Having spent many nights in the streets during riots, takes like this miss a few things: most crucially that aggressive shows of government/law enforcement force often incite more violence and spread it more broadly across a city - not suppress it

In the short term, during a given night of unrest, it often *does burn itself out. It quite literally does work that way. I’ve watched it dozens of times

There is no tried and true method of dealing with violent unrest. I’ve watched a ton of different law enforcement and government strategies backfire. It’s much more difficult and dynamic than most of these takes would have you believe.

It seems clear and obvious that violence is escalating. And also, historically speaking, there are still relatively few lives being lost compared to riots of decades past. That’s not the only thing that matters, but doesn’t count for nothing either

There’s also a distinction to be made between Kenosha, where a specific act of government violence prompted organic short term unrest, and Seattle or Portland, where there have been years worth of street clashes between political groups. Sullivan is grouping them all together

best way to avoid organic unrest would to not have a population of people so collectively distrusting of their gov and despondent at their treatment and station in society that they no longer see it as legitimate. Law enforcement shows of force would further prove their point

In Kenosha, the violence began when a police officer shot Jacob Blake. If you care about stopping violence, you have to address the government violence — and the (factual) impression that it was committed with impunity — that started the spiral