Charlie Kirk Doesn’t Deserve What’s Happening To Him
from the censor-in-free-speech-clothing dept
I am not here to celebrate the death of Charlie Kirk. I will not, however, engage in the completely unearned celebration of his life that is happening pretty much everywhere in the wake of his murder.
What’s happening now would normally be considered inexplicable in any other political climate. But this one is front-loaded to give Donald Trump deference, even if he couldn’t care less about Kirk being gunned down while engaged in yet another “I’m just asking questions” performance.
If you can’t read/see the embed, here’s the quote of the press conference Q&A with the Commander in Chief:
Q: My condolences on the loss of your friend Charlie Kirk. How are you holding up?
TRUMP: I think very good. And by the way, right there you see all the trucks. They just started construction of the new ballroom for the White House, which is something they’ve been trying to get for about 150 years.
This is maybe the one time Trump actually seems to be on the correct wavelength. An alt-right podcaster was killed. We all move on after processing the immediate horror of the act. Trump moves on faster than most, given his intense focus on himself. We all should acknowledge a terrible thing has happened, but it’s not any different than the hundreds of similar acts of violence that happen in this nation every day.
And the person killed in this act wouldn’t have it any other way:
“I think it’s worth it,” he said. “I think it’s worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the second amendment to protect our other God-given rights. That is a prudent deal. It’s rational.”
Kirk is an acceptable death, according to Charlie Kirk himself. He died doing what he loved: pretending to engage in an honest discussion with whoever decided to grab the other mic.
What Kirk definitely wasn’t was a free speech hero, although that’s what those aligned with his dishonest take on debate are now claiming with extremely straight and sad faces all over the internet. Let’s take a look at [lol] The Free Press, the “just asking questions” platform for Bari Weiss and anyone who’s willing to work under her masthead:
Kirk was assassinated for those ideals. He was at that college campus in Utah—the very institution meant to be a bastion of freedom of conscience and speech—because he wanted to promote debate. This is the very act that gave birth to this nation, and the only thing that will ensure its survival.
We fear his assassination represents a watershed moment for free expression in this country. We worry that his murder will have a profound chilling effect—that people will shy away from open discussion, that they will avoid honest debate, and that they will turn away from sticking their neck out for fear that engaging with their fellow citizens might mean an engraved bullet will be meant for them.
If none of this provoked a burst of loud, inadvertent laughter, I humbly suggest you may no longer have a soul. Kirk didn’t have “ideals.” He had invective. He didn’t cherish “open discussion.” He just managed to turn his “change my mind” shtick into a profitable extension of his innate bigotry. He was just one of hundreds of Trump-associated semi-celebrities who think the First Amendment should protect them from being criticized for being racist, sexist, or… you know, cheering on literal insurrection attempts. But those rights shouldn’t be extended to anyone who disagrees with them.
Kirk is only distinguishable from the detritus currently filling the X hole because he managed to make a living by being awful to his fellow human beings. Most people just do it for fun, but Kirk made it a profession.
There was never a chance of “changing” Kirk’s mind. That was always pretense for unloading on whoever had the misfortune of challenging him on his home field, surrounded by his supporters, and completely devoid of any neutral party that plausibly could decide who did or didn’t win this debate.
Minds can be changed. But Kirk only wanted to convert more minds to his side of the issues. His mind, however, would retain its shape, smoothed interminably by choosing to only consider the ideas of bigots even less talented than he was.
This is anecdata but I feel compelled to mention it. I have had my mind changed. I grew up in a devout Christian household and fell in lockstep with my dad, who was a hard-right conservative. I listened to tons of Rush Limbaugh during my formative years. I was convinced that abortions were for sluts, welfare was for the lazy, and Mexicans were dirty thieves. It was only after I exited that home and started actually building relationships with people that I began to understand my beliefs were based on bigots and their projection, rather than anything remotely resembling real life. Within a few years, my views had been changed, prompted by little more than treating other human beings like human beings, rather than caricatures projected on them by rich, white males who insisted on seeing the worst in anyone who didn’t look like their reflection in the mirror.
I wouldn’t expect multiple pro sports teams to hold a moment of silence for any YouTube celebrity or TikTok influencer, no matter how they died. I wouldn’t expect multiple entities to fire people for refusing to treat Kirk’s killing like a national tragedy. I definitely wouldn’t expect people from other countries to be punished for daring to speak the actual truth about Charlie Kirk. But that’s what’s happening.
