“Prove me wrong” isn’t a question, it’s a challenge. Okay, challenge accepted.
Christopher Hitchens
The guy in the photo has a razor named after him: What is asserted without evidence, can be dismissed without evidence. It’s really just an elequent re-statement of the burden of proof. When you’re claiming something, it’s on you to provide evidence, or at least reasoning for your claims. You don’t get to make a claim and then demand the other side searches for evidence to prove you wrong.
This is exactly what Charlie Kirk was doing: making unsubstantiated assertions and then acted smug when the other side was trying to prove him wrong. It’s completely unnecessary. he made assertions without evidence, meaning they can be dismissed without anything, really.
More liberals should acknowledge the fact the other side has the right to voice their opinions, but that doesn’t mean the opinion should be assumed any more valid than the noise a running engine makes as a valid statement of anything. If there isn’t any evidence to back it up you’re free to dismiss it as frivilous.
They weren’t.
They just understood what consumers of Kirk videos titled with clickbait headlines like “Charle Kirk DESTROYS college feminist!!!!” don’t.
That Charlie didn’t use that tagline because he was willing to have his mind changed.
Look, Charlie was not the worst of the right wing by any stretch of the imagination, and most of the viewpoints he held weren’t some outrageous over the top version of conservative ideals, most of what he talked about was pretty standard in conservative circles today, but some of the stuff that passes for standard talk in conservative circles today is pretty hardcore, and as with so many Conservative talking points these days have a pretty standoffish relationship with truth and reality.
He had a gift for presenting an image of “just a guy who wants to have open dialogue.” But while conservatives watch him and see “a nice young man just trying to calmly and rationally present his conservative values,” anyone who has a love for facts and evidence will pretty quickly understand why he was so frustrating to the kids he was picking on.
When Kirk was faced with people who actually did understand debate, understood how to properly counter rhetorical fallacy who understood how to prepare to counter rapid fire pseudo- facts and irrelevant interjections it quickly became apparent why he preferred setting up a table on random college campuses and picking on freshmen.
Btw, in case you were wondering, the Cambridge debate team who steamrolled Kirk on all his favorite topics earlier this year is right now showing how you behave when someone does something horrendous even to someone who’s views you disagreed with point by point.
Cambridge students who debated Charlie Kirk condemn his murder, ‘We must never lose sight of our humanity’
Students who once debated Charlie Kirk at the University of Cambridge denounced his murder, stressing that political differences can never justify violence.
They’re right.
But it wouldn’t hurt to take at least the spirit of what you thought Kirk was doing on those campuses and try some open dialogue with people who disagreed with him to understand why no, we don’t really think you can canonize him, and no, we don’t think he was a very nice guy, especially to some groups of people for whom life is hard enough without conservative rhetoric making it harder.
And no. Watching a guy for 10 years setting up a table with a “change my mind” sign on it never have his mind changed isn’t a sign that he was really great at arguing. It means he was never actually willing to change it.
