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Notes -
Doesn't this make some sense as a countersignaling performance of elite strength and nonchalance (what used to be called sprezzatura)? Realistically, the average PMC person faces little direct risk from random crime or violence, and less risk the wealthier/ better-connected they are. Simultaneously, the average middle-class person has lots to potentially gain from appearing impressively high-status, secure and confident to their PMC peers, including by showing that they don't need to fear the underclass, don't worry about job competition from foreign workers, etc.
Kyle Rittenhouse feels more cringe than anything else, and for middle-class status purposes it's often worse to be cringe than to be wrong.
Edit: to the original question about Alex, I think Chesterton points out that sometimes when people preach toleration and mercy, they actually just don't disapprove of the action in question. It's a shame you're no longer friends, because I'd be curious to learn whether they would endorse punishment for actions that are unsympathetically gauche rather than just immoral in a plebe way. (I'm not sure what would feel genuinely "gauche" for a well-pedigreed law student who's also a former edgelord/troll, but perhaps you can imagine something? Perhaps if a white, female fellow-student from Alabama, failing some key classes, were caught trying to bargain for grades by faking a rape accusation against a well-regarded male African-American professor - would Alex argue that she should not be expelled? That the professor shouldn't be able sue her for damages?)
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