Chocolate City Jordanaire wrote:I did not know a thing about him. Sound bytes make him seem willing to debate, although his views were ultra conservative.Zonkerbl wrote:And by the way, Charlie Kirk did not practice politics "the right way." Charlie Kirk insisted that people debate him, but refused to debate in good faith. He refused to acknowledge the existence of facts that contradicted his point of view. He refused to apologize and recant when caught out in a lie. He was not persuadable. If you are spreading propaganda on behalf of your patron demagogue without any possibility of being persuaded, that is not debating in good faith. To argue in bad faith is bad because it undermines trust in the very idea of productive debate, no matter what topic you are defending. But to argue in bad faith specifically to advocate for white nationalist totalitarianism is Bad Politics tm.
This is a guy whose debate tactic was to gather a bunch of unprepared liberals around him and insult them, goading them into saying something in the heat of the moment that he could post to youtube. That's not debate. That's bullying. The rare times he was confronted with a lie he would change the topic, move the goalposts, and pretend the fact he was confronted with didn't exist.
https://www.nytimes.com/2025/09/11/opinion/charlie-kirk-assassination-fear-politics.html
You're giving the answer to what I wondered. Did he faux debate? All talk but intractable in his views? Apparently so. In that case, Charlie Kirk was just spreading propaganda to promote only like-minded ideas to his kind of people.
That type of person is a misanthrope.
My point exactly. Instead of Nazi-washing Kirk's legacy, this is an opportunity for us to discuss what "doing discourse the right way" means. Otherwise you're giving a stamp of approval to guys like Nate and Daone, that arguing in bad faith, refusing to admit you're wrong when confronted with facts, is totally fine. That's not debate. That's sticking your fingers in your ears and going "LALALALA I CAN'T HEAR YOU."
If you find yourself persuaded by such arguments, you are the problem. People will die because of you. You need to transcend your animal nature and allow your decisions to be guided by logic rather than hate and fear.
It's precisely bad actors like Kirk who are the biggest danger to democracy. They're white and male, and speak calmly. We're conditioned to trust such people. His arguments have a veneer of civility, which we confuse for logical correctness.
Logic adjacent "debate" where citing facts cannot persuade the debater, no matter how civilized they are, is bad faith and uncivil.
I don't think Kirk deserved to be horribly publicly executed, any more than I think Daone and Nate do. Even though I feel people like Kirk and Daone and Nate are responsible for children dying horribly in mass shootings, and they'll be responsible for the babies who die horribly because they didn't get vaccinated. They're bad people doing bad things, and we need to have the courage to say so out loud, even when it's really difficult, like now.
