Following the assassination of Charlie Kirk, there’s been a lot of “discussion” about how we reached this point in our history.
“Discussion” almost feels like too charitable of a description. It implies a level of sincerity I don’t think is there.
Democrat after Democrat has gone on air, taken to social media, and proclaimed before the nation that what happened to Charlie was a result of “right wing hate.” They point to Trump, they point to “rhetoric” and “radical ideas” (like an enforced border or a government that actually does what it was designed to) and say that if Republicans weren’t so extreme, Charlie would still be alive today.
I don’t know if they’re lying to themselves, lying to us or entirely delusional, but nothing coming out of their mouths makes sense. Whether they intend to or not, they’re gaslighting the American people at a severity unseen since 2020.
I know that nothing they’re saying is founded in fact, reality, or history because I used to be one of them.
When I was in high school, Obama and McCain were competing for the presidency. I remember asking my parents if McCain could or would reinstitute slavery, because that’s how far gone the discourse was among Democrats.
When Obama was up against Mitt Romney and I was eligible to vote for the first time, I regurgitated hyperbolic and hysterical talking points I’d seen online without a second thought, never bothering to further investigate them or even verify them. If anyone had something bad to say about Mitt Romney (or his supporters), I’d absorb it, share it, and probably repeat it.
The media I consumed and the adults around me told me that conservatives weren’t people with policy differences, but vindictive misanthropes motivated entirely by bigotry while rejoicing in cruelty, and that’s what I believed.
I know that as a black woman that grew up in Boston, not everyone has had my experience. There are enclaves of the country where teenagers were taught that Obama was the anti-Christ and all of his supporters were America-hating communists.
But when you consider what was dominating news cycles, what was going viral on social media, and what Hollywood was producing, it overwhelmingly reflected the attitudes of a certain kind of person that grew up in a certain kind of city.
When I finally realized that everything I thought I knew was founded on half truths and outright falsehoods, for the first time in my life, I felt fear around speaking my mind.
But I did it anyway.
I said I wasn’t a feminist, I condemned the Baltimore riots, I declared my love for my country without conditions before these “hot takes” became freezing cold and I actually had something to lose. I felt like a cultural heretic, and I was treated like one too.
I lost friends, I lost acquaintances, and I lost opportunities.
A lot of people weren’t willing to take those risks at the time – and I don’t blame them.
I think I could have had a much easier life and made a lot more money if I’d kept my mouth shut.
Part of the reason Trump was so successful in his 2016 bid for the presidency was because until him, conservatives by and large were culturally castrated.
From candidates to voters, it seemed like a lot of us were cautious in our political expressions, constantly distancing ourselves from completely reasonable positions to appease the other side. But while his peers were trying to explain themselves to their adversaries, begging them to stop calling us Nazis, Trump spoke his mind in plain English with no exceptions.
He didn’t cower, he didn’t apologize, he didn’t grovel for approval – and he showed other conservatives they didn’t have to either.
He was willing to say what everyone else was thinking but few others were willing to say out loud, in public, and on camera.
He gave Republicans a backbone, and it changed everything.
Of course, this didn’t happen overnight.
Pollsters were completely caught off guard by his first victory, and while the reasoning is debatable, most agree that it had something to do with Trump voters being incredibly tight lipped, driven at least in part by fear of retribution.
By the time 2020 rolled around, after a summer of looting and lockdowns that we were told were for the “greater good,” it seemed like something had changed. Trump supporters weren’t nearly as sheepish as they were the first time around. And by 2024, after the national embarrassment that was the Biden administration, maybe the right realized the stakes were too high to keep quiet for social acceptance.
Now, when Democrats throw tantrums on national television, compare us to Hitler, or cherrypick Bible verses for partisan pursuits, we don’t have to play by their rules.
We don’t have to participate, we don’t have to coddle them and we don’t have to pretend there’s any validity to it.
And now that their propaganda machine is on life support, and they face the prospect of a level playing field, they’re imploding.
For years, liberals got to dictate the terms to the rest of us.
If you opposed abortion, you were a misogynist, but if you cared about the 2nd amendment, you were personally responsible for every school shooting.
If you believed in the Christian definition of marriage, you needed to “mind your business” – but two men had a constitutional right to force you to bake their wedding cake.
If you believed in law and order you were heartless, but if you cared about Kate Steinle you were a xenophobe.
That’s over now. The dam is broken, and I don’t know that we as a society could go back to the way things were even if we wanted to.
Charlie Kirk isn’t dead because his political allies grew spines. He’s dead because one side got so used to their opponents’ silence that they now equate speech with violence – and justify “retaliatory” physical aggression up to and including murder.
I’m not under the impression that violence, lunacy or blind partisan allegiance are exclusive to one side of the aisle. I’ve worked in politics for far too long to think that. But I am saying that for over a decade, one side completely dominated culture, and drew selective attention to vitriol and political violence when they were the victims, but ignored it, excused it or encouraged it when it was targeted at their opponents.
And we’re living with the consequences.
Erika Kirk gave a beautiful speech at her husband’s memorial about forgiveness, and I commend her for it. Some might point to her remarks and wonder if this reflection honors her wishes. But I don’t think we can truly forgive anyone before we know what we’re forgiving them for. And forgiveness has never meant a world without accountability.
I know that if anyone on the left even bothers to read this in full, most of them will immediately dismiss this. But this isn’t for them. It’s for the people they’re blaming, being made to feel crazy, watching them try to rewrite history in real time.
What happened to Charlie wasn’t his fault, it wasn’t Trump’s fault and it wasn’t your fault. It’s partisan projection that’s hoping you’re too stupid to see through it.
what do you think?