The Murder Of Charlie Kirk Didn’t Help Anyone
from the on-violence dept
I didn’t like Charlie Kirk. His morals and principles, as expressed through his rhetoric and actions, disgusted me. I’ve no reason to mourn his death—and no plans to celebrate it.
Kirk was killed in what is most likely an act of politically inspired violence. He was shot during one of his usual speaking events; at the moment before he was shot, he was trying to link transgender people to mass casualty shootings in a way that statistics don’t bear out. His death will galvanize conservatives, who will claim that political violence is “not the answer” and “Democrats caused this” but who refused to condemn—and sometimes mocked—the attack against Paul Pelosi that was motivated by conservative rhetoric.
This brief essay isn’t necessarily about conservative vs. liberal, Republican vs. Democrat, or whatever other sociopolitical dichotomy you might have in your head. Sure, it would be easy to take that route, especially with Donald Trump as the head of the Republican table. What this essay is about is violence.
For months now, in this site’s comments sections, I’ve been mocked for (and pressured to give up) a stance I hold with complete sincerity: Violence should be the absolute last resort for any issue, especially sociopolitical ones. My stance has been erroneously likened to suicidal pacifism. I don’t believe in such a thing and I would never ask others to believe in it. What I do believe is that violence, like the murder of Charlie Kirk, creates more problems than it solves.
Sure, Kirk is dead, and he will never again spread his brand of vile rhetoric anywhere. But now Kirk is being turned into a martyr to a cause and a party for which he likely didn’t intend to die; those who believe in the MAGA movement will use his death as a rallying cry for going after the “enemies” of that movement (and its leader). His murder is likely to beget more violence, which will cause more pain and more strife, which will further fracture our already fragile society. No social good is served by him being murdered in an act of political vigilantism.
My beliefs about violence are driven by the idea that the use of violence curtails any chance of a situation being solved peacefully. Violence always makes a conflict worse, especially when it becomes the go-to “answer” for conflict resolution instead of the last resort. But I recognize that violence can sometimes become a necessity—which is why I say that people should forgo the use of violence unless all non-violent paths to resolve a conflict have either been exhausted or taken off the table. Even then, one should only use as much violence as is necessary to stop a situation from getting worse. Lethal violence is the line that should only be crossed when it, too, is the last available option. Once someone is dead, you can’t bring them back, so you better be goddamn sure that killing them is the only way to save yourself from them.
Charlie Kirk is dead and nothing will bring him back. We are all a little worse off for his death—not because he was a good person, but because his death is likely to inspire more violence. That will cause far more problems than murdering him could ever hope to solve.
Filed Under: charlie kirk, political violence
Comments on “The Murder Of Charlie Kirk Didn’t Help Anyone”
His death helped Trump
Remember that about a week ago Laura Loomer was calling Charlie Kirk a traitor because he turned on Trump over the Epstein files. He was no longer supporting Trump and silencing helped Trump’s agenda. His death furthermore martyred him (to people who didn’t realize he’d turned on Trump) and is being used as an excuse to justify more 1A and 4A rights violations by the Trump regime. It is making his cultists feel justified in violence against a perceived enemy (when the shooter has never been identified). I doubt the real shooter will be caught alive. It’s very likely they will try to pin it on an immigrant– further pushing the narrative about immigrants being violent criminals. Notice how the newsmedia is talking all about Charlie Kirk and stopped talking about the Epstein files? No longer talking about Trump’s declining health. It successfully distracted the media from those topics. So Charlie Kirk’s death benefited Trump.
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I agree!
Re: Yeah but still I m sick of bad people like him
Kinda of rockstar for stupid people, that are full of hatred and lies, I can t talk to my little bro anymore, he s si on his crazy world full of hatred, conspiracies, fake news, reptilians, chemtrails and yoga shit vibes, it s so sad, men and women like this idiot destroy families, friendships with his crazy ideas anti lgbtq shit, anti Ukraine shit etc
Re: Re: Are you trying to be ironic?
Somehow Charlie Kirk trying to have civil discourse with people who disagree with him is justification for killing him.? What rhetoric caused this otherwise normal 22 year old to shot and kill someone? And talk about breaking up families, what about Charlie’s wife and two kids? Come on man.
Re: Re: Re:
What do you mean? Are you suggesting that everyone who disagreed with him thought the killing was justified?
What causes anyone to kill someone else? There are a myriad of reasons but in this case we don’t actually know.
As Kirk himself said: “I can’t stand the word empathy, I think empathy is a made up new age term and it does a lot of damage. Sympathy is a better word, because empathy means you are actually feeling what another person felt, and no one can feel what another person feels.”
Do you want us to empathize or have sympathy? I guess the Hortman families can empathize, because empathy isn’t about having the same feelings which is something Kirk got wrong, it’s about understanding what other people feel.
And I have to ask, why do you think one person’s pain isn’t as important as someone else’s? To each of them, their own pain is more important than any else’s and who are we to choose which pain is the most important which is something you just did.
US have always been the country of violence, not because of poverty, drugs, power, tribes, like other countries, but because of the culture.
But what is to fear (there is no many other words to use) is targeted violence.
Kirk was a white-supremacist, violence will target non-white.
Kirk was anti-immigration, violence will target immigrants.
Kirk was anti-LGBTQIA, violence will target LGBTQIA.
Kirk was anti too many thing, and violence will target pretty much everybody.
Violence is never the answer, but Kirk wasn’t asking for answer, but a solution, any solution.
We have been warning about the rise of political assasinations the moment trump ushered in the age of flat out disinformation. Not partial lies, not stretching the truth but pure lies made of whole cloth. It fell on deaf ears. I will not lift a finger to harm these right wing propaganda peddlers but they got what they deserved. Political opinions based on facts are one thing but the second bigots start lying they risk dying. They harm innocent people with their hate. FAFO is definitely something to consider when you lie to the public to push your own agenda. The liars rightfully should fear the consequences of their actions. Nothing of value was lost with his end, that is a fact.
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Re: Sanctity of Life
How is it that human life can be devalued based on words and beliefs? Facts are pretty easy to distinguish if one cares to research and educate themselves on evidence-based sources. You are saying that a person deserves death based upon the disinformation targeting the illiterate population, even though most people have the chance, through the use of smart phone technology, to search out truth. On a similar note, the fact that anyone would participate in a moment of silence for a person with a criminal conviction history, because he was murdered based on the suspicion of racism, but would not participate in silence for a murdered Christian family man promoting truth and unity, is bad. I don’t like Trump, or extreme politics, but Charlie Kirk was not guilty of anything and that is truth. Your comments are driven by personal emotional and cultural bias driven into your brain by a victimhood mentality. Jesus loves you enough that he was murdered for you, so that you may have life, and life abundantly; in this life and the next. In fact, we all deserve death because of sin. Jesus died in our place, for our sin. All he asked was for us to confess our sins and ask for forgiveness. We are forgiven because of what he suffered; tortured by flogging where pieces of bone and flesh were ripped from his back and ribs, his beard ripped out, thorns shoved into his scalp, spit on, and beaten worse than any man, beyond recognition. He was then crucified outside the city. This included nailing his feet together to a Wooden cross. Nailing his wrists to the cross. Often times, criminals had their legs broken to speed up the asphyxiation that led to their deaths. Jesus’ death was prophesied hundreds of years earlier that no bone in his body would be broken and that his side would be pierced, which is historically what happened. His death and resurrection have the MOST facts surrounding any historical event to the point that even atheistic historians cannot say his death AND resurrection were confabulated. Charlie Kirk, like the early Christians were willing to be brutally murdered and tortured in the truth of Jesus Christ. So do yourself a favor and research truth before you spout hate in a narcissistic manner like Donald Trump or any other emotionally charged, uneducated extremist. Jesus loves you. Read the Bible and any historical documents that corroborate it and then think for yourself, putting aside your personal abusive trauma suffered at the hands of your trusted “Christian” loved ones, like I did.
Re: Re:
Charlie didn’t deserve to die. But he doesn’t deserve beatification either, his message was not one of truth and unity.
Re: Re:
How is it that human life can be devalued based on words and beliefs?
Oh for fuck’s sake…it’s an integral tenet of religion.
If your god endorses what Charlie Kirk was, then you should ask yourself ‘is my god a bigoted asshole?’ instead.
Re: Re: Re:
Not to mention, if their god endorses what he was, why would said god let him die?
Re: Re:
How ironic that this was clearly not written by a human.
This is where I think you show the basic problem with your position. The people who’re engaging in, and exhorting others to engage in, violence DON’T AGREE WITH YOU about violence being the last resort. And as long as they don’t agree with you, you’re entirely right that there’s no chance of resolving the situation peacefully. That leaves precious few options for resolving the situation, and not resolving the situation leaves us with the continuing violence.
I personally prefer a more nuanced position that distinguishes between initiating violence against someone else vs. responding to violence initiated by someone else. The former I consider an absolute last resort, and one I don’t think needs applied in this situation. The latter I consider to merit whatever response ends the threat of violence with the least danger to myself, the target of the violence and innocent bystanders.
Re:
I would say he sort of addressed that point with this:
Re:
That’s a fair position, and I agree with it. I do believe that some violent situations—mostly stuff like low-level scuffles that haven’t become full-on fist fights—can be resolved peacefully, but a violent response takes peace off the table. Hence why I say that violence should be a “last resort” response, to be taken only when it is necessary. But as I mentioned in the article, this position has been twisted by a certain commenter to endorse suicidal pacifism even though I believe in nothing of the sort.
Re:
Whatever there is to be said about Charlie Kirk (the less, the better, IMPO) he was not violent. He was not a source of violence. He did not initiate violence against anyone. Could his ideas have inspired someone to violence? Maybe. But inspiration is not culpability.
If violence is the only political answer that remains, then (in that case) it should only be directed at the actual source of violence. The American Revolution wasn’t fought by butchering royalist authors.
Re: Re:
The difficulty is the vary issue we call the paradox of tolerance. Charlie Kirk was not a tolerant man. In fact he was the embodiment of the right wing drive to create boogeymen out of normal people so he could create out groups.
The paradox to be resolved his that he lost almost every formal debate, his world view had no grounding in reality, yet as long as he did his life’s work, a great many people suffered and will continue to suffer.
I don’t know what legal avenue was left, ignoring him just lets him recruit and push his agenda. Interacting with him just let him push his message. Laughing at him made him want to spout more nonsense. Ultimately he was going push his message of hate, cause small harms to others, and we would just have to accept this as the price of free speech.
I can’t say what the solution is, but in a post Trump world, we need a response to the paradox of tolerance that is better then just allowing it to continue. We need something better then violence that’s for sure.
Re: Re: Re:
There is no Tolerance Paradox. Allowing bad speech doesn’t “enable” bad acts. If that were the case then absolute intolerance of bad speech would prevent bad acts, but it categorically does not.
Re: Re: Re:2
The former doesn’t imply the latter. Intolerance of bad speech doesn’t prevent all bad acts, it would (even hypothetically) only stop bad acts caused by speech. There are things besides speech that can motivate bad acts.
