Douglas Murray and Rita Panahi respond to Charlie Kirk assassination

Joining me now is the author of groundbreaking works, international bestsellers, his latest on democracies and death cults, Douglas Murray. Let's start with the murder of Charlie Kirk, one of the brightest and bravest voices of his generation, a genuinely decent man, a father of two,

shot dead at the age of 31, at the type of event that had really become synonymous with his name. He understood the importance of robust debate, of maintaining dialogue with your ideological opponents.

When people stop talking, really bad stuff starts. When marriages stop talking, divorce happens. When civilizations stop talking, civil war ensues. When you stop having a human connection with someone you disagree with, it becomes a lot easier to want to commit violence against that group.

What we as a culture have to get back to is being able to have a reasonable disagreement where violence is not an option.

Douglas, this is a heartbreaking, unimaginable loss.

Yeah, we're speaking just a few hours after the murder of Charlie Kirk. And I suppose like everyone, my thoughts are with Charlie, but also his wife, his young wife, and his two young children that he leaves behind. It's an extraordinary, appalling act of violence.

And I wish I could say that it's completely surprising, but it isn't because of course, we've had assassination attempts on President Trump, who Charlie Kirk has been a very vocal supporter and ally of for many years now. And there've been many threats over the years

against Charlie himself. What we just heard him saying in that video is something that Charlie said often, and it's completely true. He spent a lot of his energies since he first came onto the scene

at the young age of about 18 or so and founded Turning Point. Since then, he had always made an effort to stress this point, that yes, you need to be able to talk, you need to have differences of opinion out in the public square, and that it is the best way to avoid a descent into political violence. And although he made that point so often, so many of his critics, most of whom I suspect really never listened to anything that Charlie said, demon so much of the left does, which is to regard

their political opponents not just as wrong but as evil. And this is something that many of us have pointed out over the years. Most conservatives tend to think that the left is wrong, but not that it is certainly not in its entirety evil. But that favour is not returned the other way around. And so we have people routinely claiming that mainstream conservative voices like Charlie Kirk's are somehow extreme, and that they somehow themselves are causing harm. Think of all the people in recent years who Charlie has talked about who you and I Rita have talked about who have said that words are violence and that ideas or questioning ideas is literally killing people and much more. Well here we see once again the reality of it. Words

are not violence. Shooting somebody in the throat is violence. And I really hope that a moment like this, as well as thinking of Charlie and his family, people think if they're on the side that has been demonising their opponents to such an extent and dehumanising them, I hope they think themselves about the fruits

of their their own words. words? And Charlie was rare. He had the ability to persuade so many from across the political divide. That's rare these days. It made him

enormously influential, particularly among young men. And, Douglas, it was such a wholesome message at its heart. It was about prioritising family and religion and truth.

And you spoke about the hate he received. It was so unhinged, so ugly, a lot of it from media and it continued even after he was shot. Let me play you a little of the discussion on MSNBC earlier today.

He's been one of the most divisive, especially divisive younger figures in this, who is constantly sort of pushing this sort of hate speech or sort of aimed at certain groups. And I always go back to hateful thoughts lead to hateful words, which then lead to hateful thoughts lead to hateful words,

which then lead to hateful actions.

I'm not gonna say what I want to say. What's your response, Douglas, to what you just heard? That was Matthew Dowd on MSNBC earlier.

Well, I mean, the obvious thing is to make a rhetorical point about what Daud said there, which is what if somebody had hateful thoughts about him? What if his hateful words that he said just there led to somebody shooting him or loved one of his or a friend of his in the throat? Would he exercise the same attempt at logical consistency then? I would think not, probably. But yes, that is an absolutely classic example of smearing the only just dead. And what Matthew Dowd said there is completely shameful. And if MSNBC had any shame,

they would have said that immediately to him and taken him off the air. What Charlie Kirk argued for throughout his public life, which was effectively throughout his adult life, were very straightforward things that were not controversial until very, very recently.

For instance, what this ignoramus Daud thinks is controversial, if he bothered ever to listen to anything that Charlie Kirk said, and I doubt he did before deciding to smear him before his corpse is cold. What Charlie Kirk said were things like, there are two sexes, there are men and there are women. He said America is a tremendous country and he was enormously proud of it and an extraordinary patriot. That wasn't neither of these things were until very, very recently. Charlie Kirk argued for biblical values, for Judeo-Christian values. That wasn't controversial until extremely recently.

None of what Charlie Kirk argued for was in any way hateful. And I wish, as I say, that people like Dowd, MSNBC, and many others realize that the hate has been so disproportionately coming from them. It's them who say that saying that America is a good country is somehow hateful.

It's them that says that saying that there are two biological sexes is somehow hateful. No, it isn't. None of that was ever hateful. It was a statement of fact or of opinion. And that used to be allowed in America, and that used to be respected in America. And it's a terrible, terrible demonstration of where America and the West has come to, that the statement of obvious truths and the statement of opinions that millions and millions of people hold fast to should be smeared in this way.

