I’m going to start this column by stating that which should go without saying: the shooting death of Charlie Kirk was an abhorrent act, and one that should not be celebrated. You should never shoot someone simply because you disagree with them. I say that not only as someone who says things that some people disagree with, but also — and more importantly — as a human being with empathy for my fellow man.
I’m not going to lie to you and say that I was a fan of Charlie Kirk. No regular reader of this column would buy that anyway. But I’ve felt sick since his murder, both over the incident itself and its implications.
In the immediate aftermath of the incident, I saw two incorrect assumptions begin to form, one from those on the right and one from those on the left. I’ll start with the latter.
On the left, I heard a number of people say that Kirk’s death was a classic example of why we need common sense gun reform in this country, or point out the irony of Kirk — as devoted a 2nd Amendment advocate as they come — dying in a way that would have been prevented by better gun laws.
I’m both a gun owner and a supporter of common sense gun laws. I think most people agree on the broad definition of common sense gun laws; principally, broader background checks and bans on assault weapons, or even bans on semi automatic rifles if you want to go a step further.
Kirk’s shooter wouldn’t have been stopped by expanded background checks; by all accounts, he had a clean record and he was of legal age to purchase a firearm. Additionally, the shooter didn’t use anything close to an assault rifle. He used a Mauser 98 chambered in .30-06, which is essentially a 125 year old bolt-action rifle design that fires a popular deer hunting cartridge. If we were to start banning guns in this country, this would be among the last to be banned.
I firmly believe that expanded background checks and a ban on semi automatic rifles would prevent a lot of tragedies in the country. I also believe they would not have prevented this one.
That’s an example of an incorrect assumption that’s not all that dangerous. However, the incorrect assumptions being made on the right side of the aisle were wildly dangerous.
In the immediate aftermath of Kirk’s death when nothing was known about the shooter, many prominent voices on the right announced without evidence that the shooter was a violent, murderous liberal.
Within hours of the shooting, South Carolina Rep. Nancy Mace said that “Democrats own what happened today.” President Donald Trump released a video promising vengeance against the Left. And across social media, hundreds of conservatives announced that the Liberals had gone far enough and now they were going to reap the whirlwind.
Most of that rhetoric fell by the wayside pretty quickly once it turned out the shooter was a native son of Utah from a deeply conservative white family, but the overall effect was still chilling. I’ve long contended that this country is in the midst of a cold Civil War and has been for some time; until Kirk’s death, I don’t think I’d realized that we’re a hair’s breadth from our division bubbling over into violence.
Based on reports from reputable news sources, Kirk’s shooter was not radicalized by the left; he was radicalized by the far, far right. Specifically, he was a groyper, which is a loose confederacy of terminally online alt-right white nationalists led by Nick Fuentes, the internet’s most prominent neo-Nazi.
The groypers hated Charlie Kirk. They’re wildly anti-Semitic, so they hated Kirk for believing Israel has a right to exist. They didn’t think Kirk was as homophobic as he should be. They thought he was too mainstream and was using his leverage to silence voices from folks like them on the lunatic fringe.
Essentially, based on our current best understanding, Kirk wasn’t murdered because he was too conservative; he was murdered because he wasn’t conservative enough for a bunch of neo-Nazis.
How do we prevent the death of the next Charlie Kirk? Call me a broken record, but once again, my recommendation is that we sort out the Nazis. No matter the year, it’s just good policy.
