How to deal with rioters?

[IUBrink]

With the combination of the "Securing my neighborhood" guy and rioters in Milwaukee, how would you deal with protecting your property?

I live in an apartment complex that contains 8 units per building, 4 up and 4 down. There are cheapo doors with glass on both ends splitting the building, so anyone who wants to get inside aren't going to have any issue.

With the possibility of a fire being set, and with them school folk telling me heat rises, I'm not likely to be hanging out in my upstairs unit waiting to be roasted. That means I'll likely be stuck downstairs in full view, making myself a target (if the riots turn the way Milwaukee did.)

Care to explain your housing setup and plans? How close is too close to your property?

 

[BehindBlueI's]

My gut response is evac. Alone, in a fire trap, with no defensible position? Yeah...evac early.

And no, I won't get in to my personal plans except to say they've changed given the targeting of off duty LE lately.

 

[ArcadiaGP]

Jokes aside... Apartments are good because one way in, one way out. Much easier to defend a single point of entry... but if something were to happen like a fire, you do have fewer options. I guess if things are semi-violent... but don't seem to be involving fire... I'd stick around in an apt. But if fire has been seen nearby... may be best to bug out to a house w/ family.

I figure I'd just stay inside, not be a visible target, and be ready to defend my home if the worst were to present itself.

 

[GodFearinGunTotin]

It's been a few years since I've lived in town and even longer since I've lived in an apartment. But to my recollection, there's always something going on, and it seems the din is more frequent to almost constant, the denser people are packed in together. I guess, the first thing I question is how much lead time will you have between when a riot starts or begins to approach your location and you're right in the midst of it? Depending on your specific circumstances, I'd think you might find yourself "surrounded" before you even realized trouble was brewing.

 

[Expat]

If I see someone trying set fire to my house with me inside or the wife. I will shoot them. I would definitely be in fear for my life and my wife's life and safety.

 

[T.Lex]

Warning shot. Totally.

(Wait. OP is serious?)

 

[Kutnupe14]

If you have stuck around to the point that a riot has evolved around your residence, you're not being very smart. Bug out, and wait it out.

 

[bobzilla]

Thankfully this is something I need not worry about. In fact, for some of my closer friends in the city, I AM the Bug out point. They know the rules: Bring food, bring ammo. I've got the water and power solved.

 

[T.Lex]

If you have stuck around to the point that a riot has evolved around your residence, you're not being very smart. Bug out, and wait it out.

I can't totally agree with this.

I mean, how are we to predict when a local PD may or may not shoot/injure/stare intently at an aggrieved individual and his or her aggrieved family/friend group who may or may not have been armed?

Honestly, the trigger events for this kind of civil unrest have become downright absurd.

Then it comes to underlying problems of poverty, distrust of police/gov't generally, tensions between the haves and have-nots... well... what place IS safe? As stated upthread, and elsewhere on INGO, the only place is outside of any decent sized city.

And, as appealing as that may be, it isn't realistic for a lot of us.

 

[spec4]

The first way to deal with them is to not call them "protesters". They go from protesters to rioters the minute they break any law.

As for my home, in the Army we were taught not to let the enemy advance on us.

 

[Alpo]

The first way to deal with them is to not call them "protesters". They go from protesters to rioters the minute they break any law.

As for my home, in the Army we were taught not to let the enemy advance on us.

Yup, that's my thought as well. 'nuf said.

 

[Kirk Freeman]

I was at a riot in Bloomington. Varsity Villas during Little 5.

We were out on the back deck, drinking foul keg beer and trying to talk to girls.

I saw the smoke billow up as they started to burn the mail boxes. Shouted out to Ranger Brady. Brady turned as he started to light a cigarette. He spit out the cigarette and rolled over the railing. I hopped over and we began our "E&E" to 2nd & Dunn.

We were fast walking past the first cop cars. When the fire engines came we had already found the creek and started to jog.

With the combination of the "Securing my neighborhood" guy and rioters in Milwaukee, how would you deal with protecting your property?

Protect your property? If you want to protect your property, don't live there.

Second best, call the FD and you leave. Go full Otis Day and the Knights.

 

[MohawkSlim]

I dealt with it recently by moving to Bedford. Not sure when the last riot happened here but I feel my chances of getting caught up in a riot are mathematically impossible.