Mexican congressional staffer Salvador Ramirez was forced to resign after saying these extremely accurate things about Kirk while appearing on the Milenio news network:
“I think if Charlie Kirk lived, he may like what I am about to say, because what I am about to say is very ‘anti-woke’,” Ramírez facetiously said. “He was given a spoonful of his own chocolate. They gave a spoonful to someone who promoted the use of weapons. They gave a spoonful to someone who was financed by the National Rifle Association – a political association that is of the extreme right, pro-Trump, of the most radical wing of the Republicans.”
Ramírez added that Turning Point USA was “an anti-rights, anti-LGBT – practically anti-women – movement”.
All of this is true. And pointing out that it’s more than a little ironic that Kirk was shot after advocating so vociferously for unfettered gun rights is just stating the obvious. It’s not mocking the dead.
What’s happening now — this outpouring of sympathy for an unsympathetic person coupled with claims this will somehow “chill” free speech — is abhorrent. Kirk didn’t care about free speech. He only cared about pushing his beliefs. That’s why he formed Turning Point USA. That’s why he courted gun money and aligned himself with Donald Trump. That’s why he built a small fortune by attacking minorities, the poor, LGBTQ+ people, and anyone who chose to defend those being bullied by Kirk and his followers.
If Kirk is going to be memorialized, it should be done in the spirit of free speech that he (pretended) to endorse. Here’s Elizabeth Spiers, saying what needs to be said about someone who died tragically, but definitely is not a tragic figure worthy of the praise he’s being showered with now that he’s dead:
Charles James Kirk, 31, died on Wednesday from a gunshot to the neck at a Utah Valley University campus event just as he was trying to deflect a question about mass shootings by suggesting they were largely a function of gang violence. He died with a net worth of $12 million, which he made by espousing horrific and bigoted views in the name of advancing Christian nationalism. The foundation of his empire was the group he cofounded and led, Turning Point USA, which is a key youth-recruitment arm of the MAGA movement. Kirk was able to launch Turning Point at the age of 18 because he received money from Tea Party member Bill Montgomery, right-wing donor Foster Feiss, and his own father, also a prolific right-wing donor. He was an unrepentant racist, transphobe, homophobe, and misogynist who often wrapped his bigotry in Bible verses because there was no other way to pretend that it was morally correct. He had children, as do many vile people.
This is Kirk’s legacy. There’s no free speech advocacy left unfinished. There’s no contribution to a more unified nation. There’s no bravery to be admired. There’s just the senseless killing of a person who managed to spin hate into gold. Honoring him in death grants credence to the hideous beliefs he espoused. The only thing separating him from the average racist is generational wealth.
Filed Under: 1st amendment, bigotry, charlie kirk, free speech, gun violence, international subservience
Comments on “Charlie Kirk Doesn’t Deserve What’s Happening To Him”
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Charlie deserved it. Prove me wrong.
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How about you make an argument for why he deserved it first?
To quote a video I saw earlier today: “How you die does not redeem how you lived.”
Careful Tim.
You are not properly mourning him so you might be targeted by Trump and his allies.
It sounds like I’m kidding but I’m not. Trump plans to use his unfortunate passing as pretense for a broader crackdown and dismantling of those he sees as his enemies (aka The Left).
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Oh don’t worry, they’re being pretty censorious w/ the comments on the Kirk topic. Kirk would have loved all the self-censorship the left is currently engaged in.
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You are correct.
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2025/9/15/white-house-promises-crackdown-on-left-wing-terror-after-kirk-killing
I don’t think the quote really shows that. It could, for example, be referring to accidental gun deaths rather than murders; I don’t see any clear context near that quote.
I also don’t think it’s fair. I could just as well say that several Techdirt authors clearly consider the Westboro Baptist Cunts “acceptable”, whenever those authors voice support for freedom of speech. You could say I support deaths from traffic accidents and pollution because I believe people should be allowed to own and drive cars.
In any case, the title’s a non-sequitur. Charlie Kirk no longer exists, and the dead do not deserve.
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Kirk was a dude thought kids brains on the ground after all school shooting was simply acceptable collateral for the 2nd amendment
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Those are both true.
