The Reaction To Charlie Kirk... What It Reveals About Us All
Political violence strips away our illusions and exposes the operating system we’re running on
It happened in broad daylight. A crowd gathered, expecting politics as usual… speeches, debate, noise. Then chaos. A shot cracked the air. Panic spread like fire through dry grass. A man lay dying on the ground.
The news raced faster than the ambulance. Within minutes, social media was ablaze. Some voices mourned. Others mocked. Still others demanded blood. The killing stopped one man’s heartbeat but set millions of pulses racing with outrage, certainty, and tribal fervor.
Here’s the uncomfortable truth: the way we react in these moments shows us who we really are. Fear strips off the mask. Tribalism grabs the wheel. What comes out isn’t our carefully crafted identity, but the raw level of human we’ve chosen to live from.
The Big Idea
Charlie Kirk’s killing isn’t just a tragedy… it’s a mirror. It exposes three levels of human operating systems:
Base-level: ruled by fear, obsessed with power and punishment.
Culture-level: ruled by tribe, selective in outrage, loyal to the team above all.
Next-level: ruled by purpose, empathy, and the recognition that we’re all human first.
Which one you’re living from isn’t revealed by your slogans, your yard signs, or your tweets. It’s revealed by your gut reaction when someone you hate—or someone you love… is harmed.
The Breakdown
1. Base-level: Fear, Power, and the Eye-for-an-Eye Illusion
At this level, fear is the master. Uncertainty feels intolerable. So base-level humans cling to control, punishment, and power. They believe safety comes from domination.
It often starts early. A child grows up with parents who themselves lived in fear, who enforced rigid rules, harsh punishments, or constant warnings. “The world is dangerous. Don’t trust. Hit back.” These lessons burrow deep.
So when violence erupts, base-level humans default to Hammurabi’s code: “Do unto others what they did to you.” Eye for an eye. Blow for blow. Never mind that, as Gandhi reminded us, “An eye for an eye leaves the whole world blind.”
Science backs this up. In repeated game theory experiments, revenge strategies collapse. “Tit for tat” works for a while, but the strategies that endure are forgiving ones… generous tit for tat, where cooperation is restored even after betrayal (Axelrod, 1984). Retaliation feels powerful, but it’s a trap.
Base-level reactions to Kirk’s death were everywhere: calls for vengeance, conspiracy claims, celebratory posts from the other side. All of it destructive. All of it fear disguised as righteousness.
Metaphor: It’s like two kids on a playground, each shoving harder until both are bloody and the teacher finally steps in. Nobody wins. The only lesson learned is “hit first, hit harder.”
2. Culture-level: Tribe, Popularity, and Selective Empathy
Culture-level is less primal but more insidious. Here, the operating system is belonging. The tribe defines truth. The team defines morality. If one of ours is harmed, outrage floods in. If one of theirs is harmed, silence… or worse, mockery.
This is why Democrats raged when Paul Pelosi was beaten but shrugged when Trump survived an assassination attempt. Why Republicans mourn Kirk’s killing but dismiss Giffords’ shooting. Outrage has become a team sport.
Psychologically, culture-level mirrors adolescence. Think high school cliques. Belonging is everything. Popularity trumps principle. It’s why people laugh at jokes they don’t actually find funny… because the tribe demands it. At this level, empathy shrinks to the size of the group.
Metaphor: Imagine standing in a stadium. Your team scores, you cheer. Their team scores, you boo… even if the play was brilliant. The scoreboard decides your emotions, not the humanity on the field.
The problem? This is the largest group of humans. And their lack of self-awareness makes them dangerous. Because when outrage is only applied selectively, justice dies. Violence festers. And the extremes, on both sides, feed off the silence of the culture-level majority.
3. Next-level: Empathy, Purpose, and the Third Path
Next-level humans break the cycle. They hold paradox: disagree deeply with someone’s politics, yet grieve their death. They refuse to reduce a human being to a mascot for the team.
They don’t want a holiday for Charlie Kirk. They want a day of mourning for all victims of political violence. They don’t see red and blue, left and right. They see human beings… flawed, messy, imperfect, but human all the same.
