As naturalized American I tried to learn a little about American revolution, and to compliment it, I watched Turn. I wanted to ask, do you know, in numbers, how bad was the taxation that sparked American revolution? How bad was the taxation after, by our very own states and our Congress? What angered the colonist most? they can had relatively comfortable life under protection of the strongest Empire of those days, in British Empire, yet they chose to fight it, and (incredibly) won. What sparked the revolution? What made it success? What convinced public to go along?
How can bunch of civilians, farmers, colonists, defeat a professional army/navy of the British Empire? How was it even possible? It is as if some ragtag Alabama civilians defeated US Army...How was it possible for US to defeat UK? It still looks totally unrealistic.
What gave them the edge? Personal bravery? Willingness to risk life and property by colonial leaders? Firearms? Novelty of having firearms among any able bodied men that was equalizing advantage of professional soldiers? Propaganda? Lack of censorship by British? nonexistence of UK controlled currency?
Was it foolishness/naiveté of UK to obey it's own rules and play fair? I am asking myself over and over, how well would Indian Gandhi fare in hypothetical rebellion not against rules respecting Brits but against Stalin and USSR...
You are asking a whole stack of questions. I will answer this one, because it is the easiest one: How can bunch of civilians, farmers, colonists, defeat a professional army/navy of the British Empire?
They did not. The war was won by the American colonies, but they did not fight it alone: the American revolution was heavily financed by Spain and France, nations that footed an important part of the bill of the Revolution, to the point of causing a severe debt crisis in France, that would eventually be one of the causes of the French revolution. Spain also suffered a debt crisis, but not to the point of France's.
The war was also fought, in no small measure, by France and Spain, traditional enemies of the British. In this case, the American Revolution was nothing short of a proxy war for both Spain and France against the British. In fact, Spain was quite unwilling to enter the war, but it was forced to by the 3rd Family Pact subscribed with France.
The Spanish Army secured the whole Southern part of today's USA, capturing everything between New Orleans and Tallahassee, and defeating the English in several battles like Pensacola. Furthermore, general Bernardo de Gálvez took an army up the Mississippi river to subdue a rebellion in Natchez, and then protected the rear of the American forces preventing any flanking maneuvers.
The Spanish Navy took absolute control of the Gulf of Mexico, secured the Bahamas channel, and drove the English naval forces from their bases in the Caribbean, making it extremely difficult for them to supply the troops that were trying to suppress the revolution. The biggest blow dealt by the Spanish navy was the action of Cape Saint Vincent in 1780, when old admiral Córdova and captain Mazarredo captured the British double convoy that should have supplied the royalist forces in America: 294 cannons, 80,000 muskets, 3,000 barrels of gunpowder, ammunition, supplies for 12 regiments, and over 1 million pounds in cash were captured, tanking the London Stock Market in the process.
That is only the Spanish contribution. The French supplied a lot of ground troops and officers like the famous Marquess of Lafayette, who would become one of Washington's closest allies and collaborators. Lafayette and his troops took part in the battles of Brandywine, Yorktown, Barren Hill, and Monmouth, where the French intervention was crucial.
Edit: I've been rather short on the French involvement because it is something I'm not particularly familiarised with besides some broad strokes