Spencer Cox, Governor of Utah full statement about Charlie Kirks is well worth a watch, whether you are a detractor or a fan of Charlie. Gov Cox talks about Charlie Kirk specifically, and the unique evil of political assassination. Charlie is the second political assassination this year. The first being Melissa Hortman, who along with her husband were murdered in June. Classifying someone’s words as violence, and then using physical violence against them is the definition of hypocrisy. Targeting legislators to be killed, injured, harassed, and intimidated is not ok. We mush stand against this sort of violence. Prayers for Charlie’s wife, children, and friends. I feel nothing but deep sadness that Charlie’s life was ended prematurely by violence.

TL;DR

• We need to stay in dialogue with the people we disagree with, never demonizing them, but looking for what we have in common, and together seeking what is true. We want the same thing, for all people to thrive. Where we differ is how to achieve this.
• While it’s appropriate to reflect on someone’s legacy, it’s rude to do this before people have had a chance to grieve when someone was assassinated. My bad.

Shared In Common

Yesterday I posted a short video which reported to be snippets of Charlie talking about what’s most important to him. I thought both critics and fans would benefit from it, especially, those of faith. Charlie noted that if he was to be remembered for one thing, it would be “courage for his faith”. He acknowledged that there is a long list of things he has done wrong AND that thankfully, God’s grace covers it all.

In the video Charlie went on to say at the end of the day what matters is relations with God, family, friends, and truth.  On these points I agree with Charlie 100%.  I have earlier written about why I believe faith, truth, and love are absolutely central to the best life, the life God would have us live.

I shared the video because it is a good reminder of what is most important. That at the end of the day, our relationship to God, and how that flows out in our interactions with others is all that matters.

Too Soon… Doh!

I posted the of video what’s most important on Facebook with some comments. What surprised me, but it shouldn’t, was the strong reactions that my post provoked.

Now before I share the post, a caveat. I believe most ideas, and all people  are complex. I try to be accurate, to capture the complexity. As a result I often say more than is needed.  It’s a flaw, I know.  In the past, when reflecting on someone’s passing, I would remember and reflect on the full measure of the person.  Typically both their strengths and weaknesses.  The day my wife passed, during a conversations with a dear friend  about  Libby’s beautiful life we reminisce about her whole life, including laughing about how she could be prickly. Likewise, when I was processing my dad’s passing, I reflected on his many strengths, and one of his failings.  So for me, it’s ok not be 100% positive at the time of someone’s passing. 

Historically it has been considered appropriate that at the time of a public figures death, that it is reasonable to consider their impact and to reflect on the their legacy.

What I failed to recognize is that the rules seem to be different when someone was assassinated. In this case it seems “proper etiquette” is to delay those considers while people morn.  As a friend pointed out… my timing was bad.

Here is my post (misspellings preserved)

charlie kirk, and  turning point usa were misguided… putting “american exceptionalism” narrative ahead of Jesus’ concerns and Jesus’ way. He thought guns in the hands of the people to defend agaist government tyancy was worth the colladeral damage. He is now one more, heartbreaking statistic. Differences should NOT be settled with violence and the use of physical force… but that is the way of our broken world often resolves issues. Jesus changed hearts and lives with LOVE and KINDNESS.  This is how we can change the world.  A friend sent us a video short pasting together charlie sharing his understand of everyone’s need for grace and forgiveness which is a good reminded for all of us… We need of humility and God’s grace.

A Good Man?

Several of my friends were disappointed by my post. They expressed disappointed that I criticized the name of good and decent man.

As noted above, my timing was ill considered. That said, the cat seems to be “out of the bag”, so I guess I will lean in more.

My first observation is that disagreeing with someone position is not questioning someone’s decency or their “goodness”.   Public discourse today is breaking down because people are attributing bad intent to people who hold a different viewpoints. I think Arthur Brooks has eloquently written about this in the book Love Your Enemies  and I briefly discuss it in my post Against Contempt.

