# Charlie Kirk is Dead **URL:** \ **Category:** Politics & Elections\ **Created:** [September 11, 2025, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935 "2025-09-11T07:35:08Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![Snarky\_Kong](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/a183cd/32.png) [@Snarky\_Kong](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Snarky_Kong)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 3:00pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/41 "2025-09-11T15:00:00Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > A hero for bailing out a criminal, and as they saw it, getting to the bottom of what happened. Is bail bad now? You are credulous to a degree I find implausible. ---
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/42 "2025-09-11T15:02:18Z")
Same here. ---
**Author:** ![JKellyMap](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jkellymap/32/15880_2.png) [@JKellyMap](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JKellyMap)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/43 "2025-09-11T15:02:40Z")
Thirded. ---
**Author:** ![orcenio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/orcenio/32/1036_2.png) [@orcenio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/orcenio)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 3:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/44 "2025-09-11T15:02:58Z")
Ditto ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 3:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/45 "2025-09-11T15:03:43Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > > [@Snarky\_Kong](#): > > > > Saying a person would be a hero for freeing the attacker is not excusing. Ok. > > A hero for bailing out a criminal, and as they saw it, getting to the bottom of what happened. Is bail bad now? That was obviously disjngenuous on Kirk’s part. Likewise, when Kirk’s killer is caught and people start donating to his bail fund (if he’s even allowed bail) or defense fund, those will be despicable people. ---
**Author:** ![SenorBeef](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senorbeef/32/2220_2.png) [@SenorBeef](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SenorBeef)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 3:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/46 "2025-09-11T15:04:51Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > A hero for bailing out a criminal, and as they saw it, getting to the bottom of what happened. Is bail bad now? There are bail projects in many parts of America to raise money to free criminals who can’t afford bail. Oh give me a break. You can’t honestly think he was talking about bailing the guy out because, what, he was framed? That he’s innocent and detective Charlie Kirk is going to solve the case? No, it’s endorsement of the violence he committed against a family member of a prominent democrat. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 3:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/47 "2025-09-11T15:05:28Z")
I was wondering if he was shot in the neck to echo the stabbing of Iryna Zarutska. But probably the killer was aiming at his head. ---
**Author:** ![Babale](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/babale/32/15666_2.png) [@Babale](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Babale)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 3:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/48 "2025-09-11T15:07:28Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > I was wondering if he was shot in the neck to echo the stabbing of Iryna Zarutska. No one can aim that well at that range. Anyone capable of making the shot at all would understand this and not go for a “trick shot” to begin with. ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 3:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/49 "2025-09-11T15:39:39Z")
> [@Babale](#): > > That was obviously disjngenuous on Kirk’s part. Was it? What I see on his Twitter account is him complaining that Republicans were being blamed for the attack, and endorsing conspiracy theories that would indicate a very different motive. That’s far from laudable, and I don’t see any sympathy for the victim - but I also don’t see him endorsing the attack or praising the attacker. Maybe I missed it? > [@SenorBeef](#): > > Oh give me a break. You can’t honestly think he was talking about bailing the guy out because, what, he was framed? That he’s innocent and detective Charlie Kirk is going to solve the case? No, it’s endorsement of the violence he committed against a family member of a prominent democrat. No, his tweets indicate he believed the guy was guilty. He just bought into (or maybe was cynically promoting) conspiracy theories about the motive, seemingly in an effort to shift blame away from the right. * * * > [@Babale](#): > > Likewise, when Kirk’s killer is caught and people start donating to his bail fund (if he’s even allowed bail) or defense fund, those will be despicable people. If they are donating because they approve of his killing, yes. But charitable bail funds have bailed out people charged with violent crimes before now. Was that also wrong? > [@Babale](#): > > No one can aim that well at that range. Anyone capable of making the shot at all would understand this and not go for a “trick shot” to begin with. Fair enough. And damnit, I did not have ‘defend a dead Charlie Kirk’ on my bingo card for today. Can’t you all please stick to accusing him of things he actually did? 🫣 ---