But the bigger issue is that absolute intolerance of bad speech is impossible from a practical standpoint. It’s just impossible to do with things slipping through the cracks, and people disagreeing on what qualifies as bad speech. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t suppress bad acts, though.
There’s a reason we have laws against incitement, even here in the U.S., as limited as they are by Brandenburg. Those limits are because of risks of abuse, not because speech can’t persuade people into bad acts.
Re: Re:
Ah, the Charles Manson defense.
Re: Re:
Legally, no. Ethically? It is. A person is morally responsible for the results of their actions, especially when it’s predictable. And that includes speech.
The reason we have free speech laws that are so broad is because it can’t be implemented safely, not because the person isn’t culpable for it. (And even then, we still do have incitement, albeit narrowly)
Royalist authors were definitely targeted in the revolution. It’s something we tend not to focus on, but we were uh… not tolerant. See e.g. Jonathan Boucher. Many were forced to flee.
Re: Re:
I categorically disagree with your position. The mob boss who tells his underlings “That guy, we’d be better off if he weren’t around anymore.”, he’s as culpable for that guy’s murder as the low-level mook who actually does the deed. When someone tells his followers that “Your body, my choice.” is a valid opinion towards women, he’s as culpable as the guys who put that opinion into practice. When his words inspire others to violence he is absolutely endorsing and encouraging violence and I’m going to call him what he is: violent. He is the actual source of the violence right along with the people he incites and he doesn’t get a pass on it.
Re: Re: The word you're looking for, is 'incitement'
Charlie Kirk was most definitely a source of violence — he was, with malice aforethought, inciting violence.
Charlie Kirk was careful to couch his “arguments” as mere social discourse, political debate superficially (if one assiduously ignored any broader perspective) within the limits of permissible speech, and even as appeals to common sense, logical reasoning, and principled values, but the arc of his arguments and inevitable consequences of his misinformation, disinformation and faux-principled hate mongering was clear.
Charlie Kirk was not “just talking”. Charlie Kirk was a conscious, self-motivated participant of an organized program to incite change, to override objections by any means available, and to impose that change on the rest of society — whether the rest of society wants it or not. (The last few months should suffice to remove any reasonable doubt about whether imposing that change by force is part of that agenda. The use of force and violence — contrary to law — is already underway.)
Generals and politicians safely ensconced in their bunkers behind the lines are at least as much a participant in the violence they direct, as the schmucks soldiering at the front. They don’t get to evade responsibility by claiming “Well you know, I personally didn’t really engage in actual violence myself. I didn’t personally fire a rifle or launch a missile… other people did that part.”
The only surprise is that in this case, some of the hate and violence that Charlie Kirk incited — was in fact at that very moment inciting — splashed back on him personally.
That splash-back wasn’t some non-violent actor becoming the victim of violence. That was Karma.
Re: Re: Re:
Reminds me of the poem “The Prime Minister Told the Army” by Clive Sanders:
Re: Re: Re:2
Yeah; that’s how it goes.
Re: Re:
He didn’t initiate violence, that’s true, provocative “debate” was his hat. he didn’t directly, call for his followers to commit it.
But the thing is, he was more than fine with it when people on his side committed it.
We need to be better than he was, we need to not be okay when someone on our side goes to far.
Re: Re: Re: The Phule
Actually, he did call upon his followers to commit it: He said that gay people should be stoned as per the Bible.
That’s a call for violence.
Re: Re:
You’re wrong. He instigated and fomented violence.
Re: Re:
Who is it claims only Koby and ACs can be trolls again? Oh, right. You.
Re:
I think if you want to advocate “a more nuanced position”, advocating “[distinguishing] between initiating violence against someone else vs. responding to violence initiated by someone else”, you might want to recognize that the author you criticize was making that exact nuanced argument. You cut off everything at the top and rushed down to the comments to advocate without taking the time to read and appreciate nuance.
Ok. I admire your purity.
He was literally in the middle of explaining why MY CHILD should be considered a societal mass-murder risk.
I’m glad he’s dead.
Re:
What he was saying (and what he’d said about trans people in the past) was odious and vile, so I get why you feel how you feel and I won’t begrudge you for that. That being said: Killing him didn’t kill his rhetoric or beliefs—if anything, his murder has galvanized people who shared his beliefs into entrenching them further into their belief system. Yes, he probably inspired a lot of anti-trans shittery. But did he really, truly, 100% deserve to be murdered in cold blood over his speech alone?
Re: Re:
Yes. Because if he had the chance he would kill a trans child. None of us would kill anybody for being different, for existing differently. He would. His audience would. Or will.
Fascist lives don’t matter. All the others who could disagree but would never make any existence impossible and would never kill anyone different do matter.
That’s the paradox of tolerance.
Re: Re: Re:
I hate to say this, but if you say “I believe he deserved to be killed for his speech alone”, you’re opening the door for people who believed his speech to say “well, now, if we can kill people for saying offensive things…” and act accordingly.
Charlie Kirk was a piece of shit. He still didn’t deserve to be murdered.
Re: Re: Re:2
When your speech only result is violence and death…
The door has been shattered already. I don’t think I’d kill anyone for their murderous speech alone but I find it hard to find any pity for those who find their demise because of it.
I am thankful the Constitution of my country doesn’t allow this kind of speech. And while it can be used in nefarious ways at the very least we are actually better than the US on many fronts because of it. And the ones that attempted a coup are actually being punished.
Re: Re: Re:
Except that you are advocating for the people that killed him. He was different from you.
Yes, Charlie Kirk was a horrible person based on his rhetoric. Despite him claiming to be a Christian he didn’t act like one when he advocates for the persecution of people he considers less deserving or different.
I am a Christian, I believe that everyone is a child of a loving Heavenly Father. And because of that status we all have inherent worth and are equal to each other. So we should be actively engaged in helping one another, understanding each other, and caring about the well-being and welfare of others. That means building healthy relationships with others, even those that appear different.
It is difficult, maybe impossible to do anything with someone like Kirk, other than keep him at arms length, keep him from a position of power, and counter his vile words with more speech. Murder was not the answer at this time for dealing with the issues plaguing the US. His kids and wife are going to need support to deal with the trauma of his death.
Re: Re: Re:2
FYI, I’m not advocating for the far right bigot that killed Kirk because he began disagreeing with his god at all.
Agree, but...
[Which typically means ignore everything before the comma.]
I’ve been concerned about the growing violence caused by various policies coming from the White House, specifically the unnecessarily violent actions of ICE. Similarly, the hatreds expressed by Trump and his minions are accelerating the divisions among us. Trump’s call to arms last night was terrifying. I suspect we’re being intentionally pushed into a situation where the only way we can protect the freedoms detailed in the Bill of Rights will require physical action beyond protests. Kavanaugh’s idiotic justification for racial profiling just destroyed any credibility the Supreme Court had remaining, which seems to free the current administration to do whatever the creeps like Miller fantasize about. This is a slippery slope, and history tells us not to slide too far down before we respond. I’m not anxious to participate in another Civil War, but that may be the only way we can save our democracy.
Re:
As several people on Bluesky have mentioned over the past day, taking stock of what is considered “political violence” should also include violence inflicted upon people by the government that is meant to represent them. Charlie Kirk’s murder was most likely an act of political violence; so is police brutality.
I find it hard to have sympathy for someone like Charlie Kirk, the man played a major role in spreading the ongoing hateful rhetoric against the vulnerable people. However, I do not approve of sniping that hateful being to remove him from the board as there were other legal means to do so (ie: the petition with nearly 1000 signatures that was circulated on campus to keep Charlie Kirk from speaking there). Sadly, this is only going to make things far more difficult in the coming days.
Re:
End of the day there wasent a legal way to end this. The petition today is a good way to get targeted by Trump. Thats why so few signed it. Nor is the petition actully a legal means of anything but expressing displesure that he is allowed to make statements.
Charlie Kirk was going to continue to use coded language to incite violence from now till the end of days. He chose his words to never clearly say something that would cross the first amendment. Sadly this is the case because the courts have rejected the idea that coded language is a thing at all.
Outside his death this is really a conversation on if the first amendment needs an adjustment. At the moment with Trump’s administration I’d say no, At some point in the future I’d ask for non violent ways to shut down someone whos figured out how to get around basic safeguards and be able to call out coded language for what it really is, calls to violence.
Re: Re:
That idea has one small problem: “Incitement through coded language” would be near-impossible to prosecute as a crime. How could anyone ever be prosecuted for using “coded language” to incite violence if such language can always have different interpretations? Consider how both sides of the political aisle often use comparisons to Nazis/Hitler. (Yes, the right does it as well.) If someone makes compares a political figure to Hitler and a different person kills that political figure the next day, how can the person who made the comparison be cited for incitement of violence if they didn’t say “kill this person”?
None of this is to say that the political temperature couldn’t stand to be lowered—by both “sides”, really. What I’m saying is that any proposal to ban “coded language” will run headfirst into problems with interpretation and intent. You have to get around those hurdles to make a convincing case for such a ban; I don’t think you, or anyone else, could do that.
Re: Re: Re:
I don’t know any good examples offhand, but I’m pretty sure that already fits under Brandenburg. You’d just need to convince a jury of “directed to inciting or producing imminent lawless action” and intent. It’s way harder to do, but establishing mens rea is something courts already handle, even if a defendant doesn’t just say the crime out loud. The bigger issue is imminence.
You’re not wrong, but I’m not sure what someone who is targeted by that incitement is really supposed to do with that.
Re: Re: Re:2
The sad reality is that there isn’t much they can do. Once the words are spoken and heard, they can’t be unspoken and unheard. The government can’t arrest everyone who spoke/heard the words on the basis of “well, they might do something violent in the future”. This ultimately comes down to people needing to take more responsibility for their speech—by which I mean they need to consider what they’re saying far more carefully than they may be doing right now. It’s part of the reason I avoid advocating for violence, political or otherwise: My words have weight and I’d rather not toss out the heaviest ones with no forethought about the impact they’ll have.
Re: Re: Re:3 The Phule
Or we can finally start regulating speech, like most civilized countries do.
Free speech isn’t free, and the price we’re paying for it isn’t being paid by the violent speakers, it’s being paid by random civilians who didn’t agree to this shit who are attacked by people activated by the violent speakers.
Re: Re: Re:3
Free speech isn’t free
It kills folks like you and me
And if you won’t support that assassin
Who will?
Re: Re: Re:2
Even better, take out the requirement for the action being imminent or give imminence the legal definition of within a year rather than within a week.
Re: Re: Re: Nothing of value was lost.
Kirk did not use racist coded language he used racist dog whistles louder than fog horns.
babe they were already doing violence. gabby giffords got shot 15 years ago. melissa hortman and john hoffman were shot 3 months ago. i don’t think shooting charlie kirk helps anyone, but let’s not act like this is the thing that will kick the hornets nest; the hornets have been well and truly out for decades.
you’re a fool. tell me what non-violent actions trans people should take to get them to stop calling us pedophiles and taking away our life-saving medicines and killing us. tell me what non-violent actions immigrants should take to get them to stop deporting us to concentration camps and blowing up our boats and fucking killing us. all i’m hearing is that my people should lay down and take it until you don’t have to hear about our suffering anymore.
the other side has no qualms about using violence against us. miss me with your hand-wringing when they reap what they sow.
