Field Report: ASU Rittenhouse Protests
Dueling pro and anti-Rittenhouse protests descend on the Tempe Campus
BLUF: Leftists teach their people how to organize and build capacity, Righties teach their people how to get on Fox News.
Yesterday the ASU chapter of Students for Socialism held a protest in Tempe to get Kyle Rittenhouse “off our campus.” Granted he’s an online student and AFAIK has never even set foot in Arizona, but regardless the local left has been assmad about this ever since he admitted during his testimony that he was taking virtual classes. The local chapter of College Republicans United organized a counterprotest, and I decided to swing by and check things out in person.
The numbers turned out to be roughly equal, however my assessment was the energy was more noticeable with the Rittenhouse supporters:
I’m so inured to it by now that I tune it out to some extent, but the leftists said crazy leftist shit like usual:
The Leftist side demonstrated their basic skillset and the usual grasp of logistics, having designated protest marshals in yellow vests as well as loudspeakers and rally equipment. They also organized a signmaking event the Monday before, which is something that can do double duty as a networking event.
The righties…well, showed up. I don’t think I ever identified someone actively in charge or directing things, and it was definitely BYOS (bring your own sign). To be fair, people did have some really funny ones:
After the speechifying, the leftists marched to the administration building (with righties in tow) to to deliver their mostly-incoherent demands. The doors were blocked by police, so they ended up chanting them for a few minutes. Don’t worry too much about what they were, it was nonsense like expel Kyle (he just took some online classes and hasn’t even technically enrolled) and denounce white supremacy, as well as give the PoC students free stuff and safe spaces.
The lefties marched some more, then about an hour after it started held an ending rally, dispersed, and went back to their dorms. The righties followed the entire time, seemingly gaining energy and volume as the lefty numbers dribbled away. By the end the disparity was brutally apparent, just look at the expression on the SFS student faces:
My main takeaway from today was even when the left has a dumb, low-energy event, they still use it to teach their people useful, durable skills that will come in handy in the future.
For example, they set up a respectable stage area:
They also had trained protest marshals in the usual yellow vests and working as a team:
During the speeches and while the march started and ended, the marshals did a decent job keeping the sides somewhat separated:
These two protest marshals I found particularly interesting. They didn’t quite fit in with the rest, they wore red armbands and gloves, and they seemed to work together when possible. They also seemed more aggressive as well, although they were pretty good about avoiding anything that could be construed as assault. My suspicion is they were from an affiliated outside group, possibly the local Socialist Rifle Association chapter; they certainly had that dumb LARPer look. Note the Iron Front and Hammer & Sickle logos:
As dumb as lefties can be, the skills they practiced today were the same skills they put to use last year while burning police stations and small businesses. So even though the event got drowned out by counterprotesters, the organizers at least got some good practice in that they can apply in the future. The righties meanwhile got outrage clicks for advertisers, Fox News interviews, and not really much else that’s useful or durable. Quoi de neuf?
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