I agree with Charlie on many fundamental issues and I disagree with him on how one implements these shared value.

My second observation is that I am surprised that Christians, of all people, would call any human “good”.  Jesus in responding to someone calling Him good said in Mark 10:18

Why do you call me good? No one is good except God alone.

We are all a mix and daily struggle. Charlie noted this in the video above, that he has a long list of failings. I don’t think he would have called himself a “good man”. I don’t know Charlie, but I would imagine he would be more comfortable with “a man with a mission”.

Finally, I would note that in case of a public figure, I think it’s arrogant for anyone to try to assess someone’s goodness. We have no idea what is their internal life is, nor what they do when the lights aren’t shining.  All we can talk about is what they said, what they did, and maybe what resulted from their life.

Polarization

Charlie Kirk has been a lightning rod in the American political landscape. While there are many evangelicals and members of MAGA who hold him in high esteem, there are many liberals who are deeply troubled by his rhetoric and political positions.

Most people would agree that American society is becoming increasingly polarized, with some of us, the historical “middle of the road”, feeling disenfranchised by both sides. It seems like anything we say will be jumped on by one, if not both of the extremes, accusing us of siding with “the other”. I knew of Charlie Kirk, just like a know of several people who would be considered his opposites. I never bothered to dig in and learn what they really thought. I spend my limited time looking for small ways that I can impact my local community. I pay attention to people who are successfully bridge building and foster collaboration which is bringing about positive change on the local level. Maybe this is short sighted… or maybe this the the only way to bring about lasting change.

Context and Soundbites

Polarization in society is fueled by meme and comments which are lifted out of context. I would urge everyone that when you see an outrageous statement being reported by someone opposition, hunt down a full transcript to understand the context before jumping to judgement.

I just read the article Charlie in his own words, which reports to be a summary of several of Charlie’s positions with corresponding soundbites reported by the Guardian. Without context, I found they range from true but rude, to horrid. On the surface, I am deeply troubling with what I see. It’s possible that these are out of context, but I am troubled that someone would say these things even if there context somewhat mitigates the statements.

Note: according to adfontesmedia.com (best bias dashboard according to grok), The Guardian is left leaning, and considered reliable (mixes reporting facts with analysis) as compared to say Fox or MSNBC which are rate as Hyper-Partisan and “reporting” opinion with variable reliability.

I don’t know if the soundbites from The Guardian capturing Charlie’s core views, or if they were a technique, an over statement of an extreme position he was then going to interact with. Soundbites and single sentences lifted without context lose nuance and can lead to misunderstandings. This is an error both sides make.

I committed the sin of providing just a soundbite in my Facebook post. I regret this but it out there now. Here is what I wrote:

He thought guns in the hands of the people to defend agaist government tyancy was worth the colladeral damage. He is now one more, heartbreaking statistic.

Here is the full text and context. This question / answer was in light of the shooting at The Covenant School in Nashville, Tennessee which left six victims dead, two wounded, and many traumatized. The following is pasted from transcription on snopes. I respectfully disagree with some of Charlie’s points, but this isn’t the time for that.

AUDIENCE QUESTION: How’s it going, Charlie? I’m Austin. I just had a question related to Second Amendment rights. We saw the shooting that happened recently and a lot of people are upset. But, I’m seeing people argue for the other side that they want to take our Second Amendment rights away. How do we convince them that it’s important to have the right to defend ourselves and all that good stuff?

CHARLIE KIRK: Yeah, it’s a great question. Thank you. So, I’m a big Second Amendment fan but I think most politicians are cowards when it comes to defending why we have a Second Amendment. This is why I would not be a good politician, or maybe I would, I don’t know, because I actually speak my mind.