What commentators on the right are upset about
I agree with this piece pretty much entirely, and I’d like to add this: the people on the right (now, all of a sudden) saying that political violence is not the answer are merely upset that they don’t have a MONOPOLY on political violence. They’ve been actively participating in it for years. Not just privately, when they assault marginalized groups, but by enabling police to attack and kill anyone they like almost entirely without consequences, or even the bans on abortion care that lead to women dying because doctors are scared to treat them. These are all forms of political violence.
Of course, we must also ask what counts as ‘political’ violence. Or, more to the point, what DOESN’T count as political violence? Is a school shooting somehow apolitical just because we acknowledge those children are neither left nor right wing?
The right has never cared about your right to speech; they spend all their time talking about how THEY’RE being silenced even while Kirk held huge events like this. They have not somehow grown morals overnight, they just don’t like it when they have to look over their shoulders.
So the reality is that the violence has been ongoing for a very long time, and you’re probably correct: the potential to confront the problem in a non-violent way was left behind. It was probably left behind a long time behind a long time ago. But it was by Trump and Miller and Kirk and his ilk, not their opponents.
According to his own words gun deaths are acceptable collateral to protect the 2nd ameb
According to his own words gun deaths are acceptable collateral for the 2nd amendment.
He was a terrible, horrible person who likely helped harm many people.
He was friends with Alex Jones and was fine with harassing the sandy hook families.
I don’t feel sorry for him. I wish we could live in a world where this wouldn’t happen.
It’s pretty clear that his death is going to be used as an excuse to hurt any and all republicans can blame for it.
Person trying to get others shot gets shot instead
Kirk was killed in what is most likely an act of politically inspired violence. He was shot during one of his usual speaking events; at the moment before he was shot, he was trying to link transgender people to mass casualty shootings in a way that statistics don’t bear out.
I agree that violence should be a last resort, and likewise agree that his death is likely to just make things worse in general under the premise of ‘People talk, martyrs scream’, but at the same time he was shot while trying to link trans people to mass shootings so you’ll have to excuse me but my tear ducts seem to be broken at the moment.
Re:
Well, that’s one I haven’t heard before, but it’s going into the ol’ brain vault now.
I mostly agree with you. But I think the point of no return will be crossed (or has been) before all non-violent routes are tried or blocked.
The fascists have already started to use it. They are using it via the weaponization of ICE and more concretely by the assassination of two Democrats. Violent speech is already killing hundreds, thousands around the world by inspiring vile people into action. Kirk’s death is just a good excuse to the fascists, bigots to intensify what they are already doing.
I say good riddance. And I hope it’s just the beginning of a broader movement against these types. It’s past time the ones on the receiving end of their violence gave them their own medicine. I’m done with taking the moral high ground and seeing people die by the hands of these despicable pieces of turd, directly or indirectly. I’ve seen two people from my closer circle die because of these people, one indirectly and the other one directly. Fuck them all.
Re:
I understand the urge to think this way. But “an eye for an eye” is no way to hold together a society, especially when it’s more likely to fracture that society than bring it together. The murder of Charlie Kirk took him “off the table” in terms of spreading anti-trans rhetoric, but it didn’t take that rhetoric off the table—and there’s a good chance his death will worsen both the spread of that hatred and the rhetoric that spreads it.
Don’t take this to mean I have any sympathy for Kirk. I won’t mourn someone like him. All the same, I fail to see how killing him accomplished anything other than maybe furthering the goals of accelerationists who actively want a civil war to tear this country apart.
Re: Re:
Stephen, I like you, I really do. And I admire your position and I actually agree that this probably doesn’t work. More than that I believe you despise this Kirk idiot.
But I think the fracture is already there and it’s not fixable. That’s where your point fails.
Re: Re: Re:
The fracture is there; whether it’s fixable is up for debate, but shit like Kirk being murdered sure as hell don’t help. That’s exactly why I don’t endorse that kind of violence: It always makes everything worse.
Re: Re: Re:2
What is worse? Yes, it will get worse, but how long do you wait? Hitler killed himself, but only after millions died.
Re: Re: Re:3
If you haven’t figured it out, everyone will eventually discover their own limit when they think enough is enough.
Instead of asking someone who yet hasn’t discovered their limit for what it is, tell us what your limit is?
I have two things to say about Kirk’s death – I agree that killing him doesn’t help anyone nor was it the right way to deal with his hateful, bigoted rhetoric.
On the other hand, he was killed via the exact sort of political violence he advocated for, and was probably shot by an alt-right lunatic because of something utterly inane. Play stupid games, reap what you sow, etc. etc. RIP in piss bozo, and I hope he burns in hell.
Re:
Yeah, one comment I saw yesterday summed it up: Charlie Kirk died in the America that Charlie Kirk wanted to live in.
Re: Re:
Side-note, but against an oppressor it has to be accepted that you have to readily reserve self-defense as a fallback option, if not the only option available. Despite popular history depicting him as a pacifist, Martin Luther King Jr. embraced the right of black Americans to arm themselves against white oppressors, his methods were not spotless and pure (he has been severely whitewashed over time), armed black resistance was just as crucial to the civil rights movement as the peaceful marches if not moreso, and if you need to push back, push back.
“This Non-Violent Stuff Will Get You Killed” by Charles E. Cobb Jr. and “We Will Shoot Back: Armed Resistance in the Mississippi Freedom Movement” by Akinyele Omowale Umoja, amongst other books, should be required reading for folks who really want to understand the civil rights movement and how it involved decades of armed resistance. Also, “we’ve been duped” by lil bill.
There is no such thing as a bloodless/non violent revolution
The U.S. is past the point fo no return and pundits, bloggers, the mainstream media etc. all pretending it isn’t and still pushing the “we need dialogue” or “just vote harder” is utter bullshit. NEVER in history has a tyranical/dictatorial/authoritarian or Fascist government EVER been removed from power via the ballot box. EVER.
Re:
Impeachment was an attempt to prevent bloody revolutions. It seems like it didn’t work.
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Shooting Kirk is not a revolution.
Something you need to grapple with is- they were already saying this shit before yesterday. Threatening to kill people? Already a thing. Kirk was one of those people. He literally tried to help bail out Paul Pelosi’s attacker, as well as help on J6. (I’m also not sure that this is more galvanizing than the attempted assassination of a presidential candidate, as far as that goes. Speaking of, there is a nontrivial shot that the shooter has complicated politics, again)
Where is the line, then? I’ve never seen you give any criteria for when you think that last resort becomes active.
(Reminder to everyone: Don’t commit subpeonable activity in the comments)
So I think a big question is, when exactly does that kick in? Is it before people get sent to concentration camps, or after? Because every ally sent to the camps while you exhaust other means, makes you more likely to lose once you decide it’s necessary.
Re:
As alluded to in an earlier comment, that line comes when violence is the only available and reasonable response to a situation. Someone shoving you in an attempt to provoke you into hitting them back is a situation that can be solved by walking away or trying to talk that person down; that same someone punching you in the face and preparing to attack you again won’t be talked out of punching you in the face.
I don‘t have a concrete answer for that—partly because having one might get me a visit from the feds, but also because the level of violence that would come with such a response is one that I believe should be the absolute last resort. For now, we still have the courts (SCOTUS notwithstanding) to help keep the government in check, and that is still working to some extent. I know it’s naïve to hope that the courts will help save us—no institution will save us, really—but I have to hold onto that hope. I don’t want to imagine what will happen if violence becomes the only reasonable response to the American government, the leader of which is likely more than willing to send American troops into American cities to kill American citizens.
Re: Re:
> For now, we still have the courts (SCOTUS notwithstanding) to help keep the government in check, and that is still working to some extent
Sure, if you’re white.
If you’re Black, or brown, or Asian or gay or transgender, you’ve been experiencing violence for ages in this country.
Re: Re:
Right, I just don’t want us to be holding onto to that hope until it’s too late. They’re actively weakening any opposition, so the longer we wait, the worse the odds get. The longer we wait, the more Emil Boves get confirmed to a lifetime judgeships, the more the FBI gets stacked with loyalists, the more gerrymanders get passed, the more occupying DC is normalized, etc.
And one big issue about a last resort is, it’s not really all that clear where that line is. There’s a lot of uncertainty. I don’t disagree on it being a last resort, but I’d also rather the epiphany not happen after we’re cuffed and being sent to the gas chambers, y’know? That’s a bit too late.
That’s kind of my worry. It’s a horrible thing to contemplate, which gives a strong incentive to put it off and hope things just work out. I just don’t want it to be put off until it’s too late. You may not be able to put it in writing, but it is worth having a clear line in mind of where the breaking point is. Hopefully, it never comes to that.
Re: Re: Re:
That’s part of the problem with trying to come up with one: The line will be different for everyone.
Even if you could get someone with conservative beliefs to agree that shit like the Dade-Collier Concentration Camp shouldn’t exist, you’ll likely have a harder time of figuring out when violence becomes an appropriate response to the existence of that concentration camp. And even then, we’re talking about a concentration camp run by the federal government. If you take on the government and lose, you’ll end up either dead or in prison for life. I’m hesitant to endorse a strict “end of line, line ends here, go past that line and it’s time to start splitting skulls” notion for that reason.
Also, as a sincere concession to you and those who would agree with you on this point: Yes, I do believe that we’re closer than ever to violence being on the table as a legitimate response to government malfeasance. I’m not looking forward to that day. Ideally, neither should anyone else. As the history of war has shown us, once a war is being fought, nowhere and no one is safe—and I’d very much prefer to not have to wear a bulletproof vest while grocery shopping.
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Re: Re: Re:2
The Ham-Ass terrorist pigs thought that “violence being on the table as a legitimate response to government malfeasance” was the way to go. How’s that working out for them? How did it work out for the BLM arsonists, rioters, and looters? How do you think it’s going to work out for you? I suppose that people who live in the fantasy that men can be women entertain other fantasies as well. They will find that the situation becomes clarified.
Re: Re: Re:2 Utilitarian
The discussion about where Stephen’s lines and boundaries are, is unnecessary. In my view they were properly explained by Stephen in his initial article. I see his views less as idealistic, which is how most people seem to view them, but as utilitarian.
He is clear that violence is an option, but only the final one and it will never be a solution to anything. He rejects violence because it begets violence. After violence is initiated the next step is escalation.
So, logically, shooting Charlie Kirk is against his world view, since it solves nothing. But, I would go even further: Shooting Charlie Kirk is an admission that all other options are null and void. It is an admission that the only path is escalation. It’s nihilism. If that is the answer, then it’s time to start the civil war because you stopped believing in the US as a functioning country.
