Dear Editor, 

The Charlie Kirk murder is still in the news, and it makes me realize how desensitized we are to killing. Murder, shootings, and other maynem are daily occurrences on the news.

Some of us took Charlie’s murder personally because they knew him. I’ll have to admit that I had never heard of him until he was killed. Apparently, in conservative circles he was quite the hero.

It seems to me that political types took the opportunity to start the blame game. It seems they’ve decided that the only reason this happened was because he was somehow radicalized by the radical left and that he was killed for what he believed not what he did. It was an attack on free speech.

I don’t know about you, but that rings hollow and I don’t believe it for a minute. There are millions of us out there who have similar beliefs, and no one is gunning for us. I believe he

Charlie used his bully pulpit to demonize trans sexual people among other things and made a lot of people angry. Now most of us aren’t going out and killing anyone over what they think or say, but it only takes one. Is that radicalization? I don’t think so. There is no organization out there that I know of calling for political killings.

Anger itself is a powerful force. Just watch the news every day we are presented with an assortment of murders and shootings perpetrated by angry people. Wives, girlfriends, and family seem to be the main victims, but our police officers, judges, bosses, co-workers, and people in general are there as well. Anger can be random or pointed. Is that radicalization? I don’t think so.

I don’t presume to speak for the killer, but I believe Charlie was killed because a young man thought he was responsible for turning people against his love interest. It wasn’t because some radical group or what he saw online had politically radicalized him. There is no evidence of that. What Charlie was doing made him mad, and he was the one in a million that stepped over the line and acted on his anger.

Charlie’s death will disappear from the headlines and our minds soon enough as have all the other murders we hear of. What we will be left with is a sense that nothing can be done.

How do you stop angry people from acting out. We may wonder who’s next. I didn’t know Charlie before and in a while I won’t remember his name. Because Charlie was political, his death will be politicized but, he is dead because he made someone angry enough to kill.

Another thing I’ve noted in the press is that some people in the media have said that people were celebrating Charlie’s murder. I’ve seen none of that. That appears to be political propaganda to anger you against the other side. As a matter of fact, condemnation of the murder was almost universal. This type of event happens to all sides.

Richard King