Yesterday I watched in absolute horror the online video of Charlie Kirk the founder of the conservative and free speech organisation Turning Point USA being assassinated at a speaking event at a university in Utah in the United States. Mr Kirk was peacefully expounding his political views for an audience at the university when he was murdered.
When the news of the shooting came in many of us, including those of us who might not share all Mr Kirk’s views, hoped and prayed that he would survive this horrific shooting but it was not to be. Mr Kirk who spent his time peacably debating with his political opponents and with the American public in general died as he lived promoting open debate. One thing that I know from observing some of Mr Kirk’s debates is that he debated in good faith, he let his opponents speak and then did what should always be done in such situations which is he focused on the ideas in question and not the person making them. He, as we say in Britain, often did the morally correct thing and played the ball and not the man.
Charlie Kirk was only thirty one and was married with two young children. I cannot imagine what they are going through right now following Mr Kirk’s murder. Their devastation must be immense and something that will be with them for the rest of their lives.
The event in Utah was one of many similar events that Mr Kirk had attended in order to promote his brand of conservatism and to promote freedom of speech. He did this at a time when freedom of speech is under constant attack throughout the West, even in places like the United States where the right to speak freely without hindrance from the government is enshrined in its Constitution.
At the time of writing, 09:00 BST, the shooter who murdered Mr Kirk is still at large and we therefore do not know the motiviation that made the murderer target Mr Kirk. A person who was originally pointed out on social media as being the shooter turned out not to be them and the man was later considered to be unconnected to the murder and released by Utah police without charge. If or rather when the murderer is apprehended at least he or she might not get away with a life sentence as Utah is a death penalty state.
There has of course been a reaction to this assassination by both the Left in both the UK and the USA and from politicians in the UK. The Leftists as you might imagine are behaving abominably and show why the Left cannot be trusted with guarding the free speech rights of others. They are openly and loudly celebrating Mr Kirk’s death, it appears that because they could not defeat Mr Kirk’s arguments they now approve of his murder. Some UK politicians who have commented on this matter have shown themselves to be the utter and complete hypocrites that the are. The UK Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer put out a note of condolance following Mr Kirk’s murder even though in the UK under Starmer anybody exercising free speech as Mr Kirk did would probably end up in gaol for a long time. I do not celebrate the deaths of anyone, apart that is the deaths of actual proven terrorists, but Mr Kirk was not a terrorist, he was a decent family man with views that enraged the Left, the Trans cult and the Jihadists who plague the West and who seek to destroy the cultures, nations, families and socities that we have built, with a great deal of travail over many centuries.
There is of course immense speculation as to the motive for the murder and much of that speculation and criticism is aimed at the American Left who have been, since Donald Trump’s first Presidential win in 2016, been engaged in escalating violent rhetoric about the Right. We do not know at this point definitively why a deranged person did this terrible act but we can probably all have a good guess about the type of person who might do this and maybe their ideology, if that is they have one.
Mr Kirk was killed I believe in part because of his political views and the type of society that he advocated for and whose views were disliked by shallow, thin skinned and self entitled people who believe their own bullshit about their own ‘virtue’. That this murder occurred at all is abhorrent in and of itself, but it is even more abhorrent for it to happen in a democratic society like the USA and one where there is a consitutionally baked in right to freedom of speech. This murder, whatever Leftists might say, was not remotely comparible to say the Norwegian resistance bumping off a Nazi propagandist in Occupied Norway during WWII, that could be somewhat morally excused as a military act. This murder was an attack on democratic ideas and the freedom of speech that underpins a properly functioning democracy.
I’m shocked and very disturbed by this murder. It should not have happened. A wife has been robbed of her husband and two children have been robbed of their father by the deranged extremist who shot Mr Kirk.
May Charlie Kirk’s memory be for a blessing and his life’s work be an inspiration to others. He was a brave and principled man, he must have known that at some point he might be targeted with lethal violence by a Leftist or a Jihadist or someone from the transgender cult or any of the other groups that he had criticised, but he spoke out anyway. Charlie Kirk was a brave man who has been taken from us far too soon.