Digressing a little, K. being shot is exactly what Trump wants. Remember how he reacted when Zelensky mentioned there couldn’t be presedential elections in war time? Do you think it’s an accident he’s sending troops into DC or threatening to do the same in Chicago? They’re actively hoping for shoot outs, so they can declare a national emergency. This, of course, will give them sweeping powers and it will end democracy in the US as you know it.
So, considering the above, I can subscribe to Stephen’s views. It is clear that how you weigh the factors will determine when the ultimate response (violence) is needed. I do want to stress though, that everything, probably even a large public support for K.’s shooter, will be seen by Trump and his cronies as a legitimazation for a clamp down.
And this, I think, is the point of Stephen: If you punch some body in the face because he pushed you, expect to get into a fight. So, you’d better be damn sure you’re ready for a fight!
Note: As of this writing I haven’t heard who the shooter is or wat his motivation is. I find it a bit disconcerting that basically evrybody is kinda assuming the bullet came from the left, including the president, based on vibes.
I wonder what the right wingers and the Cheato will say when the shooter turns out to be a right winger?
Re:
Again you mean? Same response they had to the jan 6 insurrection I imagine, ‘No it wasn’t, it was a democrat, all the evidence saying otherwise is fake news’.
Given the pattern so far in recent US history while it’s possible that it was a non-republican that took the shot I would be very surprised if it turned out to be the case, as the pattern from the last few years is that it’s republicans taking shots at republican public figures, not non-republicans.
Remember, back in June a MAGA supporter killed a Minnesota state legislator and wounded another and many of these same MAGA reps decrying political violence made jokes about it.
Fuck them.
Beg to differ
Kirk’s removal unquestionably had strategic value to rival far-right groups such as the Oath Keepers and the Three Percenters. TP USA’s astronomical growth was sucking the energy out of their movements and with “West Point Reject” Kirk’s appointment to the United States Air Force Academy board, his proximity and influence into recruiting military members for TP USA likely was seen as an existential threat.
Both groups had members with the Means, Motive and Opportunity. This wasn’t a crazy nut mass shooting participants at a TP USA rally. It was a well planned, reconn’ed, and executed mission with sufficient disinformation planted to lead “Crash” Patel’s goons down the wrong path and smear another enemy of whichever far right paramilitary group may have been responsible for the strategic elimination operation.
Not mourning
Celebrating killings such as this is obviously wrong – both morally and strategically. That, equally obviously, does not mean I am under any moral obligation to morn or say nice things about somebody who was a hate-monger and all around despicable human being. Hoping that the US Right understands that is a hopeless cause, as they have given up on any coherent moral system, or indeed connection to reality. I was a bit taken aback by how acceptable celebrating the murder of an enemy has become to the Left.
How charmingly -- and dangerously -- naive
I was once like you — peace, love, and flowers, man! — and then I read history.
Your attitude is exactly the one that resulted in entire populations being subjugated, persecuted, imprisoned, tortured, and executed…as is already happening in the United States in 2025, in case you haven’t been paying attention.
So you go on feeling self-righteous and good about yourself and moralizing at length. But understand that it’s all just your feeble excuse for being a coward, and when they come for you — and they will — your tolerance won’t save you.
“Nobody in the world, nobody in history, has ever gotten their freedom by appealing to the moral sense of people who were oppressing them.” – Assata Shakur
“Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.” – Frederick Douglass
Re:
Hey, so, I’m actually on-board with the idea of violence in defense of self or others. What I’m not on board with is killing people because of their speech, no matter how odious or vile. Charlie Kirk was a piece of shit, and his rhetoric and political beliefs were not exactly what I’d call “good”. But his being murdered didn’t (and won’t) stop his beliefs from being held by others.
Besides, if violence for the sake of stopping “offensive” rhetoric becomes acceptable and normalized, you’re gonna see a lot more people on the political left getting whacked by people from the political right. Do you want to live in a country—in a world—where a crackpot with a gun determines the acceptibility of a given kind of speech and whether its speaker deserves to live?
Re: Re:
It won’t erase people who share those beliefs, but it might make someone reconsider if they’re being a provocateur. It’s easier to be a jerk if there’s no risk. That doesn’t mean it was worth creating a Horst Wessel, but it probably was a wake up call for the RW grift machine.
And if some of the initial rumors (massive caveat, could just be this administration using a crisis) coming out are true, it might’ve been a marginalized group. Which gets real complicated in terms of self defense. I don’t even know what to say to them if that’s the case.. we’re already failing to protect them. As a country we’re not over the edge yet, but for people in those groups, we kind of are asking them to take a bullet lying down, for the sake of the rest of us.
The sad part is, we already live in that world. Mellisa Hortman is dead because of it. Paul Pelosi, Gabby Giffords, running Biden’s bus off the road (condoned by Rubio), the MAGA bomber, Heather Heyer, the CDC shooter … It can get worse, but man it’s bloody out there. And it’s almost entirely one sided, and not really acknowledged by society.
I mean heck, we just watched hundreds of J6ers get pardoned. We’ve already seen the consequences with people like Lisa Murkowski. “We are all afraid… retaliation is real”.
Re: Re: Re:
If anything, his death will make them double down on their rhetoric to prove that they won’t be silenced for daring to speak their minds. Some of the more weak-willed grifters might slink back a bit, sure. But the ones who are true believers won’t shy away from their bullshit for a second.
Re: Re:
Except Kirk wasn’t killed because he was a bigot, he was killed because his murderer thought his speech wasn’t bigoted enough.
I wouldn’t mention him at all, except for the fact that he himself said, in 2023:
“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 to protect our other God-given rights.”
Guess he took one for the team, then. Karma is a cast-iron bitch.
Wherever he is, I hope he’s pleased with the outcome.
Re: Mormon 4:5
The wicked punish the wicked.
It helps Trump immensely.
A 2 party system, not designed to find Facts
” political violence is “not the answer” and “Democrats caused this” but who refused to condemn—and sometimes mocked—the attack against Paul Pelosi ”
With only 2 sides to EVERYTHING, Who do you blame? Its Easy, the OTHER SIDE.
With ALL the BS flying around And nothing really being DONE to fix Anything. Who do you blame?
NO FACTS required it HAD to be the OTHERS.
But thingS are like Cigarettes’. There is smoke that coats the lungs, there is Nicotine thats a poison and depressant, There is Paper, Filters, AND about 200 Ingredients allowed to be in the Cigarettes’.
Which of these things will Kill you?
MJ, is interesting for all the things it can do. And I know persons that have smoked for a Lifetime, with Very Few affects.
Pointing Fingers DOES NOT solve problems. Does not Fix anything, Does not Find the reasoning or ANY FACTS.
What do you get when TV/NEWS has OPINIONS. Have many EVER retracted a OPINION? Not many and NOt often.
Many of us Understand what it takes to Create War, and to Program our Military to KILL a group of people, and the Side Affects are NOT NICE to those persons After they return.
To Goto war with a Bunch of people WHO THINK’ and can understand, IS NOT a good thing. Go look at the 60’s and the Protests.
IS THERE A REASON to kill a person. Will IT SOLVE anything?
Best thing to do is FIND what Thing/Who created the problem and get rid of it.
IS being NICE in Politics a Good thing? Meaning we dont Throw thing, Yell things, Shoot each other, Blow up the Buildings? WHAT can sole the PILE of BS coming from the Government we have to FORCE it to REALLY do their JOBS..
If we could get Every person in the USA to NOT pay Taxes? Would it help? WHY NOT. Its Peaceful Protest. It Cuts the Money the gov gets, I HOPE hits them in the WAGE dept.
Can we Get them to Understand that their JOB is a temp Job. It was Never to last 20-40 years. they get about 1/2 the Year off. How in Hell can you give retirement to a Temp Job?
OR can/should we walk up there and Protest or Shoot someone to FIX everything?..Doubt it.
What makes Fact, is IF we All work as a group to TELL the Gov. and Others WHAT WE NEED/WANT.
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“Best thing to do is FIND what Thing/Who created the problem and get rid of it.”
Exactly
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You guys caused this. The typical TD reader is absolutely stereotypical of the problem here.
Everyone who disagrees with you is a nazi/fascist/bigot, amiright? I have heard plenty of people say that here, including MM.
It’s OK to punch nazis, amiright? (less of you say this, but it’s still pretty common)
Ergo, it’s perfectly OK to shoot someone for disagreeing with you. This is merely the logical conclusion of your previous statements.
All the people who fled to bluesky (and lol, I hear that reddit has been meltign down the past day) cuz Musk let people say things they didn’t like, this is what you wanted.
The left wants to censor what people say.
The left is very, very hateful.
The left is willing to use violence to get it’s way.
The left thinks it’s ok to respond to speech with violence.
So we’re here now.
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Are you getting your ideas from Trump? Because this is pretty much what he said in response to the shooting.
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Re: Re:
Your evil and violence is the shocking thing.
Not good people calling it out.
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Your every accusation is a confession.
Re: Re: Re:
“My” evil? You don’t even know who you’re talking to. You’re villifying me because you buy into the Republican narrative of anyone but them being partially responsible for what caused this.
Your hipocrisy is on par with Trump’s.
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Disagreement alone doesn’t make someone a fascist. Espousing bigoted rhetoric that borders on a direct call for the extermination of a group of marginalized people? That makes someone a fascist.
Eh, depends on whether it’s just the one punch. Killing Charlie Kirk is wholly unacceptable; Dick Spencer getting punched so hard it ended his career…well, it’s not acceptable, but I ain’t gonna shed tears over it.
In all my years of commenting here on BestNetTech, I have never seen anyone (whose posts were in good faith) say or imply anything close to that.
So does the right.
The right is, in my experience, far more hateful—and far more open about its hate.
So is the right.
You say that as if there aren’t people on the right who would be more than willing to kill those with whom they disagree/hate and justify it as “protecting children” or “keeping order”.
And you’re trying to make this a partisan thing and split people even further instead of interrogating the rhetoric of your own “side” and how it also raises the political temperature.
Re: Re: Da right
Right, HAS more guns..
And has been said, the Dem’s want to REGULATE them or get rid of them.
And I think the Total is 10 dems to 1 Right?
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Actual data says you’re absolutely, provably, objectively wrong.
https://ccjs.umd.edu/feature/umd-led-study-shows-disparities-violence-among-extremist-groups
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Derp derp derp. That’s all I hear when I read right-wing talking points like the ones you’re spewing.
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It’s OK to punch nazis, amiright?
I for one, am glad to see someone finally admitting that that piece of shit was a nazi. That was what I always thought of him, and your comment was the validation I needed.
Re:
You should give soberity a try.
Those hallucinations you admit to are not healthy ones.
Re: WHO?
As you said, So shall you receive.
Which side is PRO GUN?
Which side wants to regulate GUNS?
How many Dem’s killed So far?
How many repub’s
DONT you love the 2 party system, its EASY to point fingers as there ISNT anyone else. They think.
Very Short sighted
What would it take for a 3rd group to piss off everyone? Then Stand back and wacth the fun?
Donald and a few of his Friends, could help in that area??
