by Jonathan Turley at Res ipsa loquitur – The thing itself speaks
Yesterday, the United States entered a new and chilling stage of what I have called the “age of rage.” After two attempted assassinations of President Donald Trump, leading conservative leader Charlie Kirk, father of two, was gunned down at a campus event at Utah Valley University. I learned the news while I was in Prague to speak on my book,“The Indispensable Right: Free Speech in an Age of Rage” and the growing attacks on free speech around the world. I never imagined that I would be speaking about Charlie’s murder and what it represents for free speech.
I cannot claim to have been a close friend of Charlie Kirk, but I knew him and respected him. In his relatively short life, Charlie energized a generation of conservative college students at a time of intense liberal orthodoxy and intolerance.
Kirk came up with the brilliant idea of challenging liberals to simply debate issues from abortion to immigration. His group would go to campuses and invite debate with signs reading “prove me wrong” and encourage liberals to engage in dialogue rather than violence.
The left had particular reason to hate Kirk. Campuses have long been the bastions of the left, reinforced by faculties which now have few, if any, conservatives or Republicans. Higher education has long been an incubator for intolerance; shaping a generation of speech phobics who shout down or attack those with opposing views.
Kirk struck at the heart of that power base. Polls show that most students…
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