Left-wing documentary director Josh Fox pleaded with Twitter users on Friday to stop showing Kyle Rittenhouse’s face because, in his view, the Illinois teenager “murdered my brothers.”
Fox, who is the director of the debunked anti-fracking documentary Gasland and eventually downgraded to a contributor for The Young Turks, immediately saw his content policing backfire with a wave of pro-Rittenhouse memes in the replies.
The filmmaker insisted that he “needed” everyone to start posting “warnings” in posts containing images of the teenager who is standing trial in Wisconsin. Fox is so triggered by the images of Rittenhouse that he is demanding that other Twitter users stop posting them.
“I need you all to start posting warnings on any post with Kyle Rittenhouse’s face on it,” he wrote. “The man murdered my brothers. I don’t wanna see his face. Stop posting his face.”
Fox’s plea for fewer Rittenhouse photos backfired spectacularly. At the time of this writing, he has been extensively “ratioed” — a term for when a post on Twitter has significantly more replies than likes, indicating powerful backlash — with over 1,000 replies (direct responses and quote-retweets) and only 37 likes.
His detractors have posted endless memes of Rittenhouse’s likeness looking smug, heroic, or happy. One common reply is a gif of Rittenhouse straightening his tie during the trial.
Others attacked the propagandist for his “brothers” comment, pointing out that Joseph Rosenbaum, one of the men that Rittenhouse killed, was charged with sexually molesting five pre-pubescent children before pleading down to fewer charges.
The day before this humiliation, Fox declared that Rittenhouse “killed innocents,” that he was guilty of “terrorism,” and “America is on trial with him.”
Rittenhouse was arrested for shooting three men — two fatally — during a 2020 Black Lives Matter riot in Kenosha, Wisconsin. His murder trial is heading towards closing arguments this week. A major moment in the testimony came when Gaige Grosskreutz, the man who Rittenhouse only wounded, admitted under cross-examination that he was not shot at until he pointed a gun at the teen and advanced toward him.
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