Re:
Your evil and violence is the shocking thing, not good people calling it out.
It may not have helped, but it was actually kinda funny
“A few gun deaths are necessary to secure our second amendment rights” said man who was shot to death.
Just… ironic you know? I don’t condone violence, but in a gallows sense that was hilarious.
Besides, the man died doing what he loved, suffering a gun death to preserve our second amendment rights. Would that we could all be so lucky as to die doing something we love. Personally, I want to die while petting a cat.
Re:
Don’t forget he also offered to pay bail for the guy who attacked Nanci Pelosi’s husband. So Charles kirk approves of political violence in general
🔝This
That’s all
America has long been a country where students and sometimes famous people have been shot
We had no great push for gun control under Biden or Obama
The present government is making it even worse by weakening laws that allow police to take guns from people who have mental
problems or obviously pose a threat that the public
Maybe future events will have metal detectors.and maybe not be held outside in view of a roof
where a shooter may go to attack someone
My only hope is maybe there might be some proper background checks on people that buy rifles or large calibre weapons given that
We are approaching the point where
No adult will be even allowed to read the news or buy video games
Without providing detailed user id
as online verification spreads like a virus thru the world
We can’t go two weeks without a school shooting or a shooting at some public place in America
It’s ironic that stupid politicans
are passing I’d verification laws that are useless put people’s data at risk and simply makes them explore the dark web.
While no one even seems interested in making the purchase of guns even slightly harder
over the line
Test of my commitment to our 1st Amendment is do I support it when the worst person in the world is spewing filth and venom? Well, yes, of course.
Although, that side has never extended such consideration to me.
Freedom of speech. But, not freedom from consequences.
He went over the line, by inciting violence.
But that’s not a capital offense. It is chargeable and punishable.
Honestly I’d never heard of Kirk before yesterday. Not going to mourn.
What is offensive is trump ordering half mast for federal and military flags. The guy was a civilian, didn’t represent my federal government, didn’t die in that line of service. Half mast for white trash is a mass insult to every other deserving person.
Last, the same assholes blaming it on the Democrats are the same ones that are so quick to say Democrats are incompetent and can’t run the gubbermint. Which is it , shitheads!!??
Hm
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Truth
You twist the truth to fit your agenda you can not prove anything you say.
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Why do you lie?
Re:
lmao, what?
Srsly, did you just throw that comment blindly?
What twisting? What truth? What agenda?
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(on a work pc can’t be bothered to remember my password lol)
Love you Stephen but this isn’t going to help. Nobody is going to be convinced to not celebrate his death because of a seven paragraph essay in which you spend four paragraphs groveling at the feet of this site’s commenters going “I know he was a heckin’ Bad Person and was super vile and evil BUT…”
The people you have surrounded yourself with are becoming increasingly more violent and making more and more demands that you adhere to higher and higher (and soon impossible to maintain) standards or get eaten alive. Even now they’re slagging you in these comments for it.
Consider what Stephen T. Stone wants. Don’t let other people decide who you are for you. I have been down that road before and it is a dark one.
Re:
[presses X to Doubt]
I didn’t write this for that reason—and I didn’t think it would change anyone’s mind if they wanted to celebrate his death. Also: I sincerely believe Charlie Kirk was an asshole who, if he were still alive, would have no remorse or regret for targeting marginalized people with his rhetoric.
If you’re talking about queer people: Consider how much violence they’ve had to endure for decades. I’m not saying “an eye for an eye” is a good thing; it isn’t. I’m saying that I understand if some queer people—especially trans people—are fed up with being marginalized to the point where the right can call for their genocide and no one bats an eye.
You need to better explain what you’re talking about here because it implies that you want to be a victim of, say, a trans person asking you not to deadname them as if deadnaming them will get you killed.
So what? People have no obligation to agree with me, especially on this site. And I welcome disagreement on any subject (so long as it isn’t rooted in my right to exist). People who want to celebrate Kirk’s death can do that all they please; I can’t stop them, nor am I going to try.
The funny thing about this line? As I mentioned in the essay, someone has been trying for months to make me endorse this kind of violence. I’ve told them—numerous times, sometimes at great length—that I wouldn’t do that no matter how hard they tried to manipulate me into doing it. They won’t decide who I am for me. And I’m not actively trying to do that here. Arianity has disagreed with me in these comments, and I’ve presented counterarguments where appropriate, but I’m not out here going “hey, think like I do or you’re a right-wing piece of shit”. They’re going to be who they are and I’m going to be who I am; we might argue and disagree, and the possibility exists that one of us might change our minds, but neither one of us will change the other into a mirror image.
And that ultimately holds true for you, too: I’ve told you before that posting under the name of a known troll is going to get you auto-flagged and taken far less seriously than you deserve. But you keep doing it anyway because that’s your right and your decision. I can’t force you to stop doing it—nor am I going to try, because I’m not that much of an asshole.
His death helped Trump
Remember that about a week ago Laura Loomer was calling Charlie Kirk a traitor because he turned on Trump over the Epstein files. He was no longer supporting Trump and silencing helped Trump’s agenda.
His death furthermore martyred him (to people who didn’t realize he’d turned on Trump) and is being used as an excuse to justify more 1A and 4A rights violations by the Trump regime. It is making his cultists feel justified in violence against a perceived enemy (when the shooter has never been identified). I doubt the real shooter will be caught alive. It’s very likely they will try to pin it on an immigrant– further pushing the narrative about immigrants being violent criminals.
Notice how the newsmedia is talking all about Charlie Kirk and stopped talking about the Epstein files? No longer talking about Trump’s declining health. It successfully distracted the media from those topics. So Charlie Kirk’s death benefited Trump.
Re:
Conspiracy theory: Donald Trump ordered a hit on Charlie Kirk.
Re: Re:
Conspiracy corollary:
They didn’t, but will ride it for all it is worth, and then some.
Re:
If true, bring the evidence and throw it on the pile of other evidence about crimes commited by this administration to hold trump and his ilk accountable.
If false go away.
And now for pafe 2.
Wouldnt it be funny. In a 2 party system.
That a 3rd shows up. And Starts to instigate things.
How many groups Scream they want a war in the USA? And Which side are THEY ON?
Or are they going to hand out the guns, or Sit and watch?
And Who in the Political Arena Has Friends in High places, That Might make something LIKE this to happen?
I love the Atheist Section On Quora, where religious person JUMP in and post a Comment, and NEVEr come back to debate anything. Get a Good Rumble going, Get Lots of Comment s for your account.
STOP for a moment, and have 1 conversation at a time. AND Solve something? Never happens.
Well stated and very fair. Thank you for your evenhandedness. I would love for cooler heads to prevail in the aftermath of Mr. Kirk’s death, but I am listening to the rhetoric on the right and fearing the worst.
violence = admission of failure
For a long time, I’ve held the view that war (or military action) should be seen as a admission of failure from the politicians. Failure to resolve the issue as human beings or even failure to recognize each other’s humanity.
It also works on a smaller scale. (I do agree with mr. Stone on all points.)
The Phule
This sort of violence is the inevitable result of a failure to regulate harmful speech.
If people don’t feel like they can get redress through the court systems, then it spills into the streets. Like this.
The shooter may have been a Democrat, may have been a Republican, may have been a nut who believes that Pasteurized Milk has microchips controlling his behavior.
Regardless this violence was a direct result of the normalization of violence that Charles Kirk directly participated in, and that sort of normalization of violence should frankly get someone locked up. It’s time to reassess the freedom of speech.
Re:
Whose speech should be curtailed first?
And whose speech should be curtailed after that?
And after that?
And after that?
And when your speech is the speech that censors come for, whose speech will be left to defend yours?
Re: Re:
You don’t make this argument about acts of violence.
“If you make punching people illegal, where will it stop? Which physical acts will be curtailed?! Will you make friendly pats on the back illegal? Will you make hugs illegal?!”
Saying “It should be illegal to call for political violence” “It should be illegal to say that gay people should be stoned” (Which Charlie Kirk said) and “It should be illegal to spread COVID misinformation” is not a slippery slope any more than saying it should be illegal to hit people is a slippery slope.
Re: Re: Re:
Yes, it is.
Let’s say that you get your pretty little wish granted and speech like “gay people should be stoned” is made illegal. Okay, that’s all well and good. But now you have to consider a situation where a preacher says “gay people are a Satanic abomination and God should strike them down”. Even though that sentence contains no call for violence, direct or otherwise, it could still provoke someone into committing violence. If you believe that statement, and others like it, should be banned under the logic that hateful speech against gay people can incite violence, how would you ever get around the First Amendment and its protections for both speech and religious beliefs?
But let’s say that somehow isn’t an issue and you get that speech banned, too. Okay, cool. Now assume a Republican takes the highest office in the land and decides that “anti-white” speech is also capable of inciting violence. How would you feel if he uses your law to criminalize any speech meant to “demean” white people—including jokes that poke fun at white people?
And the road goes ever further and ever deeper. Do we ban portrayals of gay people, people of color, and/or women that show them as anything other than the purest purehearted people in the world who are incapable of making any mistake and doing any harm, lest such “negative” portrayals lend themselves to fomenting hate of those groups? How deep does the rabbit hole go here, and where does one find the bottom where there’s always a new target to destroy?
I understand that this situation sucks. Yes, the kind of shit Charlie Kirk and his conservative brethren say every day annoys the piss out of me, too. But your whole bit here suggests you would be fine if the government effectively instituted what underground right-wing circles would probably call “DEI Newspeak”. I can’t and won’t sign up for that idea, no matter how much you appeal to my emotions and try to make me look past my own personal beliefs in re: speech and expression.
Re: Re: Re:2
Preventing wildly partisan whiplash back-and-frothing is part of the reason why trials require a jury of peers.
If the law is worded correctly, it doesn’t matter so much what the people in power this week believe is hate speech, it matters what twelve random normal people plucked off of the street believe is hate speech, and eventually it will matter what precedent considers hate speech.
And maybe there is hate speech against white people. I’ve certainly heard things that could be considered such. And hate speech against black people. Hate speech against gay people and hate speech against straight people.
We’d live in a more placid society if public speech was more carefully regulated, and I didn’t sign up to pay the price for other people’s recklessness of speech any more than I signed up to pay the price of other people’s recklessness with firearms.
Re: Re: Re:3
This is why such a law will never exist: You won’t get both “sides” of the political aisle to agree on what speech objectively counts as hate speech, especially if that definition would cover a lot of speech from one particular side. What political party would ever want to pass a law that would censor the members of that party?
We’d also live in a society ripped right of Nineteen Eighty-Four, where Big Brother is always watching and everyone must use Newspeak. You might be fine with that society. A hell of a lot of people are not—and I’m one of them.
Re: Re: Re:4
It wouldn’t even remotely resemble 1984, you’re being hyperbolic. It would most likely resemble Australia or Singapore, or France, or a dozen other countries that have figured out how to make this legislation work.
And to be hyperbolic in exact the same way, I’m frankly stunned that you’d rather live in Twisted Metal than Australia or France.
