363
Analysis: Charlie Kirk’s death shows political violence is now a feature of US life
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 10 Sep 2025
363 points (92.3% liked)
politics
25608 readers
3194 users here now
Welcome to the discussion of US Politics!
Rules:
- Post only links to articles, Title must fairly describe link contents. If your title differs from the site’s, it should only be to add context or be more descriptive. Do not post entire articles in the body or in the comments.
Links must be to the original source, not an aggregator like Google Amp, MSN, or Yahoo.
Example:
- Articles must be relevant to politics. Links must be to quality and original content. Articles should be worth reading. Clickbait, stub articles, and rehosted or stolen content are not allowed. Check your source for Reliability and Bias here.
- Be civil, No violations of TOS. It’s OK to say the subject of an article is behaving like a (pejorative, pejorative). It’s NOT OK to say another USER is (pejorative). Strong language is fine, just not directed at other members. Engage in good-faith and with respect! This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.
- No memes, trolling, or low-effort comments. Reposts, misinformation, off-topic, trolling, or offensive. Similarly, if you see posts along these lines, do not engage. Report them, block them, and live a happier life than they do. We see too many slapfights that boil down to "Mom! He's bugging me!" and "I'm not touching you!" Going forward, slapfights will result in removed comments and temp bans to cool off.
- Vote based on comment quality, not agreement. This community aims to foster discussion; please reward people for putting effort into articulating their viewpoint, even if you disagree with it.
- No hate speech, slurs, celebrating death, advocating violence, or abusive language. This will result in a ban. Usernames containing racist, or inappropriate slurs will be banned without warning
We ask that the users report any comment or post that violate the rules, to use critical thinking when reading, posting or commenting. Users that post off-topic spam, advocate violence, have multiple comments or posts removed, weaponize reports or violate the code of conduct will be banned.
All posts and comments will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. This means that some content that violates the rules may be allowed, while other content that does not violate the rules may be removed. The moderators retain the right to remove any content and ban users.
That's all the rules!
Civic Links
• Congressional Awards Program
• Library of Congress Legislative Resources
• U.S. House of Representatives
Partnered Communities:
• News
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
That occurred to me too. Having an awful, public crime to blame on "the left" is awfully convenient, and Trump and his ilk immediately came out blaming Democrats and calling for political violence. What if Trump or one of his circle is behind this because they wanted a distraction from the Epstein situation and literally everything Trump does being unpopular? People who are okay with raping kids clearly have no moral compunctions preventing them from such an act.
But I'm not one to profer conspiracies without any kind of actual evidence, and I doubt Kirk is really considered enough of a somebody for them to believe he'd be enough of a distraction (although that may be because I just ignore anything to do with him because of his being a bigoted dumbfuck). Having something to blame on Democrats and "the left" just happened to be good fortune for them. I do think it more likely that the shooter was someone like a parent of a kid who was a victim of a school shooting or who was queer and died by suicide.
I'm inclined towards the opposite: Kirk would have been too valuable to them. He's been one of the biggest propagandists and doing good work. Plus his debate shtick works really well on unsuspecting people with no opinions because he comes off like a well informed and well meaning "debate me" dork rather than a chud sociopath (though he is more like that on his shows, especially the one with Jack Posobiec who's a more unhinged nazi, but only the truly committed end up watching those since it's a much less entertaining format than "Kirk DESTROYS student" vertical clips).
I mean, compare that to when Matt Walsh does public debates with young people: the sleaze on that guy is permanent, he gives off Handmaid's Tale commander vibes. The newbie reaction is less "he seems to have a point" and more "why is he allowed around minors". Basically what I'm saying is I think they would have picked someone less crucial to their operation if it were a Trump hit job, someone like Jack Posobiec or even smaller. It would have had literally the same effect.