The Second Amendment is not about hunting. I love hunting. The Second Amendment is not even about personal defense. That is important. The Second Amendment is there, God forbid, so that you can defend yourself against a tyrannical government. And if that talk scares you — “wow, that’s radical, Charlie, I don’t know about that” — well then, you have not really read any of the literature of our Founding Fathers. Number two, you’ve not read any 20th-century history. You’re just living in Narnia. By the way, if you’re actually living in Narnia, you would be wiser than wherever you’re living, because C.S. Lewis was really smart. So I don’t know what alternative universe you’re living in. You just don’t want to face reality that governments tend to get tyrannical and that if people need an ability to protect themselves and their communities and their families.

Now, we must also be real. We must be honest with the population. Having an armed citizenry comes with a price, and that is part of liberty. Driving comes with a price. 50,000, 50,000, 50,000 people die on the road every year. That’s a price. You get rid of driving, you’d have 50,000 less auto fatalities. But we have decided that the benefit of driving — speed, accessibility, mobility, having products, services — is worth the cost of 50,000 people dying on the road. So we need to be very clear that you’re not going to get gun deaths to zero. It will not happen. You could significantly reduce them through having more fathers in the home, by having more armed guards in front of schools. We should have a honest and clear reductionist view of gun violence, but we should not have a utopian one.

You will never live in a society when you have an armed citizenry and you won’t have a single gun death. That is nonsense. It’s drivel. But I am, I, I — I think it’s worth it. I think it’s worth 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. That is a prudent deal. It is rational. Nobody talks like this. They live in a complete alternate universe.

So then, how do you reduce? Very simple. People say, oh, Charlie, how do you stop school shootings? I don’t know. How did we stop shootings at baseball games? Because we have armed guards outside of baseball games. That’s why. How did we stop all the shootings at airports? We have armed guards outside of airports. How do we stop all the shootings at banks? We have armed guards outside of banks. How did we stop all the shootings at gun shows? Notice there’s not a lot of mass shootings at gun shows, there’s all these guns. Because everyone’s armed. If our money and our sporting events and our airplanes have armed guards, why don’t our children?

Dialog!

I think we can all agree that free speech is critical to a healthy society. That we want an “free marketplace of ideas”.  This is enhanced by respectful dialogue.  Keeping the dialogue going and reaching for the truth is something I know Charlie repeatedly called all people toward. This is a good and worthy charge for all of us. Lets all lean into this.

There are some who suggest that while Charlie talked about dialog… he didn’t actually live it out. Rather he “weaponized” dialog.  I can’t assess this since I have not listened to “hours and hours” of his dialogue with others. I expect that given how polarization works, that those who are against Charlie likely don’t have nuanced view of him. They are opposite to a caricature of him.

I asked several LLM the question “Did Charlie Kirk advocate dialogue? Did he live this out?”

They all agree that he clearly called for dialogue. They all noted that he has critics who suggested his behavior was inconsistent with someone who is calling for respectful dialogue.  As to whether he lived this out consistently… I got different answers. The answer that seemed most factual came from claude.ai which focused on the result, rather than the intent

So while Kirk did advocate for and practice a form of open debate and engagement with opposing viewpoints, the quality and tone of that dialogue was often polarizing rather than bridge-building.

Why I Said “Misguided”

As I wrote in Change the World? Love > Rule I believe a grave error The Church has repeatedly made over the centuries is to seek power. While this can be expedient in the short term… it is counter-productive over the centuries. I fear that evangelicalism in the USA has fallen into this trap.  Wanting their way now, they have forgotten Jesus’ way and His priorities. Much of the evangelical church has fallen into what Os Guiness called “cultural containment”, associating our faith with the culture we live in. People are mistaken when they think of the USA as a Christian country. Jesus made it plain that no human nation should be equated with His kingdom:

My kingdom is not of this world. If my kingdom were of this world, my servants would have been fighting, that I might not be delivered over to the Jews. But my kingdom is not from the world. – John 18:26 (ESV)

God’s kingdom is in our hearts, not any nation state. As Paul wrote:

But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we await a Savior, the Lord Jesus Christ, who will transform ^four lowly body to be like his glorious body, by the power that enables him even ⁱto subject all things to himself. – Phil 3:20-21 (ESV)