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I think you’re looking for a reason to disagree because you’re too lazy to look into the context of the quote to see if your guess is right. Charlie Kirk was literally talking about gun violence when he spoke that statement. You could have googled it. He also made a racist dog whistle statement about having more dads in the home, because he did, as noted, pretend that the gun violence issue is just a racist gang issue.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/charlie-kirk-gun-deaths-quote/
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Sure, one could look up any fact, but when someone’s using the fact as the basis of an argument, it’s good practice to provide the necessary context. It’s not work I’m generally inclined to do when reading about someone of whom I’d never heard while they were alive. I did check this post and the linked article, and figured if the context were damning the authors would have mentioned it. Thanks for the better link, anyway.
Even with the context, I still not sure it’s as bad as it’s made to seem. I read it as a statement that such gun deaths appear unavoidable (perhaps as long as guns exist), not that they’re good. Even countries with strict laws pay that cost.
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How often do they pay it in comparison to the United States?
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A hell of a lot less. But now we’re just haggling about the price.
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Please name one country in the world, other than the United States, which has gun deaths similar or exceeding that of the United States within the last half-century. I’ll wait. Serious question too. If you can find one, I’ll be honestly surprised.
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Apologies for the poor wording. By “cost” I meant “some gun deaths every single year”, mirroring the Kirk quote. But the context wasn’t clearly stated and it does read like I was referring to magnitude, which was not intended.
Anyway, here’s a link of relevant statistics from Wikipedia. The United States had 4 firearm homicides per 100,000 people in 2020, the most deadly year for which data is present. Saint Lucia had 30, Jamaica 44, Mexico 17—and these are considered “restrictive” in terms of gun control.
The numbers for “developed” countries, such as Canada or those in Europe, are not anywhere near America’s; but I’m surprised to see so many much higher numbers. Even “mass shootings” seem common (several annually) in Mexico and Brazil.
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Notice that you switched the wording. You literally first quoted “an acceptable death,” but now you’re pretending the death was described as “good.” Acceptable and good have very different meanings and your criticism doesn’t make sense in proper context.
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No, I’m not pretending that; I’m suggesting that Tim mischaracterizes it in such a way by writing that Kirk “wouldn’t have it any other way”. Whereas the quoted word “unfortunately” suggests that Kirk might settle for having no gun deaths, were that possible while keeping the Second Amendment.
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So you didn’t watch the source video. He explicitly, emphatically stated that he didn’t believe it was possible to have the 2nd Amendment without some gun violence deaths. So with his perception that deaths were inevitable, he was willing to trade those deaths for the continued existence of the 2nd Amendment. Which means, he wouldn’t want it any other way…that he considered possible.
You’re just doubling down on your bad take at this point. You did indeed change the wording to good, which wasn’t stated by Tim. You’re arguing with a strawman and then coming up with vague ponderous hypotheticals when we have Charlie’s own words to go by.
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So you totally ignored the part about “gangs”, then. Got it. You’re so reasonable!
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He said gun deaths were acceptable. Spin that however you need to.
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This is the question that led to that quote:
“We saw the shooting that happened recently and a lot of people are upset. But, I’m seeing people argue for the other side that they want to take our Second Amendment rights away. How do we convince them that it’s important to have the right to defend ourselves and all that good stuff?”
It was clearly a question about gun violence.
In the same speech Kirk also tried to use the figures for vehicle deaths as a false equivalent. It’s false for two reasons. One: Vehicles are not designed to kill. They are for transportation and deaths do not happen as a result of using them for their intended purpose but rather as an unwanted byproduct, which is the opposite of guns. Two: vehicles are licensed and registered. In order to drive one you need to pass a comprehensive test in order to check that you can competently and safely do so, unlike guns.
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He said this in the wake of a school shooting. He said similar things in response to other mass murders.
I don’t get why people make these hypothetical counterfactual arguments like “well you could be wrong, if [thing they imagine might theoretically be true]” instead of checking if it is actually true.
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All sorts of things “could be” when you studiously ignore the years of evidence because you need to make some stupid “here’s my totally different angle” argument.
i do not give a fuck if that evidence is not in the direct quote. Your supposition of potentiality is idiotic.