Doubt said plenty more and there's been other media outlets who have disgraced themselves today. Just to clarify, he made those comments after Charlie was shot but before his death was announced, but shameful at any time to be saying that, to be blaming the victim for speaking the truth. Douglas, the next generation of young men in particular are becoming increasingly

conservative, increasingly right-wing, rejecting so much of the leftist ideology that's been shoved down their throats by their culture, by schools and universities. And like yourself, Charlie Kirk has played a significant role in that, in opening the eyes of so many young Americans, young people across the West, and making them unafraid to speak, making them say their opinions boldly and putting forward an alternative view to the prevailing dogma. And Douglas, he always did it so politely,

even in the face of terrible abuse. I used to play his videos on this program all the time, the interactions where he would cop this ugly, unhinged abuse, and he would always remain calm and politely dismantle the radical left's arguments in the face of terrible abuse. And they still shot him,

no matter how much you spoke about the importance of dialogue about not demonising your opponents, about engaging and making sure that we're at a point where we can still talk to each other. And they still shot him.

We'll find out who they is, I suppose, in the coming hours and days. I think that whoever the shooter turns out to be, I do hope that people who listened to Charlie, who were inspired by him, he was an extraordinary communicator.

I mean, his success, his earned success over the years of his adult life came about because he had an enormous skill at speaking to people and for people. And he was enormously persuasive. He was enormously skilled and talented.

And as I say, it needs to be said again, an incredible patriot. I hope that after this, there will be many people, I suspect, particularly young people who learned a lot from Charlie, admired Charlie and much more,

who will be tempted at a moment like this to sink to the kind of level that they perceive in their opponents. I think these moments can be real crossroads. And I hope that all of those young men and women across America and elsewhere who were inspired and educated and informed by Charlie realize that their task now is to pick up where he left off

and to emulate what he did and to emulate the courtesy, the patriotism, the decency that he showed in his public life and that they don't sink into the kind of behavior which they see among their opponents. I hope that is the case because you say, Rita,

Charlie always demonstrated such considerable courtesy and decency, even to his political opponents who were screaming abuse at him and much more. So it could be, as I say, it's only hours after this terrible news has come through, it could be one of those moments where some people sink down and meet their opponents on their opponents terms. But it would be a much better thing for America and for all of us I think if we rise above that. And remember

that what Charlie said and was saying right up until the moment he was shot remains as true now as it was all these years, which is that yes, we need to be able to explore ideas, we need to be able to talk, we need to be able to talk across divides. And that if we lose that, then people resort to violence. And how terrible it is that something that he perceived so clearly and said so often should be something which has now been proven by the evil person who's taken his life away.

And he was always so brave. He would, he talked about speaking truth and in the past week, he has spoken a lot of truth, a lot of uncomfortable truths about crime in the US, particularly after the murder of the young Ukrainian woman down in North Carolina and the media's reluctance initially to touch that story at all, the over-representation of a segment of the

population in the violent crime stats, so many really crucial issues Douglas that should be spoken about but the media is perhaps afraid to, so many commentators don't want to be cast as racist or bigots or be called hateful like Charlie was, for stating facts, for stating facts that may be uncomfortable, but how are you going to ever tackle these issues

if you don't actually even acknowledge them?

Absolutely. And what happens if you don't acknowledge issues which are staring everyone in the face is you push them down under and they bubble away and evil things come up. You seed an evil harvest when you do that. I suppose there's one other thing I would say about that which is that after an act of violence like this as well as great anger and great rage, which many people will have. There will be some people who will feel in some way, afraid, or cowed by

this, they may not admit to it, they may not wish to explore it, but but they it's understandable. There was no reason why somebody saying what Charlie Kirk said should ever have been the subject of violence, the object of violence. But I hope that people realize again that that although at such a moment they can they might feel it's a good time to pipe down or or not make themselves a target

that actually the much better thing to do is to everyone for everyone to be a bit more courageous for everyone to be a bit more courageous, for everyone to be a bit stronger in standing up for what they believe to be true, for stating facts that they see before their eyes, by getting out there, by making their voices heard. You know, I think often of, after a previous assassination a good decade ago, in the offices of Charlie Hebdo, I remember what my friend Ayaan Hirsi Ali said, and perhaps it's as applicable now as it was then, which is that if there are people who seem to be in this position that Charlie Arnn found himself in, of being

this object of hate as the cartoonists and the editors of Charlie Hebdo were a decade ago. I hope that people remember now what Arnn said then, which is the best thing is to spread the risk around. If people are going to believe that it's respectable, reasonable to target conservative voices with violence, let's all speak up a bit more.

Let's all take a step forward. People don't need to be heroes or martyrs or anything, but they could be a bit more heroic and speak up a bit more and be proud a bit more for the things you should feel pride in, like your nation. And if people do that, that would be in the midst of this, this awful time,

it would be a tribute and one which I think Charlie would himself be very proud of.

Beautifully said, and I think you're so right. Let's step up and spread the risk. Douglas Murray, thank you so much for your time tonight. Douglas Murray, thank you so much for your time tonight.

It's a pleasure.