True to form, Rage Against the Machine have issued a statement on last week's Kyle Rittenhouse verdict.
The California rockers posted a photo of 18-year-old Rittenhouse crying in court to their Instagram, writing in the caption:
What defines innocence in America? Tamir Rice was executed by police for playing with a toy. Nobody was charged. Ahmaud Arbery went jogging and was murdered in broad daylight.
Kyle Rittenhouse armed himself and killed people who were fighting for racial justice. He claimed self-defence. This is the settler logic of America's founding myth: whiteness must cast itself as the victim in order to justify its violence against those resisting its oppression. Welcome to the Land of the Free, Home of the Brave.
Guitarist Tom Morello added on Twitter: "When the courts do what they were designed to do and protect and enforce white supremacy: don't mourn, organize."
On Friday (November 19), Rittenhouse was acquitted of all charges stemming from the 2020 Black Lives Matter protest in Kenosha, WI, following the shooting of Jacob Blake at the hands of police. The armed vigilante had travelled from Illinois to attend, shooting and killing Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber, as well as injuring Gaige Grosskreutz. Rittenhouse's lawyers claimed that he'd acted in self-defence.
The title of Rage Against the Machine's signature protest song, 1992's "Killing in the Name," feels eerily uneasy in this context.
See the band's post below, which has since received nearly 70,000 likes — though the four-piece appear to have limited the comments section through Instagram's privacy settings.
Rage Against the Machine's music recently fuelled the now-viral incident of Brass Against's frontwoman Sophia Urista urinating on a fan's face onstage.
The California rockers posted a photo of 18-year-old Rittenhouse crying in court to their Instagram, writing in the caption:
What defines innocence in America? Tamir Rice was executed by police for playing with a toy. Nobody was charged. Ahmaud Arbery went jogging and was murdered in broad daylight.
Kyle Rittenhouse armed himself and killed people who were fighting for racial justice. He claimed self-defence. This is the settler logic of America's founding myth: whiteness must cast itself as the victim in order to justify its violence against those resisting its oppression. Welcome to the Land of the Free, Home of the Brave.
Guitarist Tom Morello added on Twitter: "When the courts do what they were designed to do and protect and enforce white supremacy: don't mourn, organize."
On Friday (November 19), Rittenhouse was acquitted of all charges stemming from the 2020 Black Lives Matter protest in Kenosha, WI, following the shooting of Jacob Blake at the hands of police. The armed vigilante had travelled from Illinois to attend, shooting and killing Joseph Rosenbaum and Anthony Huber, as well as injuring Gaige Grosskreutz. Rittenhouse's lawyers claimed that he'd acted in self-defence.
The title of Rage Against the Machine's signature protest song, 1992's "Killing in the Name," feels eerily uneasy in this context.
See the band's post below, which has since received nearly 70,000 likes — though the four-piece appear to have limited the comments section through Instagram's privacy settings.
Rage Against the Machine's music recently fuelled the now-viral incident of Brass Against's frontwoman Sophia Urista urinating on a fan's face onstage.