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Actually, it does show that in defending the 2nd Amendment to the extent he did, Kirk was accepting all gun-related deaths, deliberate (murder and suicide) as well as accidental. He didn’t specify accidental deaths, so you’re ascribing unknowable motives to him.
Since Kirk didn’t provide any, no one else needed to.
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People who take a strong free-speech perspective, like most (maybe all) of the TechDirt authors do, seem to absolutely find the speech of Westboro Baptist Church “acceptable.” Not “acceptable” meaning that there is nothing wrong with it, or that it’s something we should all be chill with. But “acceptable” in the sense that people having the right to say heinous stuff is an acceptable consequence of living in a society with strong protections for free speech. This actually does line up with what you said about traffic deaths and pollution. While opinions on cars and emissions vary wildly, almost everyone thinks that it is “acceptable” to have at least some deaths and some pollution as a consequence for people being able to use vehicles.
Was Ezra Klein always this much of a dipshit and I just never noticed because he was standing next to David Brooks?
Re: Trick question...
…David Brooks is a dipshit too.
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Keep going, you’re almost there.
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Dear god.
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I think that you misunderstood. They weren’t saying that David Brooks is such a good dude that people around him seem good too. They were saying that noticing someone else sucks when David Brooks is around is like looking for the north star at high noon.
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Heh! I didn’t like him that much even in his Vox days, but Ezra Klein has been way more of a dipshit since he got on the Andreesen Horowitz/Peter Thiel gravy train. See: https://therevolvingdoorproject.org/who-is-behind-the-growing-abundance-movement/
Like Matt Taibbi, he was apparently just waiting for a sugar daddy to buy his services.
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He’s always been a bit of a dipshit, but he’s gotten worse, similar to a lot of pundits due to things like Twitter/group chats/NYT culture.
Part of it is also just him playing the game, which he’s gotten more concerned about since moving to NYT. Klein’s article reeks of “burnishing my sensible centrist credentials for clout”.
'If you ignore all the terrible things they said and did they were a saint!'
A person is a collection of all their traits and actions, good and bad, so if upon their death you ignore all the bad stuff and only remember them for the good parts you’re neither remembering them as a person nor holding them up as an example for others, you’re merely exploiting their death for your own use by holding up a butchered caricature of them.
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National Review is correct, you are wrong. Charlie Kirk was the nice one, and most of your accusations have been proven wrong numerous times.
And yes, you are celebrating his death.
You and most of people writing on this site are responsible for encouraging violence.
You are not the good guys in this story.
“The wicked become worse when they are tolerated.” Tolstoy.
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I think you’re thinking of a different Charlie Kirk, because the one we’re talking about was despicable and will not be mourned.
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LOL
Says the sicko who worships false idols like drump and laughs when democrats are attacked and killed.
Shut the hell up you Nazi scumbag
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If you’re saying that Charlie Kirk never said any of the following…
* “I think it’s worth it. I think it’s worth to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year, so that we can have the Second Amendment.”
* “I think empathy is a made-up, new age term that does a lot of damage.”
* “They were actually better in the 1940s. It was bad. It was evil. But what happened? Something changed. They committed less crimes. … Black America is worse than it has been in the last 80 years.”
* “The answer is yes. The baby would be delivered.” (in re: a hypothetical situation in which his 10-year-old daughter has been raped and made pregnant)
* “A man who calls himself trans is wearing ‘woman face,’ no different than I would wear Black face trying to be a Black person. It’s assuming an identity that isn’t yours.”
* “If we would have said that Joy Reid and Michelle Obama and Sheila Jackson Lee and Ketanji Brown Jackson were affirmative action picks, we would have been called racists. Now they’re coming out and they’re saying it for us … You do not have the brain processing power to otherwise be taken really seriously. You had to go steal a white person’s slot to go be taken somewhat seriously.”
* “If I see a Black pilot, I’m going to be like, ‘Boy, I hope he’s qualified.’ ” (in re: the plane/helicopter collision earlier this year and Trump blaming “DEI” for the collision)
* “Now, I will say that for future retirees, people under the age of 45, we should absolutely raise the retirement age. I’m going to say something very provocative. I’m not a fan of retirement. I don’t think retirement is biblical. … You say, ‘Charlie, I’m just gonna retire and I’m just gonna go golf.’ I think, what a waste of the gifts that God has given you.”