I’m tired of the violence. Other countries don’t have this level of violence. Non-coincidentally they also don’t permit stochastic terrorism.
Re: Re: Re:5
Other countries also don’t have the amount of guns and the lax gun control laws that we do. How about going after the Second Amendment before you go after the First, mmm’kay?
Re: Re: Re:6
Stephen, you defend the First Amendment with the same level of dogmatic irrationality that the NRA defends the Second Amendment. I hope you realize that. Both the Second Amendment and the First Amendment need to be scrapped and we need something better in their place as part of the Second Reconstruction we’ll be needing. The marginalized groups that have been perpetual victims of the stochastic terrorism that the First Amendment protects and allows are not going to be on your side over the course of the next series of years of Trumpist rule.
Re: Re:
I also want to point out what sort of hypocrite you’re being: You say ‘Find any solution before violence’
‘What about regulating speech? Things wouldn’t be this amped up if it weren’t for the constant calls for religious and political violence, more from the right than left’
‘Not that solution!’
Would you say killing Charlie kirk to stop him from speaking was a better solution than regulating speech?
Charlie Kirk is dead. That means he’s no longer speaking. Dead Martyrs scream a single word, live demagogues write a dissertation.
If the goal was to make him stop speaking? And regulating speech is off of the table? Then you believe that violence is preferable to regulating speech. Where is your line?
Re: Re: Re:
It seems to me that you somehow think this is a binary choice between regulating speech or killing speakers and you want Stephen to commit to either choice.
Re: Re: Re:2
Not precisely: If there’s a better solution than regulating speech, sure, that’s an option. I don’t think there is one.
I’m asking Stephen if Violence is actually the last resort, or if it comes before censorship as a solution.
Re: Re: Re:3
Violence should absolutely be the last resort to dealing with any sociopolitical problem and censorship is never a solution to speech issues.
Re: Re: Re:4
Problem: A man named Charlie Kirk is spreading calls for political violence and encouraging political violence, including direct attacks on politicians by praising a man who beat a politician’s husband with a hammer.
How would you solve this problem, if not through censorship and not through violence?
Re: Re: Re:5
I don’t have a solid answer to that beyond “more speech”. The conservative politicians who now venerate Kirk in death could’ve been thoughtful enough to criticize his rhetoric while he was still living, but that’s on them. Alls I know is that if you try to censor his speech, you’ll likely end up Streisanding it and making it more appealing to people who might otherwise ignore his speech, and that won’t ever end well.
Re: Re: Re:6
I don’t see how more speech, and thus more calls to violence, would help the matter.
There’s too much speech right now. It’s impossible for there to be a real battlefield in the marketplace of ideas because there’s no rules, no judges, and no such thing as unfair play. The truth may win out in the end, but how can it when there’s five thousand new lies for every truth told?
And AI is very much making this worse, by the way, but that’s neither here nor there. The AI bubble will pop and this will stop being a problem.
Still: Calling for more speech, in America, right now is a bit like a drowning man calling for more water. At the very least call for BETTER speech.
To stretch the metaphor don’t call for more water, call for salt water, humans float better in salt water.
Re: Re: Re:7
See, that sounds to me like the speech of someone who very much wants to censor other people—possibly including me. And I don’t necessarily disagree with your worries. They’re actually worth worrying about. But jumping straight to “we have to get rid of a lot of speech, so let’s start making some legally protected speech illegal and fining/jailing people who say it” will only make me think you’re way too eager to start playing censor with your preferred ideas/vibes and going after your political enemies. As someone who has literally defended the rights of Nazis to speak their minds: Fuck. That. Shit.
Re: Re: Re:8
[quote] Never believe that anti-Semites are completely unaware of the absurdity of their replies. They know that their remarks are frivolous, open to challenge. But they are amusing themselves, for it is their adversary who is obliged to use words responsibly, since he believes in words. The anti-Semites have the right to play. They even like to play with discourse for, by giving ridiculous reasons, they discredit the seriousness of their interlocutors. They delight in acting in bad faith, since they seek not to persuade by sound argument but to intimidate and disconcert. If you press them too closely, they will abruptly fall silent, loftily indicating by some phrase that the time for argument is past.[/quote]
I firmly believe that the only right Nazis have, with regards to speech, is to sit in a corner, be silent, and regret the life choices that brought them to that point.
Unlike you, I do not believe that Nazis have the right to speak their mind, outside of carefully curated situations where they have every disadvantage, including ‘rules that are actually enforced’
Like you, I believe that Nazis generally have the right to breathe, unless they’re actively engaged in trying to take that right from someone else. There are many who don’t.
Re: Re: Re:9
Then what happens to people whom you label Nazis because they’re not sufficiently left-of-center enough for you? Is an accidental deadnaming enough to take away someone’s free speech rights? What if someone says something unkind about a single gay person—are we meant to extrapolate that statement to encompass all gay people and silence the person who said it? There’s always more hate to be found it you look hard enough; your quest to silence those whose rhetoric you oppose will never end if you keep looking for the slightest little bit of dissent.
And at that point, putting a bullet through their skull is both morally righteous and legally acceptable.
Re: Re: Re:10
“There’s always more hate to be found it you look hard enough; your quest to silence those whose rhetoric you oppose will never end if you keep looking for the slightest little bit of dissent.”
Preventing these sorts of excesses is actually already a solved problem in the US legal system of checks and balances. You need to be able to convince a grand jury that there was a crime, and then you need to convince a jury of 12 individuals that there was a crime, and there are several opportunities to appeal the matter.
This system has been very successful at preventing legal excesses with regards to criminal law, for example excessive strictness of ‘right to retreat’ laws. It does not prevent excesses of civil law, alas.
Which is why I believe that this speech should be criminalized, not have civil nor administrative penalties levied against it. Real jail time. Real trials. Real 12 uninvolved individuals who are expected to weigh in on behalf of societal norms.
Re: Re: Re:11
You say this like that’s a perfect safeguard. But innocent people have been convicted of crimes they didn’t commit and the Supreme Court once ruled against free speech that dissented against the government before walking that decision back years later. (That anti-speech decision also gave rise to the “fire in a crowded theater” bit that anti-speech people love to use.) The judiciary is not a flawless panacea against violations of civil rights; if you believe otherwise, you may want to go talk to the Central Park Five.
And everything I’ve asked you up until now remains on the table: How would you prevent the excesses of censorship and the danger of partisan power grabs from taking over your idea of criminalizing “hate speech” and risking the lives of people whose only “crime” was saying something that the government doesn’t like? Because when you talk about putting people in jail, you are talking about fucking up their lives in a permanent and irreversible way.
When one wants a perfect “order”, the “law” can and will expand to make that possible. Just look at Donald Trump and the GOP: Trump has an idea of what order looks like in this country, and both the rest of the GOP and the Supreme Court are effectively turning a blind eye to the law to let him make his idea a reality. I hope you’re ready to tell me how you wouldn’t be Donald Trump if you suddenly had the power to censor speech you didn’t like.
Re: Re: Re:12
Nothing is perfect. It’s impossible to produce a perfect law. We shouldn’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good enough.
And an imperfect law criminalizing calls to violence is superior to the current media atmosphere were nearly everyone on the right, and some small few on the left, are calling for violence. And many perk up their ears, listen, and obey.
Re: Re: Re:13
We already have laws against incitement. What you’re asking for is a law against stochastic terrorism that could, on a long enough timeline, criminalize any rhetoric that offends others on the claim that such rhetoric is likely to make someone commit even a small act of violence. You won’t find support for that idea here, and you won’t get it from me. I support free speech rights to a degree that some might call “suicidal”; this is a hill on which I will figuratively and literally die. Can you—will you—say the same for your anti–free speech beliefs?
Re: Re: Re:14
When Trump and his allies are no longer in power, I feel like there’s going to be a plurality of Americans who had to endure years of fascism under him that are going to fundamentally disagree with your free speech rights philosophy. There are going to be a large number of people who will, correctly, say “Never again” like the countries in Europe that implemented hate speech laws as they rebuilt after fascism tore their societies down to rubble. And I will be cheering and helping my fellow Americans looking to stamp out hate speech, every step of the way.
What do you plan on doing if they (hopefully) win out and bring us more up-to-date laws, systems, and institutions to redress the harms that come from stochastic terrorism?
Re: Re: Re:4
I hate to break it to you, but Censorship has historically worked very well for many countries, including but not limited to Singapore, China, Russia, Indonesia, and Saudi Arabia.
These laws, especially Singapore’s hate speech laws, improve stability regardless of if that rulership is more democratic or less so. Stability is something we desperately need: I do not want to be in the middle of an active terroristic civil war, and I doubt Canada will be happy to take all the refugees fleeing America as violence continues to rise.
Censorship is absolutely a solution to speech issues. Just one you personally don’t like.
Re: Re: Re:5
How many of those countries jail or execute people for political dissent?
And it’s a shitty solution that leads to fascism and authoritarianism. You might think you’ll be the one doing the censoring, but if and when you lose that power, you’ll be the one being censored—and I highly doubt you’ll be happy about having your rights abridged for the sake of “the social order”. Then again, who knows, maybe you’ll enjoy being beaten by a cop for daring to use anything other than Newspeak.
Re: Re: Re:6
How come all of these countries:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hate_speech_laws_by_country
Can figure out hate speech laws, but the USA is distinctly in the position where doing so is a slippery slope to fascism?
Second amendment fanatics sound just like first amendment ones. “Oh, we can’t ban guns, it’ll be 1984”. No. It’ll be Germany. Or France. Or the UK.
Re: Re: Re:7
We have the First Amendment. For the past 250 years, the United States has prided itself on having more freedom of speech than maybe any other country in the world—for better or for worse.
Banning speech on the basis of it being “hate speech” opens several doors for abuse, none of which you seem all that concerned about the government going through:
Re: Re:
In a world where we can trust politicians and leaders to set the best interest of the people first it may work, and I specifically say may, because even in such a world good intentions can lead to bad outcomes.
Here in the real world, it has been proven again and again that once you start banning one type of speech or related activities, mission creep soon sets in because to accomplish this type of “regulation” there must mechanisms implemented to monitor speech. When that monitoring is in place, someone will think it is a good idea to use it to monitor other things.
This type of surveillance of people already exists, but in many cases the intent was totally different from when it was first implemented. IMO it is a truism that any type of surveillance and data gathering from a large pool of people, whether it is private or public, will be co-opted and used by the government at some point. How could they not co-opt it when it’s so easy to say “Think of the children!” or any other excuse to placate the masses.
Re: Re: Re:
One also has to take political partisanship into account. Sure, if one “side” promises to get rid of hate speech, that sounds all fine and dandy as a thought experiment. But if that “side” gets the power to censor speech according to their whims, what happens when the other “side” comes into power and changes the rules so the speech they dislike can be censored?
Re: Re: Re:2
Yes, but ‘calls to violence’ is something that most folk can agree on. I’m not asking for censorship of ‘hate’ speech.