That said, I moved here from Cincinnati. Like, the part of Cincinnati where riots are pretty likely to happen. I lived in the downstairs of a two-family home and my plan was to shoot Dragon's Breath in the general direction of any masses of people approaching with ill intent. Fire works both ways. It's extremely scary and, typically, a mass of people intent on doing damage during a riot isn't necessarily looking for a fight, they're looking for something easy to torch or terrorize. I reckoned that any group of people who heard shots and saw fire coming in their direction would choose another block to terrorize. If they were still intent on victimizing my block my secondary plan was to go Israeli and use the ol' 10/22 for hip/buttock/thigh shots.

Tertiary plan was same as primary plan - GTFO. The "choot 'em" plan was only if the riot materialized too quickly to have advanced warning and evac. I pretty much assumed the "protest" would start down the hill as a march up Central Pkwy or up the hill at the college and then down through the housing areas where I lived as it turned into a riot. Either way I figured I'd have advanced warning or at least be able to hear the change from peaceful singing of "We shall overcome" to glass breaking, smoke in the air, people yelling, sirens, etc., and shouts of "kill whitey."

At present, I transition through urban areas where riots are likely to develop and my plan is to avoid those areas or immediately evac. if/when protests/riots develop. I keep my carry piece on me and have full kit in the trunk just in case I need to hoof it out but, by far, the most important thing is intel. Keep the radio on, call ahead, know a few alternate routes.

Use your head and you shouldn't have to use your gun.

 

[rhino]

What if evacuating is a problem and/or you have nowhere to go that is apparently safer in the short term?

 

[T.Lex]

What if evacuating is a problem and/or you have nowhere to go that is apparently safer in the short term?

Figure out what the popular slogan is, take a sharpie to a bedsheets, and join in.

 

[pudly]

Example of dealing with rioters:

 

[T.Lex]

Example of dealing with rioters:

Times have changed.

Watching some of the more recent videos (including the one where the reporter drew on some confrontational protesters), I think certain segments of the various protest/riot groups would willingly sacrifice themselves - particularly unarmed.

Few of us (I think) would shoot an unarmed person approaching their property. That's a tough thing to do.

 

[MohawkSlim]

Few of us (I think) would shoot an unarmed person approaching their property. That's a tough thing to do.

A riot isn't a person. It's people.

You can't look at a mob of people as "he was a good boy" times 20 or times 200. You have to look at it as ONE group intent on doing harm. The danger to you doesn't come from the individual who makes up the mob. It comes from the mob itself.

 

[IndyDave1776]

Times have changed.

Watching some of the more recent videos (including the one where the reporter drew on some confrontational protesters), I think certain segments of the various protest/riot groups would willingly sacrifice themselves - particularly unarmed.

Few of us (I think) would shoot an unarmed person approaching their property. That's a tough thing to do.

Not nearly so tough when you consider the transition toward a strategy on the parts of the rioters reminiscent of the human waves of the Korean war in which the first people were unarmed, followed up by the poorly armed (think broomsticks), followed up by the moderately armed (obsolete rifles), followed finally by the properly armed troops who arrived after the cannon fodder had worn our side down. Given that BLM hasn't multiplied to the size that you could march them into the sea five abreast and never run out of them, I am guessing that one could mow down the cannon fodder and still be up to fighting when the better armed segments attacked if they didn't chicken out by then.

There is a big difference between shooting a lone unarmed individual or a couple of them more or less preemptively and shooting them if they are on the front end of a riot headed your direction.

 

[T.Lex]

A riot isn't a person. It's people.

You can't look at a mob of people as "he was a good boy" times 20 or times 200. You have to look at it as ONE group intent on doing harm. The danger to you doesn't come from the individual who makes up the mob. It comes from the mob itself.

Not nearly so tough when you consider the transition toward a strategy on the parts of the rioters reminiscent of the human waves of the Korean war in which the first people were unarmed, followed up by the poorly armed (think broomsticks), followed up by the moderately armed (obsolete rifles), followed finally by the properly armed troops who arrived after the cannon fodder had worn our side down. Given that BLM hasn't multiplied to the size that you could march them into the sea five abreast and never run out of them, I am guessing that one could mow down the cannon fodder and still be up to fighting when the better armed segments attacked if they didn't chicken out by then.

There is a big difference between shooting a lone unarmed individual or a couple of them more or less preemptively and shooting them if they are on the front end of a riot headed your direction.

Just curious how this plays out.

Fire down the street at a gas station. You are in your 2d floor apartment watching through the windows. People in the parking lot in front of you milling around. More people. People yelling. They start bashing in random cars. Now hundreds of people are around, yelling into bullhorns, throwing rocks at windows, bashing cars, throwing fireworks.

You can't see any firearms.

When do you start shooting?