* “Are you comfortable with both London and New York having Muslim mayors? That doesn’t feel right.”
* “America does not need more visas for people from India. Enough already. We’re full. Let’s finally put our own people first.”
* “We made a huge mistake when we passed the Civil Rights Act in the mid-1960s.”
* “24 years ago a group of Muslims killed 2,753 people on 9/11. Now a Muslim Socialist is on pace to run New York City.” (in re: Zohran Mamdani’s victory in the Democrat primary for the NYC mayoral election)
* “America has freedom of religion, of course, but we should be frank: large dedicated Islamic areas are a threat to America.”
* “America was at its peak when we halted immigration for 40 years and we dropped our foreign-born percentage to its lowest level ever. We should be unafraid to do that.”
…you’re gonna need to prove wrong about a dozen different news agencies and Snopes, because that list has been fact-checked for accuracy without the use of AI and I don’t think you have the balls to deny actual reality.
Nobody here is celebrating his death. But by the same token, we’re not going to celebrate his life as if he was anything but a bigot. His death doesn’t redeem his life.
I haven’t seen anyone here endorse or encourage political violence of any kind and be taken seriously. Hell, one guy’s been trying to make me endorse political violence for months, and he still hasn’t made it work despite numerous attempts to emotionally manipulate me into seeing things his way.
Yeah, so, how about you go back and look at the violence committed by Trump supporters in the past few years? Like, for example, the murder of Melissa Hortman and the shooting of John Hoffman, the beating of Paul Pelosi, the arson that targeted Josh Shapiro, and the insurrection on the 6th of January 2021. I haven’t seen nearly as much political violence from the “far left” as I have from the far right, so please feel free to cite examples of “leftist” political violence from the past ten years. Make sure to include factual citations and not AI hallucinations!
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I find you tiresome. I”ve debated you for years.
I used to just dislike you, now I actually hate you. Not for who you are, but for the lies you tell.
None of what you just said was true. And collectively, we are done dealing with you. There is nothing you won’t mischaracterize, nothing you won’t take out of context.
Not just the “far right” but the “middle right” and the “Middle” too, we all hate you. There is no point in “debating” you, anymore, none of this is in good faith (Charlie was). We’re just done with you now. It’s over.
“God bless your heart”, as the southerners say.
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It’s quite funny how full of yourself you are.
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[citations needed]
[insert there are literally dozens of us meme here]
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What things did they say about Kirk that makes him deserving of death?
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I don’t suppose you would care to provide any examples of when anything that Tim has said was “proven wrong”? Since it happened “numerous times” it should be very easy for you to provide an example.
So that you can demonstration that you know what you’re talking about, and not just talking out of your ass.
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So bigotry is correct until proven wrong?
Libertarian or otherwise rightist people like Ayn Rand, Steven Pinker, James Damore, and the Bell Curve guys have argued that even if (and for many of these people, it’s “when”) groups of people have real differences, the variation within each group is too high to apply to individual judgements.
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It sounds like you’re not disputing that he said those things, but that they are wrong?
Do you seriously want to argue that bigotry is correct until proven wrong?
Libertarian or otherwise rightist people like Ayn Rand, James Damore (wrote “PC considered harmful”), and the Bell Curve guys have argued that even if (and for many of these people, it’s “when”) groups of people have real differences, the variation within each group is too high to apply to individual judgements.
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So him being right about those things meant he should die?
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When did you stop beating your wife?
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You’re welcome to join Charlie in the afterlife. Save us all from having to share a planet with you.
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War Is Peace. Freedom Is Slavery. Ignorance Is Strength. Black Is White. You Is Smart.
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Lol this is funny. Please explain, in excruciating detail, how pointing out that someone isn’t a saint and did or said terrible things while they were alive (or both) is promoting political violence and hatred? Should we all pretend that Hitler and Stalin were saints and ignore the fact that they killed millions and millions of people now?
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If they were, you would’ve bothered to actually address them.
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Nah. There’s a reason he’s using weasel words in his comment.
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I hope you watch your wife and child slowly die on a hospital bed as your wife is forced to become septic, because they won’t save her life to abort.
Kirk was a murdering nazi and so are you.
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Show me where he personally murdered anyone.
