Yesterday, Charlie Kirk, co-founder of Turning Point, USA (a conservative PAC), was assassinated (murdered1) by a sniper laying on the roof of a nearby building 200 yards away. Now this was no singular event. At least 4 gun related murders2 were committed yesterday according to the Gun Violence Archive incident records. According to national statistics3, about 3,500 murders were committed, nation wide, in the first half of this year — about 20 murders daily.
What is striking is the outpouring of sympathy for Charlie Kirk – the bawling, the chest beating, the braying about this being hate crime by the radical left and the fears of civil war. Even Trump has vowed vengeance on the radical left who he views as murderers, rapists and dog and cat eaters. This singular crime has been reported in all the U.S. media and in major media throughout the world and will probably be followed for weeks to come. But on the same day, at least 3 other4 U.S. citizens were murdered and 79 Palestinians were killed by Israeli forces (notably championed by Charlie Kirk) and God only knows how many other people murdered in all the world’s violence. Yet, there is hardly a word spoken or a tear shed except for those of the victims’ families and friends.
Why is the murder of Charlie Kirk so important while no one gives a shit about the murder of John or Jane Doe? What kind of world do we live in where we can be so passionate and obsessed about the death of one person while discounting the deaths of all others?
1 I find it interesting that the distinction between the two words murdered and assassinated lies principally in the socio-economic class of the victim. Important, influential, wealthy people are assassinated. The rest of us poor slobs are only murdered.
2 Preliminary data. Doesn’t include murders by other means.
4 And probably at least a dozen more