No, Boston Globe, we don’t “need more Charlie Kirks”

A shocking death cannot retroactively transform a wicked man into a saint

As you’ve undoubtedly heard by now, professional hatemonger Charlie Kirk was shot dead by a rifle-wielding assailant on Wednesday. It was a shocking and ironic death for the Turning Point USA co-founder, who said that “guns save lives” and that deaths from gun violence are “worth it … so that we can have the Second Amendment to protect our other God-given rights.”

On Friday, The Boston Globe editorial board published a piece titled “We need more Charlie Kirks.” According to the editorial:

Whatever one thinks of his political views, Kirk was never shy about talking with, and listening to, people who disagreed with him. The ability — and willingness — to talk across political lines, to view your opponents as people to persuade, not merely to demonize, is what the country desperately needs right now.

Interestingly, the editorial never quotes a single thing that Kirk said. That is, perhaps, because doing so would have undermined its thesis. Kirk’s entire career was centered around demonizing people.

Once, Kirk cited a Bible passage saying that gay people should be stoned to death, calling it “God’s perfect law when it comes to sexual matters.” He called for a ban on gender-affirming care for transgender people and said that “we need to have a Nuremberg-style trial for every gender-affirming clinic doctor.” He said that Martin Luther King Jr. was “a bad guy” who was “not worthy of a national holiday” and that the 1964 Civil Rights Act was a “mistake.” He said that “in urban America, prowling Blacks go around for fun to go target white people.” He said that if he saw a Black airline pilot, he would worry about whether the pilot was qualified. He said that people from California shouldn’t be welcomed in other states, comparing them to “locusts” that would “destroy” the places where they migrate. He called for an end to dual citizenship, saying that immigrants should “go back to [their] place of origin.” He said that noncitizens who are “seven months or eight months pregnant” should be banned from traveling to the US to prevent their children from becoming citizens. He said the federal government should indict mayors who oppose Donald Trump’s immigration policy. He promoted the “Great Replacement” theory, claiming that there “is a strategy to replace white rural America with something different” and that “they won't stop until you and your children and your children’s children are eliminated.” He said that “Jewish dollars” are being used to promote “cultural Marxist ideas.” He said that photos of malnourished children in Gaza were “propaganda.” When pop star Taylor Swift announced that she was getting married, Kirk said that she should “have lots of children,” adding, “Reject feminism. Submit to your husband, Taylor. You’re not in charge.”

That wall of text is just a sampling of the excrement that spewed from the mouth of that execrable excuse for a human being. He was a racist, xenophobe, misogynist, homophobe, transphobe, and all-around asshole. He was a bargain-bin bigot who found a way to monetize his loathsome beliefs. He was a reprehensible wretch who was paid handsomely to promote all of humanity’s worst qualities—and the fact that he was murdered in a horrific way will never change that. A shocking death cannot retroactively transform a wicked man into a saint.

The Globe editorial ignores all of this context. It says:

We all must accept that disagreements — even about fundamental moral and political questions — are normal, especially in a country as large and diverse as the United States. The solution is to do what Kirk did and air those differences. We don’t mean to sugarcoat the way he carried out his activism; Kirk could be bigoted, crude, and insulting. But the point is, his weapon of choice was always words.

While it might be true that Kirk himself never got his hands dirty, the fact remains that he wanted the state to carry out violence on his behalf. He wasn’t interested in simply airing differences—he wanted to dominate those he saw as inferior. Like a Nazi. Because he was a Nazi.

That ostensibly liberal publications like the Globe are lionizing someone as despicable as Kirk is the triumph of process over substance. As long as you go through the motions—debating college students, producing podcasts, etc—then the fact that you are calling for violence against marginalized people is just a difference of opinion. The celebration of Kirk’s vile legacy also reveals that many liberals view repulsive right-wing propagandists as their peers more so than the marginalized people Kirk spent his life trying to harm. Bigotry, it would seem, is not a barrier to being in good standing with the liberal media.

Kirk once said that he couldn’t “stand the word empathy.” He added, “I think empathy is a made-up, new age term that—it does a lot of damage.”

I think we need more empathy. But don’t get it twisted—empathy is not the same thing as dialogue. Empathy is not process. Empathy is substance. Empathy isn’t just about airing differences of opinion. And it’s certainly not about tolerating people with disgraceful beliefs. It’s about supporting people even if they live different lives and have different needs.

Kirk said it himself—his political project was based on the rejection of empathy. And those who want better things for this country must reject the Charlie Kirks of this world.

UPDATE (same day as original post): The Globe changed the title of its editorial to “Charlie Kirk murder: America needs dialogue, not bullets.” Evidently someone at the paper recognized how ridiculous the original headline was—but the content of the editorial was equally ridiculous, and it remains unchanged.

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