Just about a week ago, Charlie Kirk was shot and killed during one of his college debates. Since then, a war has erupted between people who celebrated his death (or said they thought he had it coming) and those who believe that political violence is never acceptable.
I've had a lot of thoughts over the last week, and I'd like to get my ideas out of my head for my own sanity, but also, I hope my thoughts can help bring people together in this dark time.
Just to be clear on where I stand before I get started, I've voted democratic in every election I've participated in. The closest I got to voting republican would have been if Ron Paul made the ballot in 2012. I vote in every election, even small school board elections. I consider myself a centrist and do not agree with a lot of progressive issues. I didn't agree with a lot of things Charlie Kirk believed, but I regularly watched his content and enjoyed hearing the debate. When I heard that Charlie was shot, I felt sick to my stomach and mourned his passing. I 100% believe that his murder was wrong.
If you disagree with someone, you have a responsibility to do the work to understand their side as much as possible. You should be able to argue their side as accurately as possible, because only then can you effectively argue against it. I hate watching debates where someone goes on a rant against something someone said, only to find out that they misquoted them and took what they said out of context. I have been seeing A LOT of this lately with people criticizing Charlie Kirk.
Here are a few things that I believe. They are are pretty centrist and reasonable, but I'm open to good-faith conversations one-on-one with anyone who disagrees with me.
Charlie Kirk was practicing free speech. I've watched a lot of his content, and he always seemed respectful, and I never got the vibe that Charlie hated anyone. The opposite was true. There were people he clearly disagreed with, and his patience seemed endless. He seemed to come from a place of "I love you, and I want you to change your life and do better." Here is a video that I felt really showed this:
People who say it's never okay to celebrate political violence probably aren't being completely honest. An extreme example would be when people celebrated the killing of Osama Bin Laden. He was seen as responsible for the deaths of thousands of Americans, so people celebrated when our military killed him. This is clearly political violence, and I don't believe anyone was fired for celebrating his death.
Although I strongly disagree with them. I think that many of the people celebrating Charlie Kirk's death would be happy to compare Charlie Kirk to Osama Bin Laden. There could be a lot of reasons why they believe this, but one reason I've heard is that they believe that his rhetoric was hateful, and they believe that his kind of speech was violent. So in their mind, Charlie Kirk was committing violence against people every time he spoke at these schools. Again, I strongly disagree with this line of thought.
I believe in free speech, even if it's something I personally find morally bankrupt and wrong. I understand that the First Amendment only protects people from the government, not private companies and spaces. I also understand that there are limits to what is considered free speech. For instance, genuine threats of violence or incitement to imminent lawless action are not protected speech. Companies and public spaces should try to uphold free speech standards, even if they are not legally or constitutionally required to do so. It's the right thing to do.
I don't think people should be getting fired for celebrating Charlie's killing, even though I think it's a disgusting and toxic thing to do. However, there clearly should be consequences for anyone who is actually threatening violence against others, like Charlie's family or other conservative voices. Everyone should be aiming for understanding and finding common ground, even though that seems unlikely at this point. This is a gray area where it could justifiably be debated if someone's statement is considered a genuine threat of violence.
I also don't think people should be getting fired for disagreeing with progressive ideologies like gender affirming care or abortion rights. It's okay to disagree with people as long as you're not making genuine threats of violence. Words are not violence. Silence is not violence. Violence is violence. We need to be able to have conversations and debates about these topics, and not socially or legally punish people for having these conversations. I don't think intentionally misgendering someone should be considered hate speech. I think you should use preferred pronouns, under most situations, because it's a kind thing to do.
If you disagree with someone, it's okay and usually preferable to keep your mouth shut. If you can't say something nice, don't say it at all. I probably shouldn't post this, but my views aren't something that I'm seeing represented in the media. I hope that what I see as common sense will help bring people together and stop the progression of division that's destroying the world.
One sensible take I listened to today that inspired me to write this is Even in a World of Chaos, You're Still the Captain of Your Fate:
This essay was originally published on my Substack newsletter.