The new test for goodness

Work in progress, pg. 6, the long awaited graphic novel; on the drawing board now

Today, I just realized that I am using Charlie Kirk as a litmus test. It started with a friend I’ve known since 1984, longer than I’ve known my wife. He has a popular blog, but still hasn’t mentioned Charlie Kirk. He has talked about the horror of Jimmy Kimmel losing (then unlosing) his network show, but managed to do it without mentioning why it happened. Namely, the assassination of Charlie Kirk and Kimmel’s tone deaf, hostile, and repugnant reaction.

Curious, I started checking Facebook, X, and other social media to see if other people I know have posted about Charlie. Some did, some didn’t. I didn’t have loads of time to perform these checks, and viewed only a dozen or so profiles. Regardless, my opinion of the ones who didn’t mention Charlie at all has just dropped to the level of the slime that traduced his memory by posting slanderous falsehoods about him. Transcripts and FBI data show he critiqued individuals, not races.

Caveat: UK residents are exempt from this survey, because the government there no longer allows free speech. As a result, UK residents can expect jail time if they said anything positive about Charlie.

As for Americans, I now regard some people I once respected as dangerously dishonest and moral vacuums. It’s surprising to find myself writing this, because it is only one data point. That shouldn’t be enough to change my mind about someone’s character, particularly when there might be all sorts of ‘nuance’ associated with decisions to avoid the subject of Charlie’s assassination.

However, I don’t think there is nuance. As our glorious President Trump and masterful Secretary of Defense have said, ‘peace through strength’. From this, one might infer, as Charlie himself said often, that cowardice is a serious detriment and bravery is required to defeat our common societal enemies.

It’s hard for me to understand how someone might justify Charlie’s murder. Even Republicans were outraged by the murder of John F. Kennedy, who many believed stole the 1960 election from Richard Nixon. If Republicans could unite with Democrats in outrage and sorrow over that tragedy, surely it should be possible now, with Charlie Kirk.

The justifications for Charlie’s assassination started arriving almost as soon as he was shot, before it was known whether he would survive. What they made clear is the stark difference between JFK and Charlie. As far as anyone knew at the time, JFK was murdered by a lone gunman. Lee Harvey Oswald did not represent the concentrated vitriol of a widespread political movement. Therefore, Oswald represented only himself. Later revelations indicated the (unproven) possibility of some nascent Deep State involvement, but that’s all.

JFK was not assassinated by the equivalent of a member of China’s Red Guard. The Red Guard were ostensibly an organic protest movement founded by Chinese students during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976). The Red Guard was created, funded, guided, and tolerated by Mao Tse Tsung. It’s purpose, like Stalinist purges in the 1930’s, was to eliminate opposition to Mao’s policies, competitors for party chairmanship, and to consolidate power.

Charlie Kirk’s assassin, Tyler Robinson, resembles a Red Guard member much more closely than he does a Lee Harvey Oswald. This is apart from the fact he was young and a student. He was also an activist, may have belonged to a militant activist cell (which, regardless of Robinson’s membership, exists and encourages violence), and that group was ideologically if not directly affiliated with other violent political activist groups around the country.

What this means is that blame for Charlie’s murder does not rest solely on Tyler Robinson. It also rests on the members of the group or groups investigators believe Robinson was affiliated with, extended affiliations to other militant groups, politicians who actively encourage them, and civilians who support their twisted ideals. Those people intuitively understand this, and react from a position of guilty knowledge.

Whether or not they had any direct link to Robinson, and few did, all know they fully supported the assassination itself. If Robinson is guilty, they are guilty also. Therefore, to right the scales of their own conscience, they defend Robinson. And this is why Charlie Kirk is such a good litmus test: the truly innocent will feel compelled to say something in support of Charlie Kirk and his life’s work: to bring people together despite their differences, and to bring us closer to God. Even Van Jones, one of Charlie’s critics was able to do this.

Everyone else will be either too cowardly or ashamed to say anything, or too guilty to say anything appropriate.

At this point, even for people I’ve known for 45 years, the clock has been reset. As of today, if you haven’t passed the Charlie test*, you have to prove yourself from scratch.

*Again, there are a few exceptions: UK residents, coma victims, people lost in the Bermuda Triangle, etc.