Hunter Steele White ‘27 is majoring in Government and Religious Studies. The views expressed are entirely his own and do not represent any organizations he helps lead or is affiliated with.
The views expressed in the article are the author’s own.
It seems we are criticized daily for our opinions, whether it be the food we like, our take on sports or our politics. I certainly, and at times loudly, criticize the same in others. I would be surprised if you, dear reader, have not done so as well. This is nothing out of the ordinary.
Human beings love to argue about right and wrong. Is mustard or ketchup a better condiment? Is LeBron James really better than Michael Jordan? Should you be proud to be an American?
Especially in politics, you are inevitably going to dig in for what you value, and to defend what you feel the other side is challenging. Disagreement is a sacred part of the human experience. You learn, you change and you either refine your argument or realize you are wrong. However, political disagreement has progressively and unceasingly shifted away from courteous dialogue and into genuine malice. In recent days, and for the majority of our formative years, there has been an erosion of the sacredness of disagreement into pure separation. When sides stop arguing and start harming, we all suffer.
The watershed moment of this extreme separation tragically struck Sept. 10, when Charlie Kirk, a passionate but peaceful conservative activist, was murdered over his political opinions. When Kirk was killed, some of my friends and colleagues, who personally knew and worked with the man, sobbed. Upsettingly, I know many who celebrated or tacitly defended his death. And so many more were numb or ambivalent. Someone I know said nonchalantly, “I guess this is just the way things are now.”
In light of all this, I wrestled with a question. In a world of increasingly volatile rhetoric and ever-deepening division, would I ever physically harm someone who disagreed with me? Take a moment to ask yourself this question, and genuinely consider that proposition.
I do not believe we ask ourselves such questions nearly enough. The sad and horrible reality we find ourselves in is that many of our fellow humans are committing atrocious violations of dignity and life because we disagree with them so strongly. Wars, brawls and killings all, at their core, start as disagreements. Rather than having a civil conversation, we are literally shooting each other in broad daylight over the direction we want our values, our country and our world to go. Kirk’s death cannot be underplayed, but we also must realize this is a culmination of a larger crisis: we are tearing ourselves apart.
This dynamic is exponentially and rapidly worsening in our everyday lives. We are constantly exposed to heinous violence on our phones and to news stories designed with the explicit intent to agitate us toward the “other.” Our digital world is built by algorithms incentivizing us to hate. Our world is, in a roundabout way, becoming opposed to disagreement and in favor of total separation between “us” and “them.”
Social media and online spaces make it so that we only ever have to expose ourselves to those who agree with us. This spurs us to amplify and radicalize the worst aspects of ourselves. There is no room to compromise. There is no room for negotiation. In this world, the other becomes the enemy.
The assassin who killed Kirk, the one who shot President Trump, the one who killed Democratic lawmakers in Minnesota, and the most recent school shooter in Colorado were all radicalized entirely or in part by extremist groups on social media. The worst part of this paradigm is that it forces us to forget each other’s humanity. Like him or hate him, Charlie Kirk was a 31-year-old father and husband who was an ordinary man in many respects. He was fallible, he could be wrong and he was only human, like you and me.
Just the same, the person who sits across from you, who is viscerally disagreeing with you, has a mother and a father. They have people in their lives that they love and could not bear to be without. They laugh, they cry, they dream. They are not the enemy. They are human with a soul, just like us. If you don’t like their ideas, tell them. If you disagree with the way they think, tell them. Take one step towards making a connection with that person and not isolating yourself in a silo of extremism and hatred. If everyone could do this, our world would be much better.
If you find yourself as one of those people who celebrated when he died, reflect on yourself. Ask yourself if the road of radicalism and inhumanity is one you wish to follow, with all its consequences. If you are on that road, there is time to turn back, so hurry up. For those of us who are furious after his death, both fellow conservatives and all those appalled by senseless violence, we must reflect on ourselves. Our outrage must be precise and just, not unfettered and indiscriminate.
It’s worth noting that I personally was not a fan of Charlie Kirk. Even as a conservative, I disagreed with him on many of his methods. However, I admired that he treated others with dignity, even when arguing with them. So I urge you not to stoop to callousness or cruelty. Do what Kirk did: disagree passionately and try to preserve the other person’s humanity.
Those of us who are young may not remember a time when our country wasn’t so polarized. But it’s not meant to be this way. Nothing about anything happening in today’s world is normal. The hate, the suffering and this worsening separation are robbing us of our collective humanity.
So I ask you: help stop this wickedness. Mourn this loss, whether you agreed with Kirk or not. Then, go hug the person whose opinions you cannot stand. Pray for your opponents. Get out of the online silo and be willing to challenge your own perspectives. Do not stop disagreeing with each other, and disagree with curiosity and dignity.
Our country and so many in it are following a road of inhumanity and violence, so be a guide for peace. Debate loudly and forcefully, then enjoy a meal with your adversary. Stand up for your values without doing harm. Seek wrong and right it. Seek hurt and heal it. Let this act be the final gasp of a tumultuous time in our history. May it be remembered as a turning point away from evil toward justice, away from hatred toward love, away from separation toward a more united nation.