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Literally every word you said was bullshit. Nothing about Charlie Kirk was nice. He was a raging, bigoted dickspackle who only debated college kids because he didn’t have the ability to debate adults that know what they’re talking about.
How last words were literally him being this kind of gish galloping ass spelunker and not answering direct questions honestly.
Very few people are actually celebrating his death, but you and your ilk seem to mistake not caring for celebration, which is ironically making celebration seem more appealing.
Since we’re on the topic, why don’t you tell us about your measured, reasonable response to the death of Melissa Hortman.
The world does not deserve what Charlie Kirk did to it.
The only chilling of speech I see is that people aren’t allowed to make fun of horrible person who died in an unbelievably ironic fashion.
If you truly support free speech, you’ll openly mock the dead asshole.
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That’s a really good point. Freedom of speech definitely includes the freedom to mock people while they’re alive, and it doesn’t evaporate just because they’re dead.
And in this particular case, well, what we have here is a man who decided to evangelize hate for profit. He deliberately made the world a much worse place in order to achieve fame and wealth. His legacy is racism and ignorance, bigotry and violence, cruelty and discrimination — and that’s not mockery, by the way, that’s accuracy.
I’ve been mocking Richard Nixon for decades BUT at least he did some things I can grudgingly acknowledge as positive, like creating the EPA, negotiating SALT I, and opening the door to China. I’ll still always hate him because of the other things he did, but in fairness I have to give him credit for those accomplishments.
Charlie Kirk accomplished nothing positive. Not one thing in his entire life. He could have, he clearly had the ability and the resources, but he chose not to. Like other demagogues before him, he seized the opportunity to feed his ego (and his bank account) with no regard whatsoever for all the people he was hurting and for the damage he was doing.
He left the world a much worse place than he found it, so I’m delighted he’s dead. I hope, in his final moments, that he endured some measure of the pain and suffering and fear that he inflicted on millions of others for many years. That may only be a small measure of the justice he deserved, but perhaps it’s enough.
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They’re absolutely allowed to do that. The government hasn’t stopped it(yet).
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For what it’s worth, today they’ve started actively threatening it. Granted they haven’t acted on it yet, but government threats are problematic.
There’s also been a lot of voluntary firings (which is legal, but does also have a chilling effect on speech)
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Being fired is a consequence of free speech, so I have no sympathy for the people who are complaining that it’s happening and that their rights are being violated.
But you’re right that the government just threatening to punish people for legal speech is a problem.
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From what I’ve seen, people haven’t been saying anything about rights being violated. Just that it chills other speech. Which is the (surprisingly) appropriate distinction.
Ah, taking a page from (checks notes) the DHS Assistant Secretary?
https://www.dhs.gov/news/2025/04/14/icymi-dhs-sets-record-straight-about-kilmar-abrego-garcia
There some typo here Tim, you’ve put “caring” and Trump in the same sentence.
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That’s not fair, Trump is absolutely capable of caring so long as it’s about himself. Anyone other than himself though? Ehh…
I think people praising Kirk have been too pickled in the idea that saying someone was “no angel” means they deserved being killed (who cares if the killing was completely unrelated), so that when there is a case where they know the person should not have been killed, they try to build the person up to avoid giving the impression that they are arguing otherwise.
You can already see how flexible this kind of after-the-fact reasoning is, but even if they consistently praise the dead, it does not protect the living.
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This is an interesting idea. On belief and intuition, i imagine it is very well true at times.
Struggling with sympathy for a monster.
I’m struggling having sympathy for a monster like Charlie Kirk, they spread many falsehoods and lies over the years. However, that doesn’t mean I approve of how the monster was removed from the board as we’re living in rather ‘politically charged’ times. All it takes is a series of sparks from any political party to set the powder kegs off.
"Das wird immer einer der besten Witze der Demokratie bleiben..."
There is a troubling tendency in our society to act as though being polite toward one’s enemies makes one’s ideas worth considering. That civility disappears when the ruse no longer needs to be maintained, though; you cannot civilly or politely execute someone for being “other,” for the act by its very nature is uncivil. Those who argue for immoral policies, let alone in bad faith like Kirk, should not get a pass simply because they are able to be polite when not in a position to enshrine their agenda in law. To people like Kirk, civility is only ever a means to an end that gets discarded the instant it ceases to be necessary.
