Responsibility and common sense

The ABC reports:

United States President Donald Trump has shared a video on Truth Social showing Alex Pretti in a confrontation with federal immigration agents 11 days before the intensive care nurse was fatally shot during a separate encounter with Border Patrol agents.

The footage shows Mr Pretti was forcefully taken to the ground by federal immigration agents after kicking out the tail-light of their vehicle during a Minneapolis protest on January 13.

The video posted to Mr Trump’s Truth Social account includes overlay of Senator Elizabeth Warren, speaking about Mr Pretti.

“Alex carried patience, compassion and calm as a steady light within him,” Warren can be heard saying in the video, which shows Mr Pretti kicking the car.

In one of the original videos, published by the Minnesota Star Tribune and later obtained by the Associated Press, Pretti is seen shouting an expletive at the federal officers and struggling with them.

I want to explain here the difference between legal responsibility and common sense.

The video of Alex Pretti swearing at ICE officers a week earlier, and damaging their car doesn’t change the reality that his shooting by ICE agents was an unlawful killing, and quite possibly a criminal killing.

However it is fair to form a judgment about how wise Mr Pretti’s behaviour has been. Let me use an analogy.

If you get beaten to a pulp by Black Power, then Black Power is to blame. You are the victim.

However if you wore a big red bandana (the colour of the Mongrel Mob) to a party at Black Power gang hq and got assaulted that would be a pretty stupid thing to do. You are still the victim, and they are still responsible, but a bad outcome was somewhat predictable.

Likewise if you walked past a group of Black Power members in a red shirt, and said “Black Power are a bunch of pussies, and oh yeah I slept with your mum last weekend” that would be an even stupider thing to do. Again you are still the victim, and they are the criminals, but some common sense would tell you this was going to end badly.

Now I am now comparing ICE to Black Power. But I am making the point that there is a difference between peacefully protesting ICE actions, and doing the following:

• Yelling abuse at ICE officers saying “F*** you! Get the f*** out of here!” 
• Spitting into a vehicle driven by ICE officers
• Attacking their vehicle, and doing so while armed.

The more you do stuff like that, the more likely it it that things will end badly.

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