**Author:** ![RitterSport](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rittersport/32/6326_2.png) [@RitterSport](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RitterSport)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 3:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/50 "2025-09-11T15:41:13Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > No, his tweets indicate he believed the guy was guilty. If he believed the guy was guilty, and he thought the guy wasn’t actually on the Right, why would Kirk want him bailed out?? ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 3:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/51 "2025-09-11T15:49:39Z")
We are not “becoming” Kirk. We are recognizing the Kirk openly incited exactly what happened to him. ---
**Author:** ![MagicEyes](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/5daacb/32.png) [@MagicEyes](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MagicEyes)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/52 "2025-09-11T16:08:21Z")
> [@DemonTree](#): > > Charlie Kirk does seem to have had some repugnant views, but I have not yet seen any evidence that he endorsed political violence, and I _have_ now seen evidence that various things he said were reported (or maybe remembered) in a misleading way. He was 100% in favor of gun deaths. I’m not going to look up the exact quote, but you’ll probably see it again in about five minutes. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 4:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/53 "2025-09-11T16:13:23Z")
> [@SenorBeef](#): > > > [@RitterSport](#): > > > > What a stupid question on his part – the question was about mass shootings, why would gang violence mass shootings not count? Kirk was obviously saying that it doesn’t count. > > Because people deliberately mislead about what they’re saying when they mean mass shootings. They often say “the US has X mass shootings every day/week/month/year!” and when they do so, they try to invoke random spree shootings of innocent random people like Sandy Hook or something. They’re trying to give the impress that the US has 10 Sandy Hooks a week. But the reality is that two gangs shooting it out also qualifies as a mass shooting and it’s obviously nowhere near as sympathetic as a monster shooting up little kids. It’s reasonable to make that distinction, I think, if your opposition is trying to make it sound like “mass shooting” means “people killing random uninvolved innocent people” I used to go to a regular event near a place with gang shootings. So i followed them for a while. Gang shootings kill innocent people, too. Like the 12 year old girl doing her homework in her living room when a stray bullet from a nearby gang shooting killed her. Do gang shootings have a different underlying cause than random nutso shots up McDonald’s? Do they both have different causes than “political assassin kills public figure”? Yes. Are they all facilitated by the second amendment? Also yes. I think he was trying to imply that hang violence isn’t important because it doesn’t kill people like his audience. > [@Babale](#): > > MSNBC has fired Matthew Dowd for making the following statement about Kirk: I wouldn’t pay a guy to incite violence on my behalf, either. ---
**Author:** ![puzzlegal](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/puzzlegal/32/3827_2.png) [@puzzlegal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/puzzlegal)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 4:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/54 "2025-09-11T16:16:00Z")
> [@MagicEyes](#): > > > [@DemonTree](#): > > > > Charlie Kirk does seem to have had some repugnant views, but I have not yet seen any evidence that he endorsed political violence, and I _have_ now seen evidence that various things he said were reported (or maybe remembered) in a misleading way. > > He was 100% in favor of gun deaths. I’m not going to look up the exact quote, but you’ll probably see it again in about five minutes. Eh, he is on the record saying they are an acceptable price. I assume the quote you are thinking of is > **[Charlie Kirk says gun deaths "unfortunately" worth it to ...](https://www.newsweek.com/charlie-kirk-says-gun-deaths-worth-it-2nd-amendment-1793113)** > > The conservative founder of Turning Point USA made the comments following a mass shooting in Nashville last week that resulted in six deaths. ---
**Author:** ![Aspenglow](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aspenglow/32/76_2.png) [@Aspenglow](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Aspenglow)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 4:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/55 "2025-09-11T16:20:56Z")
Moderating: I’m not sure what the reason was why the OP started this discussion in MPSIMS, but it has become almost entirely political. Moving to P&E. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 4:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/56 "2025-09-11T16:48:05Z")
> [@Snarky\_Kong](#): > > I instantly lost all respect I had for Ezra Klein. He cites Paul Pelosi’s attack without mentioning that Kirk loved it and praised the assailant. I’ve been losing respect for Klein precipitously for about the last year. Even though I often (but certainly not always) agree with him in broad strokes, I often see him making spurious arguments and overlooking (seemingly with intention) issues that are inconvenient to him. He’s the kind of ‘mature progressive’ who is actually politically neutral in many ways and sometimes even bending over backward to conservatives just to demonstrate how even-minded he is when he really shouldn’t be. His interview with Ross Douthat (which I can only imagine was requested by bosses at the _New York Times_ for self-promotional purposes) was a particular low point, and I found _Abundance_, which he co-authored with Derek Thompson to be full of genuine talking points punctuated with cherry-picked and sometimes completely misrepresented examples. As for Kirk, “A man reaps what he sows.” Stranger ---