Re: It's easy to be 'polite' when your rights of even life isn't on the line
‘They’re a disgusting bigot!’
‘But they never raised their voice, unlike the rude people calling them a bigot.’
‘They’re arguing that entire categories of people don’t deserve human rights!’
‘But they’re being so polite when they say it, so they can’t be that bad.’
Seems to be working properly
Turning him into MAGA’s Horst Wessel has driven Epstein from the headlines.
“I have had my mind changed. …”
Thank you for expressing your personal situation.
Serious question. What can we (average anonymous cowards) do to help others in the situation you described? Exposing lies and presenting facts doesn’t seem to matter anymore (or at least not right away).
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Honestly, for a lot of people, it happens or at least starts to happen when you leave your bubble. As Tim described for himself and was true for me as well, you leave home. You interact with more people. This is another reason why conservatives hate college. It’s not necessarily students learning about Marxism in a class or even learning critical analysis skills. You just meet more people and you don’t have your conservative dad standing over your shoulder making snide remarks about “those people.”
So you’re more likely to change your mind if you’re pulled out of your context and see how other people live, see how other people struggle, see how your stereotypes are wrong. This is unfortunately harder to do for people who never leave their hometowns and get constant reinforcement of the doctrine they were raised in.
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To wit: They’re blaming college for “radicalizing” the asshole who killed Charlie Kirk, even though he never actually went to a physical college and the only college classes he took were done remotely.
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Dinesh D’Souza: “I need a list of all the learning management software and library video platforms he interacted with as an online student! Which student account database system is responsible for this bloodlust?!? How many online quizzes were coded with Marxism?”
It’s a classic case of be careful what you wish for. CK promoted hate and violence. In the end that’s what he got back. He should have been feeling oh so validated that someone was listening (and, yes, it was just one person’s response to his calls for hate and violence, not some fantasy “deep state”). MAGA, on other hand is a whole bunch of delusional liars filled with nothing but hate and violence. They’re the least Christian people on the face of the Earth.
that never worked
“I think it’s worth it,” he said. “I think it’s worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year so that we can have the second amendment to protect our other God-given rights. That is a prudent deal. It’s rational.”
If you use a gun to defend your rights when a cop is abusing them you will be dead.
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Leave it to Techdirt to analyze complex subjects in an entirely superficial way.
The situation is pretty clear. The majority of people who care enough to vote are conservative. Hurling invective still isn’t a way to convince us stupid people to come tl your side. Some of us ignorant, bigoted, misogynistic, dimwits actually don’t respond positively to the name-calling. You should try to convince me instead of shaming me.
Until someone on the left can make a cogent, evidence-based argument, I’ll just stand here on the sidelines and punch the R button every chance I get.
Thank you for your attention to this matter.
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If this was true, you wouldn’t keep losing the popular vote.
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There are 7 million more registered Democrat voters than Republicans, and as evidenced by the measures Republicans are implementing they are afraid of this difference.
You are who you choose to associate with.
They tried, many times. But people like you were more interested in being fed lies and grievance politics. If you haven’t noticed that pattern yet, it will take a life altering event for it to happen.
You are being robbed blind, and you are asking the thieves to protect you.
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Does that go for Republicans as well, considering all the names Trump has called people—both individuals and groups of people—for the past decade?
I’m sorry if you can’t handle the truth, but if you support the rhetoric of people like Donald Trump and Charlie Kirk by giving them your money and your vote, you’re TRASH.
I don’t know how to tell you that you should care about other people.
Re: Re: 'How dare you treat me the way I treated you?!'
Does that go for Republicans as well, considering all the names Trump has called people—both individuals and groups of people—for the past decade?
It never ceases to amuse me seeing republicans get so butthurt over being called mean names given who and what sort of people they idolize. It’s just the ultimate example of people that can and will gleefully dish it out but who clutch their pearls and faint away the second they find themselves on the receiving end of their own behavior.
Re: 'I'm not a bigot and to show that I'll support them every time!'
The situation is pretty clear. The majority of people who care enough to vote are conservative. Hurling invective still isn’t a way to convince us stupid people to come tl your side. Some of us ignorant, bigoted, misogynistic, dimwits actually don’t respond positively to the name-calling. You should try to convince me instead of shaming me.
