I agree he got owned spectacularly there but his skill is that to the right audience, even when he objectively loses the argument, he appears to them to have been in the right. Convincing your target audience you're the victor, when neutrals can see you aren't, is quite a talent that the likes of Nick Griffin were incapable of.

It seems so poetic that a man that downplayed school shootings gets shot at a school himself

Edited Friday at 12:395 days by DanielCarey

Suspect in custody; turned in by his own father, a cop. Young white man, christian, Utah local.

Wonder how this will be twisted by MAGA now. What we going for.. mental illness?

Gonna do a cringe centrist take here, but it's so easy to profile the perpetrator as being firmly from from the opposite camp to yours (Bella Ciao engraving on the casing vs. white boy from a gun-loving law enforcement/military Mormon family ).

There has been so much focus on the motives and the demographics of the perpetrator but there was every chance that we ended up in this situation where there is no manifesto, and no neat political explanation. The overall picture of his online life that has quickly come out is pretty inconclusive, with much of it politically meaningless, and don't suggest much other than his brain perhaps being fried on a diet of memes and video games more than anything coherently ideological. Which figures because as extreme as ideology can get, ideology alone can't ever explain committing a lone wolf public atrocity and the obvious personal consequences for doing it - there has to be some form of mental illness + access to weapons alongside it.

Despite it targeting a political figure, I think it'll end up in the school/mass shooting basket of atrocities where there is often no clear motive. Unless something more concrete comes out (and of course the perpetrator is still alive), then the shooting is quite different to attacks that make an overt political statement like Dylann Roof/Christchurch/Islamist terrorism I think. I'd put the Trump assassination attempt in the former category too.

The most meaningful thing about the assassination so far is not the esoteric profile of the perpetrator but the immediate calls for dire repercussions (themes ranging from violence or some form of anti-democratic repression) against anybody deemed to be left-wing that were widely shared by conservatives - and that goes from politically engaged randoms to the actual US president. 'This is our Reichstag fire' indeed.

Edited Friday at 17:165 days by Harve

3 hours ago, Rooney said:

Wonder how this will be twisted by MAGA now. What we going for.. mental illness?

He was a radical commie 🤣

Given how internet-poisoned he clearly was, 'Bella Ciao' is likely a reference to a game (seen at least 3 popular ones that it could come from), all the other references are dumb internet phrases.

But yeah, the bullets are how they'll twist it because it's hard to find any consistent ideology from an individual like this. Which is definitely turning out to be a pattern from these shooters, isolated males with nothing in their lives besides video games, unsavoury internet communities and conservative family members.

Am I missing something here - the Ch4 Bews is reporting that Trump might bury him lying in state and the governor and even more strangely the FBI spokesperson were crying regarding his death?

1 hour ago, Steve201 said:

Am I missing something here - the Ch4 Bews is reporting that Trump might bury him lying in state and the governor and even more strangely the FBI spokesperson were crying regarding his death?

Fascism

2 hours ago, Iz 🌟 said:

Given how internet-poisoned he clearly was, 'Bella Ciao' is likely a reference to a game (seen at least 3 popular ones that it could come from), all the other references are dumb internet phrases.

But yeah, the bullets are how they'll twist it because it's hard to find any consistent ideology from an individual like this. Which is definitely turning out to be a pattern from these shooters, isolated males with nothing in their lives besides video games, unsavoury internet communities and conservative family members.

Bella Ciao is a very popular anti-fash song. It’s often sung at the afd here

14 minutes ago, Silas said:

Bella Ciao is a very popular anti-fash song. It’s often sung at the afd here

Oh yeah I meant video games that have versions of that song in it (surprisingly a few!) - considering one of the other bullets is directly a Helldivers reference.

Though the cadence of the phrase he used is mocking in the way an antifascist might put it, so it could be just for the song, or it's all irony-poisoned bullshit. As the right are very keen to point out though, it doesn't really matter any more, they've got what they wanted out of it.

Trump has already moved on and the right have already moved on. It's a waste of a life but he was wasting his life already making poison. He can't hurt anyone any more now. Thank god.

For those that love a conspiracy theory.

Kirk was adamant that the Epstein files should be released publicly in full. Trump very much didn't want that.

No-ones talking about Epstein now.

15 hours ago, J00prstar said:

Trump has already moved on and the right have already moved on. It's a waste of a life but he was wasting his life already making poison. He can't hurt anyone any more now. Thank god.

Words couldn't hurt anyone and he was never violent nor did he advocate violence. Sticks and stones....

Does anyone think his widow's word's, in a statement in his Podcast studio showing his empty chair and mike, is very inflammatory? I do. She talks about the "hell that has been unleashed now, in the US, and worldwide and from this widow" and "if you think his views are silenced, they're not. They're even louder" I know she's angry and grieving but should tone it down a bit as it risks tit-for-tat attacks surely?

Edited Saturday at 17:334 days by CRAZY CHRIS

Thr pair of them are right wing grifters. What did you exoect?

"nor did he advocate violence"

IJBOL

2 hours ago, CRAZY CHRIS said:

Words couldn't hurt anyone and he was never violent nor did he advocate violence. Sticks and stones....

Does anyone think his widow's word's, in a statement in his Podcast studio showing his empty chair and mike, is very inflammatory? I do. She talks about the "hell that has been unleashed now, in the US, and worldwide and from this widow" and "if you think his views are silenced, they're not. They're even louder" I know she's angry and grieving but should tone it down a bit as it risks tit-for-tat attacks surely?

Words can hurt people though. I can’t believe after all this time people only think physical wounds are important.

You got upset yesterday because of the words people used in reaction to Kirk. I know this is nothing new for you but it’s a complete double standard.

The scumsack has thousands of quotes and tweets inciting hatred and violence and that’s not even considering his pro gun violence activism.

I do sometimes wonder how unburdened it must be to walk through life with the intelligence of a telegraph pole

8 hours ago, CRAZY CHRIS said:

Words couldn't hurt anyone and he was never violent nor did he advocate violence. Sticks and stones....

He advocated stoning gay men. That seems quite violent to me.

Absolutely normal for the FBI director Kash Patel to tweet a link to a Fox News story stating ‘Charlie Kirk’s alleged assassin lived with a transgender partner who is now cooperating with the FBI’.

Edited Sunday at 22:292 days by Steve201