History shows the power of this third path. Gandhi, Mandela, Martin Luther King Jr. changed nations not by demonizing opponents, but by refusing to mirror their hate. They called forth a higher loyalty: not to party, not to tribe, but to humanity itself.
Metaphor: Imagine stepping out of the stadium, leaving the jerseys behind, and walking onto the field to shake hands with the so-called enemy. That’s the third path. Not easy. Not popular. But necessary.
Some Science on Why Revenge Fails and Cooperation Wins
Game Theory: Robert Axelrod’s iterated Prisoner’s Dilemma (1984) proved that cooperation strategies outlast revenge. Forgiveness and generosity build stability; retaliation collapses into chaos.
Chenoweth & Stephan (2011): Large-scale data on resistance movements show nonviolent campaigns are twice as effective as violent ones. Violence burns hot but dies quickly; cooperation sustains.
Survival of the Friendliest: Anthropologists Brian Hare & Vanessa Woods (2020) argue humans thrived not through aggression, but through cooperation, empathy, and alliance. Friendliness, not fierceness, got us here.
Neuroscience: Fear responses hijack the amygdala. Tribal outrage lights up threat circuits. But empathy and long-term planning require the prefrontal cortex—the very part of the brain that makes us most human.
Zooming Out: Why This Matters Beyond Politics
This isn’t just about Charlie Kirk. The same psychology plays out in offices, families, and online arguments. How many times have you written someone off because they’re “one of them”? How often have you chosen belonging over honesty, revenge over understanding?
Every time we dehumanize the “other side,” we practice the same operating system that fuels political violence. The stakes might be smaller…an unfriended coworker, a broken friendship… but the habit is the same.
The truth is, none of us are immune. But all of us have a choice.
Practical Takeaway
Watch your reaction. Did Kirk’s death make you cheer, seethe, or grieve? Did you only feel outrage for your side? Did you want revenge? Or did you feel the tragedy for what it was—a human life cut short?
Practice expanding your empathy. Mourn your opponents as you would your friends. Reject leaders who dehumanize. Don’t use words like “libtards” or “repugnants.” Every time you do, you fertilize the soil for more violence.
Choose the third path. Step out of the stadium. Refuse the jersey.
Closing Thought
Charlie Kirk’s killing is more than one man’s tragedy. It’s a test. It asks each of us: will you feed fear, fuel tribalism, or choose humanity?
History is clear. Eye for an eye blinds us. Team-think shrinks us. The third path…empathy, purpose, humanity…is the only way forward.
Reject any leader, any voice, who stokes division, who traffics in name-calling, who dehumanizes the other side. They are not leaders of humans, only leaders of teams.
The only team that matters is team human.
PS: If you’re ready to break free of fear, outrage, and tribal hate…and become the kind of person who naturally walks the third path of empathy, purpose, and strength…explore my Next Level Human coaching program today. Spots are limited… don’t wait. 👉 http://www.nextlevelhuman.com/human-coaching
References
Axelrod, R. (1984). The evolution of cooperation. New York, NY: Basic Books.
Chenoweth, E., & Stephan, M. J. (2011). Why civil resistance works: The strategic logic of nonviolent conflict. New York, NY: Columbia University Press.
Hare, B., & Woods, V. (2020). Survival of the friendliest: Understanding our origins and rediscovering our common humanity. New York, NY: Random House.
LeDoux, J. E. (1996). The emotional brain: The mysterious underpinnings of emotional life. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster.
Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and self-regulation. New York, NY: W. W. Norton.
Amodio, D. M. (2014). The neuroscience of prejudice and stereotyping. Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 15(10), 670–682. https://doi.org/10.1038/nrn3800
Rilling, J. K., & Sanfey, A. G. (2011). The neuroscience of social decision-making. Annual Review of Psychology, 62, 23–48. https://doi.org/10.1146/annurev.psych.121208.131647
Survival of the Friendliest. "Forgiveness and generosity build stability; retaliation collapses into chaos." So excellently written with true neutrality & championing human worth above the noise. 👏🏽
this.