Freedom of speech isn't tolerated by some

[WhatNextBanana]

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/us/comment/2025/09/10/charlie-kirks-shooting-terrible-moment-american-democracy/

Political violence on the rise.

People are getting angry when people have Political views they don't agree with. Freedom of speech must be allowed not shutdown.

Tragic news of a young family man shot by someone today. Please remember he was a human with a family. Violence is never ok.

It would help if you could argue your own point without sending YouTube and Wikipedia links, but it's really quite a rabbit hole. We currently do not know the ideology or motivation of Kirk's shooter. We do know that just three months ago, Democrat officials were attacked in their own homes in a politically motivated assassination. So we have political violence targeted at Democrats and now at a right wing figure. I don't know how it helps to argue about who is or isn't a fascist. Aside from the absurdity of calling fascism a leftwing ideology which is just a ridiculous inversion of actual reality, it's just entirely pointless. Whether we call the assassins in either case fascist doesn't make any difference. The point is, terrible acts of gun violence have been carried out against figures who represent different points on the political spectrum.

I think the problem here is a) guns and b) the deliberate stoking up of fear and division. The latter is something that you and other posters on the thread making overblown and grandiose claims against the danger of leftwing ideology are contributing towards. Using Kirk's murder to incite more fear and more hatred. Making things worse, whatever way you look at it!

Do you work with the FBI and have insider knowledge? All I know about the murderer is that he or she must be a professional sniper. For all I know they could have been hired by someone with a personal grudge

The guy who supported eugenics, supported Filipino dictator Ferdinand Marcos? That one?

Other political science professionals hold very different views.

There's no facts to argue.

You've presented your opinion as statements, that doesn't make them facts.

If you want to present facts of your assertions that the left become violent when losing in the polls in a way that doesn't apply to the right (facts now, not feelings or anecdotal)
That's the left are fascists (when the right of small government in the states are actively cheering on Trump creating police states in certain cities) in a way that is unique from right wing governments

That's the left "state ownership of key industries" ( think it's Trump who is forcing state ownership of private companies)

Then go for it.

Also one of your examples of right wing violence was a trusted Republican.

As for the left engaging in good versus evil which is something the right would never do.

The right wing have perpetuated the idea that there's a deep state cabal of elites who control the global leaders of power to put in place liberal leaders and destroy Christian society.
The right did Q Anon.

Carson Tucker and Alex Jones believe they are fighting the literal Christian devil and that Bill Gates and liberals are actual demons ffs.

As for turning to violence when they lost in the polls... How many police officers died due to the actions of belligerent liberals when Trump won the election?

You were right, Mr Kirk, the be kind/progressive/we hate guns group is once again shooting people who speak words they don't like and their cult members are cheering and sneering your slaughter.

We dont know anything about the shooter or his motives in carrying out this murder, but i think we can agree he wasn't a be kind, I hate guns type.

No-one knows why the killer took that shot. Kirk once said he thought that public executions on ‘certain people’ should be brought back, public, quick AND televised. His words.
perhaps someone took him at that word?
perhaps charlie shagged someone’s wife.
perhaps it’s all a big MAGA conspiracy- what were those signals the security people
around him were giving??
Perhaps the shooter lost a child in a mass shooting?
Perhaps they were hired - looked professional, didn’t it??

See how useless and unhelpful speculating is?

That article demonstrates just how out of touch The Guardian is.

It is unbelievably manipulative, and anyone who knows anything about CK can see it straightaway. What a foul piece of work.

If you thought about it for more than one second, do you think, possibly, he meant the death penalty for, I don't know, maybe paedophile murderers, someone like Ian Huntley? "His Words" you emphasise. What is your problem with them? Why are you deliberately misrepresenting them?

It's not really an unusual view to want to execute people like Ian Huntley. I don't share it, but I can understand why people think that. Can't you?

PUBLIC executions. Public. They already have the death penalty.

Bit extreme to want to televise executions! I understand why some people support the death penalty - I do not - but public executions goes beyond anything to do with justice and into a very dark and disturbing place. As we've all just had demonstrated to us.

I’m not misrepresenting his words, I’m repeating them. It’s not my fault he was a charmless, misogynistic, facist with extreme views on everything.

What's manipulative about pointing out that this man assumed that black people and women in good jobs weren't there on merit? He said those things. Do you think they are acceptable?

Free speech yes. I don’t think that means we should all support racism, hate speech, incitement or normalisation of violence.

I won’t support someone who thinks those topics are acceptable in society in 2025. That’s not ‘free speech’- it’s hateful, toxic and damaging for democracy. Which I am in support of.

Dont be brainwashed into thinking those on the far right of politics really have your best interests at heart. They absolutely don’t and their strategy is to divide societies and cause disruption which will allow for even greater inequality and a diminishing of our basic human rights.