**Author:** ![ParallelLines](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/parallellines/32/3575_2.png) [@ParallelLines](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ParallelLines)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/57 "2025-09-11T16:51:37Z")
> [@Snarky\_Kong](#): > > > [@DemonTree](#): > > > > A hero for bailing out a criminal, and as they saw it, getting to the bottom of what happened. Is bail bad now? > > You are credulous to a degree I find implausible. **Moderating:** This is an an attack on the Poster, not the content of the Post. At the time, it was a MPSIMS thread (now P&E thread), not the Pit thread. While several other posters endorsed this, @Babale did a good job of attacking the same post, not the poster. > [@Charlie Kirk is Dead](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/45): > > A hero for bailing out a criminal, and as they saw it, getting to the bottom of what happened. Is bail bad now? That was obviously disjngenuous on Kirk’s part. Likewise, when Kirk’s killer is caught and people start donating to his bail fund (if he’s even allowed bail) or defense fund, those will be despicable people. Since there is a hydra of Charlie Kirk threads right now, I understand there can be a lot of confusion, but to all, **check** which thread/forum you’re posting in. ---
**Author:** ![DeadTreasSecretaries](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/deadtreassecretaries/32/4817_2.png) [@DeadTreasSecretaries](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DeadTreasSecretaries)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 5:15pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/58 "2025-09-11T17:15:08Z")
> [@Horatius](#): > > > [@](#): > > > > We can live with losing an election because we believe in the promise of the next election; we can live with losing an argument because we believe that there will be another argument. > > This is increasingly untrue in the US, and it’s largely the fault of the Republicans. They’re the ones who started screaming that every election they lost was rigged, and then made great efforts to rig elections themselves. When one side is actively trying to destroy the integrity of elections, you can’t be surprised that the other side stops “believing in the promise of the next election.” Very true, and Kirk himself claimed that one of his organizations (Turning Point Acton) bussed people to the “rally" on January 6. ---
**Author:** ![Czarcasm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/czarcasm/32/4050_2.png) [@Czarcasm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Czarcasm)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 5:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/59 "2025-09-11T17:19:04Z")
So there is a small chance that Kirk’s group bussed in the very person that shot him? ---
**Author:** ![DemonTree](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/demontree/32/8646_2.png) [@DemonTree](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DemonTree)\ **Post date:** [September 11, 2025, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935/60 "2025-09-11T17:32:18Z")
> [@puzzlegal](#): > > I used to go to a regular event near a place with gang shootings. So i followed them for a while. Gang shootings kill innocent people, too. Like the 12 year old girl doing her homework in her living room when a stray bullet from a nearby gang shooting killed her. Yes they do, unfortunately, and they receive far too little attention. Most of the population can avoid this kind of violence by paying to live far away from the gangs, so it doesn’t incite the same fear as random shootings. Nor are these crimes particularly useful to either side in pushing their desired gun policies. > [@puzzlegal](#): > > I think he was trying to imply that hang violence isn’t important because it doesn’t kill people like his audience. Nah. This is the conversation: > [@](#): > > Moments before Kirk was shot on Wednesday, numerous livestreams of the event showed an audience member asking him how many mass shooters in the last 10 years have been transgender Americans. > > “Too many,” Kirk responded. > > The person said five was the number, then asked Kirk if he knew how many mass shooters in total America had seen in the last 10 years. “Counting or not counting gang violence?” Kirk replied. It has become a common claim on the right that trans people are overrepresented among mass shooters. It’s clear to me that that is what Kirk and his questioner were getting at, and obviously if you want to compare numbers, you would not include the gang shootings. It would be the same if you looked at how many mass shooters were motivated by far-right ideology - it makes more sense to use the number of spree killings as denominator rather than all mass shootings. * * * > [@MagicEyes](#): > > He was 100% in favor of gun deaths. I’m not going to look up the exact quote, but you’ll probably see it again in about five minutes. The quote: > [@](#): > > “It’s worth it to have a cost of, unfortunately, some gun deaths every single year, so that we can have the Second Amendment to protect our other God-given rights,” he said during an [April 5, 2023, appearance](https://ca.news.yahoo.com/fact-check-charlie-kirk-once-205500283.html) at the Salt Lake City campus of Awaken Church. “That is a prudent deal.” When I bring up examples of ‘cancel culture’, or other complaints from conservatives, people here often complain that they are misleading, and the truth is more complicated and nuanced. And they are usually right. But the same is true here. Charlie Kirk didn’t praise Pelosi’s attacker or call him a patriot. He wasn’t in favour of gun deaths, except in the same sense that someone who says “it is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer” is in favour or releasing murderers. He didn’t say gang killings don’t matter. What he actually said in each case was something more complicated and nuanced. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935.md?page=2) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/charlie-kirk-is-dead/1022935.md?page=4)