I hope, that both sides, the protesters and police force will find a way, to exit that spiral of violence. But right now it looks like this won't happen. It's a shame.
If the state acts harder against protesters, journalists and civilian bystanders it will only fuel their anger. Leading to more violence, used by the state to issue a even worse crackdown than now. And so on and so on.
The only hope that I have is, that other politicians from all parties will stand up against that.
[1] https://www.bellingcat.com/news/americas/2020/05/31/us-law-e...
The two sides are massively unequal in terms of power, the onus is on the police to stop the violence.
How to you expect protesters to deescalate this with absolutely nothing changing and high level LE people still not accepting any blame and pushing for military help?
> and high level LE people still not accepting any blame
I don't know how you get that from OP saying that both sides need to de-escalate.
But since you mention that, cops do not have to be heavy handed. Training around handling mental health helps. Training around de-escalation helps. Not being a murdering racist helps. Body cameras work.
If the guns were the main reason, we'd see similar reactions every time a group of open-carry white protesters show up on the streets. They're not treated the same way though.