I’m asking for censorship of ‘We should stone cyz’ of ‘Won’t somebody riddle us of these meddlesome xyz’ of ‘I’ll pay the parole of the guy who attacks xyz’
People are actually calling for attacks in public media. This needs to be illegal.
Or, alternatively, there’s a solution that you think is a worse one than violence, in which case violence is not the last solution after everything else has been tried, censorship is.
Re: Re: Re:3
It is illegal. The problem you’re facing is that indirect incitement isn’t illegal, and that’s because it’s tough to prove whether a statement like “will no one rid me of this turbulent priest” is wholly intended to spur someone into violent action. I don’t like it any more than you do; stochastic terrorism sucks. But I don’t see any way to ban such speech without risking (A) mission creep, (B) partisan flip-flopping on what constitutes “indirect incitement” that changes depending on what political party is in charge, or (C) both A and B.
Re: Re: Re:4
Free speech isn’t free, but the people paying the price for it aren’t the ones who are speaking irresponsibly.
Frankly, I find option C (both A and B) more than acceptable as a price to stop the levels of violence we’ve been suffering as of late. Two politicians in Minnesota assassinated. An Arizona senator shot through the head. A republican senator baseball game fired at. A presidential candidate shot at once and sighted on with a gun on a golf corse. A black church and a black grocery store attacked in an obvious political attack. A plot to kidnap the governor of Michigan. Armed morons breaking into state and federal governmental buildings to intimidate the politicians working there. A public speaker assassinated.
This is unacceptable. I’ll take the random pingponging of censorship and mission creep over… over this.
If it was just the irresponsible speakers who were victims of violence? This would be fine. But it’s school children, church goers, grocery shoppers. These people inherently did not agree to this elevated level of risk. This is unacceptable.
No. The violence is unacceptable. We need to change.
Re: Re: Re:5
Then start looking for and treating the root causes of violence instead of going after speech. Seriously, under your suggestion of banning hate speech, I wouldn’t even be allowed to quote Kirk’s hateful rhetoric as examples of his hateful rhetoric—and while you might go “well that’s good, too”, how am I supposed to say that Kirk’s rhetoric was hateful if I’m not legally allowed to quote it verbatim?
Re: Re: Re:6
One of the root causeses is that people are allowed to say these things largely unopposed.
And, in terms of overall harm to freedom of speech, banning hatefulness and calls to violence would do much less harm than the obscenity and porn bans currently in existence do.
Presumably any practical law would require the ability to quote hate speech under certain circumstances, so long as it’s bracketed by a statement that it’s hate speech and therefore unacceptable and so long as it’s only being quoted for very specific purposes.
No exceptions for religious speech that is also hateful, of course.
Re: Re: Re:7
What does opposition to hate speech look like to you? Because plenty of people decry hate speech all the time
Oh, really? Because hey, here’s a fun idea to think about: If you ban hate speech, you’re gonna have to ban books that include it as well, and that takes several American classics off the table—including To Kill a Mockingbird. Is censoring literature a side effect of your law that you’re okay with?
Does that count only for religious groups that aren’t Christian, or would you actually have the balls to try and tell large Christian congregations—including those in places where a significant part of a congregation are likely to be gun owners—that their preacher is being censored by the government because he didn’t fawningly praise queer people?
Re: Re: Re:8
Yes, I have the balls to take on the Christians. You say the country has the second amendment, well it also has separation of church and state. If these 250 year old contracts are actually supposed to be binding, then the current passes and exemptions that Christians are indefensible.
Opposition looks like a silencing. If they shut up and slink home, they’ve been opposed sufficiently. If they speak but I can’t hear them, they’ve been opposed sufficiently.
Once more, France has figured out hate speech laws. Singapore has figured out hate speech laws. Just borrow something from the many countries that have worked it out.
Re: Re: Re:9
And in case you weren’t aware, that wall is meant to separate both the church from being too involved with the state and the state from being too involved with the church. The government shouldn’t establish one religion as the only state-approved religion, nor should it attempt to stamp out all religion in favor of forced atheism or whatever.
By your logic, Charlie Kirk was “opposed”, but I don’t think you’ve really thought through what you’re saying beyond a superficial level.
How about we don’t and say we didn’t.
Re: Re: Re:10
” How about we don’t and say we didn’t.”
That’s the exact same thing second amendment fanatics say when the success of foreign gun control is pointed out, and asked why it can’t be done here.
We need to start learning lessons from other countries who have more successful governance than we do. And one of the lessons we need to learn is when it’s necessary, appropriate and possible to criminalize firearms ownership and certain types of speech. And also ‘how to’, that too is part of the lessons they have to teach us.
Re: Re: Re:11
Hey, so, here’s a fun little question for you to think about: Do you think the people who want to censor adult-oriented videogames—i.e., porn games—will stop with those games? Collective Shout, the group of censor-happy assholes who started the whole situation with paypros and credit card companies getting adult games taken down from Steam and Itch.io, have said that they don’t care if the games they target are legal to sell. They even plan to go after mainstream games like the Grand Theft Auto series.
When you align yourself with censors, you align yourself with their mission to have speech removed from public view. Their mission will always expand because it has to—they will always find some kind of speech that disgusts or offends them, and once they get a taste of success in banning that speech, they don’t fucking stop.
Me? I don’t have that problem. I believe in the idea that even if certain kinds of speech are distasteful, offensive, or otherwise not to my liking, it still deserves to be expressed even if I would prefer it remain unexpressed. Like, there’s a whole bunch of sexual fetishes that you couldn’t pay me enough to watch voluntarily—and so long as everyone in such videos are consenting adults, those videos should have the right to exist regardless of my feelings.
Sympathizing with censors will earn you no points here. Only a relative handful of people who comment here regularly would ever support censorship. They’re trolls and right-wingers (whoops, tautology!). Don’t be like them, son. Be better than them.
Re: Re: Re:10
How about whenever sane governance returns to the U.S., we do in fact take stuff from the functional democracies that have worked it out, so we won’t wind up back here at this current spot ad nauseam? We are going to need a Second Reconstruction with actual teeth to it after sane governance comes back. That will likely take the form of new laws, changes to current laws and Amendments, that you won’t like. But they’ll be necessary. There’s no going back to whatever status-quo you seem to want, Stephen.
Re: Re: Re:8
For the millionth time, hate speech laws can be written in ways that don’t ban literary works that feature slurs within a specific context. The fact that you always reach for “You’d ban To Kill A Mockingbird!!1!” to stoke fears of hate speech laws that so many other functional democracies have when you can easily find copies of the book in German and other languages is really telling, Stephen.
I really do hope that when we have sane governance again, and we work on the Second Reconstruction, people like you are far away from having any sort of say. Because if they do let y’all have a seat at the table, we’d just wind up right back where we are now.
Re: Re: Re:6
Right, because someone saying, “Homosexuals should be stoned to death,” is absolutely not the root cause of a man being stoned to death two weeks later because someone else believed him to be gay or bisexual. Fucking bigot.
Re: Re: Re:7
I see you really thought this through…
I guess everyone must be born with a hatred for random groups of people.
Re: Re: Re:2
The requirement in criminal law to convince 12 random members of the jury that the speech is harmful should greatly curtail partisan effects.
I’m not talking about civil offenses here. I’m talking about criminalizing harmful speech. With a full trial and jail time.
Re: Re: Re:3
I don’t see how. Democrats and Republicans would likely have a difference of opinion on what would qualify as speech that requires criminalization. How can you come up with a law to ban the speech you want to ban that both passes Constitutional muster and accounts for political partisanship in defining the speech that deserves to be banned?
Re: Re: Re:4
The early amendments very much need a rewrite. The second amendment, for example, should not permit firearms with more than a single bullet between reloading. No six shooters, no magazines, no internal magazines. You load the gun, shoot it, manually remove the bullet, reload. That’s all anyone needs for hunting. That’s also all anyone really needs for self defense.
The founding fathers predated double action carbine rifles and 6 shooters, let alone 14 round semi-automatic rifles.
And the first amendment should specify that private speech cannot be abridged, but that public speech may be abridged in the name of public safety, should it become necessary. The founding fathers lived in a world where, to get your speech out, you needed to pay a significant amount of money to publish it. Where being proven a moron meant that your speech would be ignored by the people knowledgeable enough to engage with it.
Not a world where any moron can serve up unlimited copies of hateful lies for less than an hour’s wages per year.
The founding fathers lived in a world where only males could vote too, before you rush to defend them, and we certainly changed that aspect of the constitution.
The amendments should not be treated as a sacred document set in stone: They’re living things that are subject to reinterpretation and should also be subject to re-writing. Just take a look at the changes that happened with the fourth and fifth amendments and how they’re treated over the course of US history.
Re: Re: Re:5
And people call me naïve…
Look, if you want to live like it’s the late 18th Century, that’s your business. I doubt that a whole lot of people are willing to join you, though. I do agree that the Second Amendment needs a rewrite (and The Weekly Sift has some good ideas on that front), but your idea is unlikely to gain any traction because it’s unrealistic on a number of levels.
The Founding Fathers also predated same-sex marriages, interracial marriages, and the end of chattel slavery. For what reason must we let the ghosts of men who died centuries ago continue to have the final say on what society should be?
And how do you determine the exact, objective demarcation line between the two when, say, a speaker is invited to a public university and makes their event invite-only or something similar?
Again: For what reason must we let the ghosts of men who died centuries ago continue to have the final say on what society should be?
But to make those rewrites, Congress and a majority of state legislatures have to agree to make a new amendment. Good luck making that happen in this age of hyperpartisan American politics.
Re: Re: Re:6
“The Founding Fathers also predated same-sex marriages, interracial marriages, and the end of chattel slavery. For what reason must we let the ghosts of men who died centuries ago continue to have the final say on what society should be?
the first amendment should specify that private speech cannot be abridged, but that public speech may be abridged in the name of public safety
The founding fathers lived in a world where, to get your speech out, you needed to pay a significant amount of money to publish it.
Again: For what reason must we let the ghosts of men who died centuries ago continue to have the final say on what society should be?”
What can I say, I love it when people who are trying to argue with me agree with me.
The amendments are outdated. If they need to be shredded for progress they should be shredded for progress. We are clearly in agreement.
“And how do you determine the exact, objective demarcation line between the two when, say, a speaker is invited to a public university and makes their event invite-only or something similar?”
You take it to court and see what happens. But mostly I’d say that invite only events are still public speech, though I think there’s a general number of guests where it becomes public rather than private. For the sake of argument any arbitrary number is actually fine, and a poorly delineated one based on vibes may be preferable to a clearly listed one.
As the judge famously said of obscenity “I can’t describe it, but I know it when I see it.”
Re: Re: Re:7
I both do and don’t agree with you. I agree that the ghosts of centuries-old dead men shouldn’t have the final say over the laws and social progress of the United States. I don’t agree with the kind of changes you want made to the Constitution.
If you forgo thinking through the logical consequences of a law in favor of vibe-based “it’ll all turn out exactly like I want it” thinking, you’re not writing a good law.
