And so we have arrived at murder broadcast live in a Western university.
On Wednesday, September 10, in a university campus in Utah, a single shot rang out, one that will echo for years in American and Western politics.
The assassination of Charlie Kirk, a 31-year-old father of two and a leading conservative activist in America, is yet another horrific scene in a country deeply poisoned by hate. Kirk was participating in an event in a courtyard at Utah Valley University when he was shot in the neck in front of thousands of people.
Kirk was a model of civility for his generation, someone who would even silence his own supporters to let his opponents speak. He leaves behind a wife, a three-year-old daughter, and a one-year-old son.
We will not hear any “Je suis Charlie Kirk”.
What a dark day for the free West and freedom of speech, on the eve of September 11.
A video like this has never before entered the annals of Western chronicles, and I fear it could trigger reactions in the opposite direction: the killing of cultural and political adversaries recalls dark times in Europe, from the 1920s and 1930s with Nazi-fascism to the years of leftist terrorism.
Kirk’s method was to show up on college campuses—the frontlines of the culture war—and welcome anyone who wanted to challenge him with questions and opposing views. He never backed down, prove me wrong his motto. He did this in the height of cancel culture and amid the worst howling campus mobs seeking to silence conservative speakers and “eradicate all of Western civilization.”
Kirk was conservative, white, pro-Israel, pro-life, faithful to the American ideal and against any revisionism, critical of Islam, and a declared enemy of woke ideology: in practice, a human target.
Kirk was committed to open debate. He knew the multicultural project had failed. He was aware that most Americans could not stand 24/7 control of opinions by the woke.
His assassination reminded me of that of David Amess, the British Conservative MP, Catholic, father of five, Eurosceptic, Brexiteer, pro-life and a member of the Conservative Friends for Israel (Amess was killed by an Islamist extremist).
Benjamin Netanyahu reacted as few other Western leaders did:
“Charlie Kirk was assassinated for speaking the truth and defending freedom. A lion-hearted friend of Israel, he fought against lies and stood up for Judeo-Christian civilization. I spoke with him just two weeks ago and invited him to Israel. Sadly, that visit will not take place. We have lost an incredible man. His boundless pride in America and his courageous faith in free speech will leave an indelible mark. Rest in peace, Charlie.”
Few dare to say it, but part of the Left has become the party of death. Kirk’s assassination may have been our last wake-up call.
Donald Trump has survived two assassination attempts. Republican Senator Steve Scalise took two bullets from an anti-Trump militant. Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh narrowly escaped death. “I did it for Gaza,” said the woke terrorist to the police after killing two Israeli officials in Washington. And Luigi Mangione, who killed the head of an insurance company in New York, has become a modern hero for the woke.
The perpetrators of these attacks vary in their degree of mental illness and delusion, but Western society has progressively dismantled the civil and social barriers that once prevented disturbed minds from drifting away from civil norms, and it has poisoned all the wells.
Of the 67 million Americans in “Generation Z” (those born after 1996), 51 percent think America is “inextricably tied to white supremacy,” 41 percent support censorship of “hate speech,” and 66 percent support silencing speakers they consider “offensive.”
If these are the ideas of 67 million people, it is frightening.
Black Lives Matter, eco-extremists, transgender fanatics, pro-Hamas mobs, social avengers: the culture war has become civil war. Rejection has taken root throughout American culture, with administrations tearing down statues, colleges renaming buildings, publishers censoring and rewriting books.
When Harvard president Claudine Gay was asked in a Congressional hearing whether calls for the genocide of Jews violated the university’s rules on bullying and harassment, she answered: “It depends on the context.” One may take a life, if we deem them an ideological opponent.
Can those who refuse to join in the radical deconstruction of society by the woke no longer be guaranteed physical safety?
Technology has exacerbated our cupio dissolvi, and the West seems to have become a charging station for smartphones that drain psychic energy. There is a name for this: nihilism.
First moral violence, then symbolic violence and now physical violence. Words are weapons. Censorship is a method. Exclusion, the norm. All in the name of the “good”.