How about the ‘gray area’ Kirk talked about around consent when the guy is drunk so no responsible for raping?
No-one is making this shit up! This ‘amazing’ Christian and family man not only said these things but said them IN public, at rallies and events ( the consent one was at another ‘Prove me wrong’ type one)

yeah buddy, you had a few drinks and that drunk girl said no, stop I don’t want this? Not your fault, you go ahead, it’s not rape it’s a ‘gray area’.

Mmm? Does it or are they just giving examples of what made this charmless con artist so controversial?

He didn’t say many black people “couldn’t” be appointed on their own merit, he said they - in many cases at least - “weren’t”.

That’s the fault of leftist DEI initiatives that prioritise identity and skin colour when appointing over actual ability and experience.

He wasn’t having a dig at those black people, but at the recruitment policies that turn racism on its head, which mean that black people have the stigma of knowing they were selected primarily to fill a quota, not because they deserved it.

It’s condescending and belittling to black people to have a system in which they are judged to be incapable of getting a job on their own merits. It’s actually incredibly racist.

That’s not what DEI is.

DEI doesn’t select by skin colour or sex over qualification. It makes adjustments for opportunities minorities may not have had.

women are included in DEI. So what that would look like is assessing the reasons why women don’t apply and qualify for certain jobs. So it may be adjusting hours to fit round childcare, for example. Or running courses to help them achieve the skills they need for the role.

my place of work had some complaints for “DEI” hires when they set up a scheme to help mothers back into the workplace. It just facilitated access, it didn’t employ women over better qualified men.

much like those with a disability get an automatic interview. But they still have to be the best candidate.

another example is some of the scenes we have to facilitate black young people’s entry into Oxbridge. If you don’t have family that have been to uni, or have no experience, or no one to ask about how the application process works, what the interview will be like etc, your chances are low. So these schemes help those youngsters through the process. They still need the grades, they still need to get in on merit, it just removes some of the advantages that Tarquin from Harrow takes for granted.

DEI hires meet all the standards anyone else does.

His statements were incorrect. He was telling people DEI hires are not qualified, and they are employed in preference to better candidates. He clearly doesn’t understand DEI either and was using it to score his own racist, sexist points.

i mean, calling someone “a black moron” is just not on.

All of that is only true if you believe it. I know it was said a lot in the aftermath of an air crash, but it was never substantiated. DEI initiatives aren't about promoting the less capable and qualified; they are about increasing representation where people are equally capable. It's only disgruntled white people who like to believe otherwise.

If you’re referring to the UK, you’re correct… we tend to call it EDI and positive discrimination and quotas aren’t permitted.

However, that’s not the case in the US which is obviously what CK was referring to.

I appreciate this post actually because I have always been sceptical of DEI but that’s obviously because I didn’t understand how it worked in practice. If this is DEI, then it makes sense.

I wouldn’t agree with having quotas, though and think the better way to facilitate a shift in hiring practices would be to pin point where people that DEI covers start to be more disadvantaged. But I doubt that’s an easy thing to achieve.

That is still operating on the assumption that someone black or female in a good job is not there on merit - before you have seen them work. Racist,

He doesn't automatically question the competence of white males.

I would imagine that’s the point, though. If DEI policies weren’t even in existence and he saw someone black or female in a good job, I would hope he would assume they got there on merit and not by virtue of their sex or colour. Almost like the existence of DEI quotas in the first place would bring in to question whether the individual was a box ticking hire or a sensible one.

The huge rise in anti-DEI rhetoric spread by the right in recent years has led to people of colour and women being called 'diversity hires' just for being in employment. The racists and misogynists are not stopping to find out a person's qualifications - they are literally seeing a black person or a woman with a job and assuming they aren't qualified for it. Influencers like Kirk fuel this and spread inflammatory disinformation to further the a sense of grievance and imagined victimhood among those complaining - a deliberate ploy to shift the blame for declining economic circumstances and quality of life from those responsible (the super rich) to an easy target - be that black people, immigrants, women, the disabled and so on. DEI becomes an easy scapegoat, it's just something to blame.

This post pulls off yet another wild distortion of reality - claiming DEI is a racist initiative and actually more racist than all the people who shout 'diversity hire!' at any black person they see with a job. There is so much inversion of the truth taking place on these threads, it's wild.

I know a lot of farmers kids who grew up with guns. They go lamping at night to take out foxes. Believe me they're lethally accurate.

Agreed. This was not that difficult a shot with a scoped rifle, firing from a prone position.

It's been reported that they have a 22 year old suspect in custody.

nypost.com/2025/09/12/us-news/we-have-him-trump-says-suspect-in-custody-for-charlie-kirk-assassination