From Cosmopolitan

A woman known only as 'Elizabeth from Knoxville' is going viral on Twitter after she was filmed complaining about being Maced (pepper sprayed) by police when she stormed the Capitol building along with hundreds of other Trump supporters yesterday (6 January).

The scenes in Washington DC were like nothing ever seen before; as Congress met to confirm President-elect Joe Biden's electoral college victory, armed pro-Trump demonstrators broke into the Capitol to violently disrupt the process. Four people are known to have died and 52 have been arrested.

Donald Trump is accused of inciting the mob, urging a crowd on prior to the riot with the message that he will "never concede" and encouraged them to "never give up."

"All of us here today do not want to see our election victory stolen by emboldened radical Democrats," the outgoing President told the would-be rioters in an hour-long speech at the White House. "We will never give up. We will never concede. It will never happen. You don’t concede when there’s theft involved. Our country has had enough. We will not take it anymore."

He then reportedly encouraged the crowd to march towards the Capitol to "give our Republicans the kind of pride and boldness that they need to take back our country." And that's what they did; they marched, and some very scary scenes ensued.

One such rioter was 'Elizabeth from Knoxville', who was filmed by Yahoo's White House correspondent Hunter Walker appearing very distressed. In the video, when Walker asked, "What happened to you?" Elizabeth from Knoxville was tear-ridden as she replied, "I got Maced [Mace is a brand of aerosol self-defence spray used by police in necessary situations]."

Wiping her face with a towel, she continued to explain what had happened. "I made it like a foot inside and they pushed me out and they Maced me," she said, almost wailing. "My name is Elizabeth, I'm from Knoxville Tennessee," she later told the camera. Then, responding to the reporter's question about why she wanted to go in to the building, she yelled: "We're storming the Capitol, it's a revolution!"

The almost-farcical nature of it - that a protestor who clearly breached security rules to enter a highly protected building could not understand why police had responded with appropriate force - has led the video to go viral. At the time of writing, it's had over 600,000 views, and has been retweeted thousands of times.

Of course, Elizabeth from Knoxville is just one of many to have stormed the Capitol yesterday. She shouldn't be the sole target, but she has unknowingly become something of a figurehead for what happened, and is now receiving the wrath of those who vocally object to the protest, seeing it as a very real threat against America's democracy.

As a result, the responses on social media showed little sympathy for her. "I mean come on. You're starting a 'revolution' and storming the capital and you're crying because you got maced?" wrote one person.

"I don't have a violin small enough for her," added another. Others made light of the lack of forethought Elizabeth had had in "[admitting] she was committing a federal crime, [then giving] her first name and where she lived.

Some were less focussed on the serious side of it, however, and more concerned about the details. "I am trying to take a nap, but I just thought about Elizabeth from Knoxville specifically picking out her piano scarf to wear for the revolution and now I cannot stop thinking about this," posted Twitter user Alex Abad-Santos. I mean, 🤷♀️.

Following the violence yesterday, Congress reconvened and went on to certify Joe Biden's election win. Donald Trump now has two weeks left in power, and has confirmed in a statement that while he "totally [disagrees] with the outcome of the election... there will be an orderly transition on January 20th". Trump has been temporarily blocked from both Twitter and Facebook following yesterday's events.

Follow Cat on Twitter.

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