One year ago today, Charlie Kirk the co-founder of Turning Point USA, was killed while speaking at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah.
Kirk was a very conservative figure on the far-right. His comments and thoughts were often very racist and sexist. He infamously said he would be worried if a black pilot of a commercial passenger jetliner was qualified. One month shy of his 32nd birthday, he was typical of most Millennials born in the era where the Internet took off and by the time he was in high school, social media was in full swing. YouTube here as well as Facebook as MySpace was being phased out. And Twitter was the Wild West of social media.
Anybody could say just about anything about anything and/or anybody online and maybe they would get their account deactivated. All they needed was another phone number or email to start a new account. And Kirk said a lot about people and things and he was mostly wrong.
Shown a fetus if a dolphin, he claimed with full certainty it was a human fetus. Like a lot of people on the right, he realized that if he screamed the loudest, he could win an argument even if he had no clue what he was talking about. He would often travel to colleges and universities and attack students for what he considered their ignorance. Mind you, he never attended a major university even though he attended one semester at Harper College in Pallatine, Ill.
Not to criticize community colleges, but I think he was probably one of those types who can’t adjust to college from high school. Mainly, Kirk just reiterated talking points that had been spoken time and time again by Republicans. He criticized the Civil Rights movement, pushed the idea the 2020 Presidential election was rigged and of course downplayed Covid-19.
He also said that active shooter massacres were necessary for the Second Amendment. And he was fatally shot in the neck by Tyler James Robinson, a reported left leaning man in his early 20s. While I agree with people thst no one needs to be killed for having different viewpoints, that’s basically what we’ve been doing since Cain killed Abel.
Kirk wasn’t going to change the world, at least for the better. I believe it when many people say they had never heard of him. All he did was talk about division and white supremacy. He put himself out there for a debate but the dolphin fetus incident showed he was afraid to be shown he was wrong.
So he just chose younger audiences to make himself look correct. Whenever it appeared he was going to lose an argument, he’d just insult the people. And since our society feels anyone under the age of 30 isn’t worthy of a valid viewpoint, he played into the egos of those who still think being older means you’re wiser.
He wasn’t a hero. He was just another loudmouth like Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck and Bill O’Reilly. And no one really talks about them much anymore for a reason.
Zane Says 