a situation that a more ethically mature person could have avoided. The result was the unintended consequence of his narrow moral horizon, the inability to see where carrying his gun might lead and thus the harm that could and did result.
Some reactions to the verdict have also included faulty thinking, notably among pundits and politicians. Democratic Sen. Tammy Baldwin said “I understand why people believe that justice was not served in this case, because I feel the same way." Rather than supporting the verdict or at least refraining from comment, she disparaged it and in so doing damaged respect for the rule of law. This is also the product of a limited moral horizon: we can’t expect others to accept future verdicts we may like if we undermine respect for the system that produces them.
Tucker Carlson, a controversial FOX News broadcaster known to inflame audiences, mined the case for his own purposes, gaining from Rittenhouse an exclusive right to the defense team during the trial for a “Tucker Carlson Originals” documentary. He also scored the first, post-verdict on-air interview, enabling Rittenhouse to paint himself as a victim.
Three Republican Members of Congress have lionized Rittenhouse and offered him internships in their offices. Former President Trump posed for a photo-op after welcoming him and his mother at Mar a Lago and has since used the case in a fund-raising appeal. For her part, Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene called Rittenhouse “one of the good ones” and implored her Democratic colleagues to apologize. One Florida state representative proposed a national holiday in Rittenhouse’s honor. Donald Trump, Jr. posted a meme using a doctored photo showing his father awarding Rittenhouse the Congressional Medal of Honor.
To those who claim that such behavior is fully within free speech rights, they are of course correct. But what one can do and what one should do are not always the same. The courtroom jury has spoken. The jury that decides what sound thinking and ethical behavior entail is still deliberating. Our social lives – both legal and ethical – depend on more careful thinking.
Photo Credit: Twitter/KanielaLng