Yeah, hate to break it to you but if your response to being called a bigot is to double-down on the bigotry and side with other bigots, the only thing you’re showing is that the original accusation was correct.
Until someone on the left can make a cogent, evidence-based argument, I’ll just stand here on the sidelines and punch the R button every chance I get.
Republicans are so bloody pathetic, it’s never your fault for doing something, instead it’s always someone else who made you do it. At least have the guts to own your hate and stupidity.
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“I feel bullied, really.”
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Nobody is responsible for your voting pattern or your bigotry except you. No one is responsible for convincing you otherwise. It’s like AA. You’ve got to do the steps yourself. If you are actually willing to change your mind, but you’re just waiting around to be convinced, it means you’re just leaving it up to chance that you might find someone with a convincing argument (which still doesn’t mean that argument is correct, only that you couldn’t reason against it). But you’re not interested in changing your mind because if you were you’d be asking questions instead of making accusations or trying to scare people into silence by functionally saying the old MAGA line: “Keep talking. This is why Trump won!” That tactic doesn’t work. It just tells us that you’re upset when you’re called out and you’re afraid it will strike a cord with someone.
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The surest sign of a closed mind is a lack of sincere curiosity.
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No. If you had even a shred of decency or a minimally-function conscience or some small bit of humanity, you would have already convinced yourself.
What you’re doing is abdicating responsibility — a common tactic among Republicans/conservatives, by the way. To wit: it’s not your fault for being a racist and a bigot &etc., oh no, it’s the fault of the people who couldn’t convince you to be better. And just to spite those people, you’re going to be even MORE of a racist and a bigot &etc.
This is — pretty much — about as intellectually, emotionally, and ethically immature as it’s possible to be. You should be embarrassed to look in a mirror and see the profoundly horrible person you’ve become.
So no, I’m not going to try to convince you. Nobody else should either.
You’re not worth the effort. You’re beyond help, beyond hope, beyond rescue.
Enjoy living in the hell you’ve made for yourself.
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Hurling invective still isn’t a way to convince us stupid people to come tl your side.
How entitled of you to think we want you stupids on ‘our side.’ I thought we got rid of a bunch of you when you were playing chicken with a virus and taking up all of our ventilators.
The last fucking thing I want is more of you ignorant, bigoted, misogynistic, dimwits on ‘my side.’
Fuck right off, and stay where you are.
CK memorial catch-22
I heard they were trying to make plans for a Charlie Kirk memorial to go alongside the MLK Jr, Jefferson, and Lincoln memorials in DC, except unlike those other ones the architects can’t chisel any of his quotes on it without being accused of attacking him.
The irony is partly in the fact he was killed by a weapon he openly espoused; the other part is the killer was another of his far-right “community”. Upholding community standards, or so it would appear …
And now Trump is going to use the killing as part and parcel of a crackdown on Lefties? He was always going to do that – all he needed was an excuse, and a far-right nutter gave him it.
Re: Conspiracy Theory
Conspiracy Theory: Trump ordered the assassination.
Re: Re: 'Will no-one rid me of that troublesome speaker?'
I honestly wouldn’t put it past the regime to have ordered a hit or even just ‘hinted’ to some deranged nutter that the regime would be better off if Kirk died, but whether they did or not is kinda moot at this point as either way they’re exploiting his death to rile up the MAGAts by lying and claiming that the killer was a non-republican and therefore everyone but them is a threat that they need to ‘defend’ themselves from.
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Y’all motherfuckers keep giving Trump credit for these devious plots like he isn’t dumb as shit.
He’s not playing 12D chess, dude. He’s just an idiot.
Some asshole with easy access to a gun shot somebody, a thing that happens so often in America that it wasn’t even the only high-profile shooting that day. We don’t need to go all Alex Jones and claim it was a government false flag for something that has a simple and obvious explanation.
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If not Trump, then his handler.
Murder
I’m sorry, but I think that murder, any murder, is objectively wrong. What I see in the comments above could so easily be reversed by someone with a contrary point of view to justify further killing; before, or after, the fact.
There is no philosophy I want to live by that does not leave me unhappy about the cold blooded, premeditated killing of another human being for the opinions they espouse.
Whatever his views, I mourn his death, and will not join in supporting assassination as a method of political discourse.