U.S. Politics

Careful about what you say online today.

I don't advocate for political violence, but I won't shed any tears for Kirk.

I've seen several (smart) people online saying this portends dark times to come.


Yes, the right is already using this to further fascism (see below), but I don't think Kirk's death is noteworthy.


Political violence requires a nutjob, a gun, and an opportunity. Should people speaking in public fear for their lives? No more than they did yesterday.

Will the right use this to whip up their base? Sure. If it weren't this, it'd be Cracker Barrel's logo, college curriculum, or some other nothingburger that doesn't materially impact them.

The news moves too quickly for anything to have an impact. I bet we all forget about this within two weeks, just like everything else.
 
A coworker asked another coworker who Charlie Kirk was, and he answered "he was a guy who started a Christian youth group across the country. And now he was assassinated."
 
Posted by a friend of mine on Facebook (took a screenshot so as not to have another wall of text- friend asked to stay anonymous). Think it sums up my views as well.




I see a lot of folks online mentioning Charlie's kids and to be sensitive to that fact, and I guess I am. It's terrible for kids to grow up without a dad, let alone to see their dad assassinated on video. But I hope it awakens them to the reality that words and actions have consequences, and they don't grow up sharing their father's views. I also think it's important to remember, in addition to, or maybe even moreso than Charlie's kids, the countless other kids who have been victims of gun violence in this country. Or the refugee on the train who was killed the other day, who I've seen many jokes about since. Or, say George Floyd, of whom many tasteless jokes have also been made. I could go on and on. It's okay when it's someone they despise, but not someone on their side. Could they say the same about us? Sure, but I think the separation still exists in that one side clearly has empathy and boundaries the other does not.

Like TSI said, I'm sure everyone is up in a tizzy right now, and might use this to further their agenda or prop up their own voice, but a month from now, Charlie Kirk will be nothing more than another statistic. He may have been popular with that side, but he was no messiah figure like Trump was.
 
It's hard not to assume the worst, that this was a blood sacrifice so they can up the ante on martial law, and we're headed into a truly terrible time.

So I hadn't even heard about the shooting a friend pinged me to say her husband didn't know who Charlie Kirk was, her son said "he's a knockoff Ben Shapiro," and her husband didn't know who Ben Shapiro is, and so she said he's a knockoff Tucker Carlson, and finally he was like OH I GET IT! And I was like "So funny story about an action figure this morning" and THEN she mentioned Kirk was shot. Like, I truly feel like we're living in a glitch in the Matrix and we should just reboot and start over.

I'm not gloating online, but I keep thinking that it is not difficult to live your life in a way that thousands of people need to be reminded it's not in their best interest to piss in your grave before you're actually in it, and yet this is not the first time someone has died by violence in what, the last twelve months where a lot of people just kinda shrugged. (I had a doctor, a DOCTOR! I was interviewing say that the Luigi incident was "understandable." A pediatric SURGEON was like yeah fuck that guy anyway.)

I am nothing if not a teacher. ;)
Stochastic is a great fuckin' word.

Lastly: the president announced Kirk's death. The president, IIRC, didn't say a FUCKING THING about when Melissa Hortman and her husband were assassinated. Nobody should die at the business end of a bullet, not even shitbird upjumped Youtubers. But you either value human life or you don't, and the leader of the free world doesn't get to choose which lives matter. Or in a real society, he wouldn't.
 
It's honestly hard for me to register this at all outside the noise it's generating. I sincerely don't think anything has changed. They invented a crimewave in DC to send in the troops. I don't think him living, or even never being shot, would change the pace of things now. All it does is change the talking points on Fox for the next week. Changes the spin.

Whatever Rubicon folks assume we're about to cross, I think we crossed it months ago.
 
The news moves too quickly for anything to have an impact. I bet we all forget about this within two weeks, just like everything else.

Except for one thing.

I'm not forgetting the Epstein files or why Orange Marmalade doesn't want them released.

If there's a pedophile in the oval office, I want to know. If we have a former prostitute for a first lady, I want to know.

The opposition needs to keep banging on this drum until we get some answers regardless of what headlines each day brings.
 
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