What "legacy" should we be honoring, Robby Soave? His lying? His grifting US$12,000,000 from chumps? This, found on Facebook, sounds about right. Can't attribute it 'though.Jonathan V. Last / The Bulwark:
The Assassination of Charlie Kirk — Charlie Kirk's murder was not just a murder. It was an assassination. That's the crucial point. — We often forget the philosophical underpinnings of criminal law. Rightly understood, we view crimes as being committed not against individuals, but against society itself.
Washington Times: Charlie Kirk, a Christian family man and patriot, assassinated for traditional beliefsJeffrey Blehar / National Review: Charlie Kirk Never Gave Up the Fight, and You Can't EitherJacobin:
Charlie Kirk's Murder Is a Tragedy and a Disaster
Susan B. Glasser / New Yorker: Did Trump Just Declare War on the American Left?Naftali Bendavid / Washington Post: America enters a new age of political violenceSimon Kaufman / Scripps News: Charlie Kirk's assassination stokes fears of rising political violenceTime: ‘This Is War’: Trump and Others on Right Call for Crackdown on Left After Charlie Kirk's MurderDan Pfeiffer / The Message Box: Donald Trump Pours Gas on a Dangerous FireAdrienne LaFrance / The Atlantic: Strawberries in Winter — This article was featured in the One Story to Read Today newsletter.Nigel Farage / Daily Mail: The Left tried to silence my friend Charlie Kirk with wild slanders. Did they create the febrile atmosphere where someone thought it was legitimate to stop him talking for good?The Moderate Voice: ‘This will not end here’: A scholar explains why Charlie Kirk's killing could embolden political violenceShawn Fleetwood / The Federalist: Don't Let Leftist Media Gaslight You About ‘Political Violence’ On ‘Both Sides’Isaac Saul / Tangle: The assassination of Charlie Kirk.Mackenzie Thomas / Washington Examiner: Political violence on the rise in the US: A timeline of key incidentsTess Owen / The Guardian:
Far-right commentators echo Trump in calling for ‘vengeance and retribution’ for Charlie Kirk's death Jacob Kornbluh / The Forward: Why Nazi comparisons triggered Trump after Charlie Kirk's assassinationJessica Valenti / Abortion, Every Day: Let's Talk About Political Violence
Charlie Kirk is dead, and the media wants you to believe he was some saint of free speech, cut down in his prime. They’re already sanding down the edges, turning a man who spent his career spewing bile into a martyr. But here’s the truth: Kirk wasn’t about dialogue, he was about domination. He wasn’t protecting liberty, he was laying the rhetorical groundwork for fascism.This guy wasn’t just “against gay marriage.” He opened his Bible, pointed to the verse about executing gay men, and called it “God’s perfect law.” He tweeted “Pride is a sin” like he was dunking on an entire community. He told a gay student that their life wasn’t valid. Then he went even further—demanding a nationwide ban on gender-affirming care and calling trans kids an abomination. That’s not policy debate, that’s state-sanctioned cruelty dressed up as a sermon.
And race? Same playbook. He called George Floyd a “scumbag,” smeared Martin Luther King Jr. as “awful,” and sneered at the Civil Rights Act as a “huge mistake.” That’s not contrarian courage, that’s spitting on the graves of people who bled to expand democracy. And the man didn’t just flirt with white nationalism—he blasted the Great Replacement theory on national radio, pointing to demographic charts and telling his audience the decline of white Christians was “intentional.” Do you hear the subtext? He wasn’t warning about immigration policy, he was laying out a war cry.
Immigrants, in his mind, weren’t people—they were invaders. He called for a total immigration shutdown, then promised mass round-ups. Not the usual “tighten security” talk—he said, “We will find you and your family, and we will return you. All 20, 25, 30 million.” That’s not a plan, that’s a threat. It’s the fantasy of a police state that tears apart homes in the middle of the night.
And let’s not forget his casual acceptance of violence. He said it outright: “Some gun deaths every single year? Worth it.” Worth it! As if dead kids in classrooms are a reasonable trade-off for his right to pose with an AR-15 on Instagram. He called for Trump to unleash the military on American streets under the Insurrection Act. He told dads they should’ve physically stopped trans athletes from competing. He framed blood in the streets as part of liberty’s price tag and told the audience to clap for it.
Now the obits will paint him as a victim of “political violence.” But the man himself glorified violence when it came from the right. He cheered Rittenhouse. He excused Jan. 6. He was fine with militarized crackdowns as long as they landed on protesters, not his base. He didn’t fear political violence—he marketed it. And here’s the uncomfortable truth: if someone makes it their life’s mission to be a hate-mongering fascist, they shouldn’t be shocked when political violence finds them. Actions, rhetoric, and consequences are not separate islands—they feed each other.
So no, he wasn’t a saint, he wasn’t some brave debater taken too soon. He was a professional hate-monger, a demagogue who wanted to roll this country back to the dark ages of church-run morality and white supremacy. And if the papers try to hand him a halo, it’s our job to rip it off and remind people who he really was.
Because the truth matters more than their eulogies.
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