Re: Re: Re:2
Obviously you don’t let them come to power ever again if you can help it. I think I can read the room enough to say that this statement is the hope on both sides of the isle at the moment.
I think your argument in the OP for the most part is good. You are clearly a nice guy who I wouldn’t mind sharing friendly conversation with over beer. Your heart is in the right place. However, at least a portion of the wider issue at hand lies in your opening statement:
“I’ve no reason to mourn his death—and no plans to celebrate it”
You don’t, but there are A LOT of people celebrating the killing loudly and pushing that out far and wide across the series of tubes known as the internet. Shithead or no, pathological lier or no, what do you think is going to happen when people watch a presumably “normal” guy who’s background isn’t being a politician die in a visually visceral way… and then see what they consider the majority of whatever media they intake from “the other side” gloating and celebrating it? They will be thinking “oh shit, that could be me and not only could it be me, but half the country (not really actually half the country or at least I sure hope it isn’t) wants that.” Let me back up a little bit more though first: I haven’t seen anyone say it in here yet, but this isn’t just Kirk. In a relatively short amount of time, but not so long as to disappear from peoples’ short attention span, we’ve had a mass shooting of children, then a girl knifed to death on the subway and visibly no one bothering to assist, and then Kirk gets murked. That series of events colors this. Violence would normally not be the answer just by an assassination alone, but with a combo like that? Yeah, “retribution” is going to be whispered out in the backyard after a round of beers while phones are out of battery in the house charging. It will be the answer for someone, which will — as you said — lead to further escalation. The time for discussion hasn’t passed, but I think the other “options” are being taken of the table a lot quicker than either of us would hope for. I sure have lost a little more faith in being able to resolve this peacefully reading through the comment section here, since there seems to be fairly clear sentiment — and it’s not exactly in your favor either.
Ninja isn’t wrong on the wider point and it pains me double to say that given how much I have quietly disagreed with many of the comments I’ve seen from him in the past (still do) and how I wish he was in fact actually not right for once.
Anyway enough of me rambling on, I guess. 80/20 odds this will get hidden, but I wanted to let you know in case things do rapidly get worse that it’s been nice lurking and reading here while it lasted. Lord knows I never really agreed with any of you “dirty slimy other-siders” or whatever insult of the day we’re supposed to view each other as, but at least you were one of the few who always tried to keep it moderately civil.
Re: Re: Re:3
And that’s their right, and I’m not going to try to stop them. Charlie Kirk was a piece of shit; if someone gets a little bit of joy by joking about his death or whatever? Not my circus, not my monkeys.
His death helped me. I’m much happier.
Try to set aside your owm morals for a while...
… and apply Charlie Kirk’s morals to his own shooting.
Kirk has said that gun deaths are acceptable (cuz of 2nd Amendment and all). Now he has become one such case himself, so by his own standards it’s no big deal. Put him in the ground and move on.
I don’t advocate shooting anyone, but now that this has happened, it’s a good opportunity to point out the Right’s hypocrisy. Loss of human lives didn’t matter much to them, as long as it was the lives of people declared “the others”. But now it’s a guy they like, and they are screaming bloody murder.
The radical Right has always demanded that the Left respect laws, democratic principles, and human life, while trampling those same principles themselves if they could get away with it. (See also: Wilhoit’s Law.)
Send them thoughts and prayers, if you are so inclined, but in any case point out their hypocrisy.
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Charlie Kirk was everything that was good and spoke the truth. I feel sorry for anyone that saw him any different. You want to talk about vile speech, look at what you are saying. We need more prayer, more talk of our relationship with God. Look at where we are right now!! This is evil, pure evil.
Re:
Which god? Shiva? Zeus? Osiris? Or perhaps you are thinking about the Christian god, and the bible has a good passage that people may want to apply to Charlie Kirk’s words:
Matthew 12:34
For out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks. The good person out of his good treasure brings forth good, and the evil person out of his evil treasure brings forth evil
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I’m not out here saying…
…like that TRASH-peddling asshole Charlie Kirk. I’m not sad that he’s dead, and I’m not going to act like he was a saint worth mourning.
And yes, I looked up every quote on that list to make sure they were all genuine, so don’t go telling me I misquoted him or whatever. He said all that heinous shit, so don’t go denying that he did.
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I suggest you look up Stephen King where one of those quotes came from.
You might also want to see what Dave Rubin and Jillian Michaels are saying about how he hated them because they are married gays.
Lots of people getting cancelled for saying things about Charlie their employer didn’t like.
Hope you guys are for that as much as you were when Gina Carano was fired by Disney for same reason.
Now show us how much this site is for free speech by holding my comment for hours if not forever…
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I didn’t use him as a source. Every one of those quotes is sourced from at least one credible news agency, and Snopes has confirmation on several of the quotes as well.
FAFO. I have less sympathy for Carano because of her politics, but the principle of “make yourself a liability for your employer and you might end up getting fired” holds true for everyone.
At the time of this post, I have a comment being held up by moderation, but you won’t see me whining about it.
Re: LOL
You talk about God, yet you clearly do NOT know God. Otherwise, you would not be saying such nonsensical BULLSHIT like how ‘ol Charlie was a good person and told the truth. Well, here’s the TRUTH. He was a piece of shit. He espoused everything that SATAN loves. I’m not sad that he’s dead. AT ALL.
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Fuck you Democrats I hope you all get what you deserve for causing the separation of this country. Further more I hope all of you celebrating his death get death yourself you worthless waste of life you always preach about racism well guess what you made a racist out of me I hate all of you with all of my heart and truly hope you and your families die slowly and painfully you worthless king mentality retarded fucks!
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Such irrational emotion, you may seek help to deal with that before you go on a killing spree.
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No human has ever said that.
Dumbest pin quote I have ever seen on BestNetTech yet. Premature quotaculation is the sign of writers who are morons.
“I think I will pin a quote that will be disproven forty seconds later!”
FYI,the alleged killer has turned himself in/ been turned in. He even has a name. And your type of “writers” can even “Google it.”
Mr Stone
In your last line are you suggesting that sort of thing is an attempt to solve a problem???
This sort of thing is straight up murder,nothing more. The piece of shit that did this will die in prison, as he should.
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All action is an attempt to exchange a less satisfactory state of affairs for a more satisfactory one. That holds true even if the action itself, or the motive behind it, is morally heinous.
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Death of Charlie Kirk , loss of a good man
so many idiots mocking Charlie Kirk after his assassination with no respect for the man nor his grieving family. Shame on you.
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Respect is earned by giving it.
kirk ran a deep defecit.
Re: Since when did republicans care about grieving families?
I don’t get what the problem is, people are just treating his death and the suffering of those that were close to him the same way republicans treat the death and/or suffering of those that aren’t one of theirs.
Turnabout is fair play after all, if you don’t care about others don’t be shocked when they return the favor.
You may want to look up the video of the man who was speaking with Charlie the moment he was shot. Ironically it was a conversation where the man at the mic was explaining how peaceful and non-violent the left is.
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So, hey, here’s the funny thing about this “irony” you brought up.
The guy who killed Charlie Kirk seems to have been radicalized online, and the statements he put on the bullets found by the FBI—none of which had anything to do with trans people!—all point towards him being terminally online. Whether he was someone who believed in leftist ideals or someone who believed Charlie Kirk wasn’t right-wing “enough” is unknown at this point.
But let’s examine some other notable bits of political violence in recent years, shall we?
Three months ago, Melissa Hortman, a Democrat state rep for Minnesota, and her husband were shot and killed in their home. State senator John Hoffman, also a Democrat, and his wife were shot in their home the same day. The man who committed these acts had a list of 70-something people he intended to kill—a list that included abortion providers, pro–abortion rights activists, and prominent Democrat lawmakers, including Tim Walz, Ilhan Omar, Rashida Tlaib, and Tammy Baldwin. The killer was a Trump supporter.
Five months ago, an arsonist targeted the Pennsylvania Governor’s Residence with the intent to harm (if not kill) Governor Josh Shapiro, a Jewish Democrat, mere hours after Shapiro held a Passover seder. The arsonist was a Trump supporter.
On the 28th of October 2022, a man broke into the home of Nancy Pelosi and assaulted her husband, Paul, in an act that can also be described as torture. He intended to take Nancy hostage and torture her as well. The man who did that was a Trump supporter.
On the 6th of January 2021, thousands of people descended upon the U.S. Capitol to protest the results of a free and fair election. Hundreds of those people broke into the Capitol, which was closed off that day due to Congress carrying out the certification of the 2020 presidential election. The building was vandalized and several people threatened, either implicity or explicitly, the lives of several lawmakers, including Nancy Pelosi and Mike Pence. One of the people who broke in was shot and killed by a Capitol Police officer who was trying to protect members of Congress. All of the people who broke into the Capitol that day were Trump supporters.
On the 8th of October 2020, thirteen men were arrested for plotting to kidnap Gretchen Whitmer, the governor of Michigan and a Democrat, and to use violence to overthrow the state government. Many of them were, to some degree, Trump supporters—but all were opposed to Whitmer and her actions as governor during the COVID-19 pandemic.
On the 19th of July 2020, a man shot Daniel Anderl and his father, Mark. Mark was married to Esther Salas, a U.S. District Judge in the District of New Jersey; Daniel was their only son. Mark survived the shooting, but Daniel did not. The killer, who died of a self-inflicted gunshot wound as befitting his status as a coward, was a Trump supporter.
There are many, many, many more examples of right-wing violence that I could cite. But here’s a fun experiment for you: How many examples of left-wing extremist violence can you cite going back a decade, and how does that number compare to the number of incidences of right-wing extremist violence in the same timeframe? And for bonus points, how many of those left-wing examples are as heinously violent as the right-wing examples?
Make sure to include factual citations and not AI hallucinations!
This likely goes back 30 years when there really was the possibility of the Christian RIght creating a fascist government in America
Did the perp have parents or grandparents who came of age in that era
The Christian Right nearly brought the Republican party to ruin in the 1990s.
My wish for all ALL humans
Find God in your life and only he will change your heart. I offer zero judgment to you as I am full aware that sin is sin. Jesus does not discriminate the degree. I am no better than the other. I believe in Jesus. I now God sent him to die for my sins. The good lord wants his house full and overflowing with those who believe. He died so we can live forever eternity after our lives end in this life on earth. This is a plea for every soul. He offers it to anyone, everyone, all who believes WHO he is. This world is not eternity, it’s a stoping ground for the great, mysterious, loving, mercifical God and his great plan for mankind. All love to you!!!
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Cool story bro.
In regards to the discussion farther up of speech laws and whether or not we can come back from the brink safely, here’s the thing: Even if we come back from the chaos and hate of the Trump Administration through electoral and legal means, we are going to have to make sweeping and fundamental changes to the law here in this country in order to do our damnedest to make sure that it never happens again. The broken rules and systems and yes, Amendments, that got us here will have to go away and we’re going to need new rules put in place. You may not like the idea, Stephen, but it’s going to have to happen. For our sake to become a stable country once more, and for the necessity of regaining the trust and allyship of the actually-civilized democracies across the globe.