September 24, 2025

ROGER KIMBALL: Iryna Zarutska and Charlie Kirk have exposed the media’s depravity.

The accepted media narrative was that Charlie Kirk was a “far-right” fringe figure.  But his murder allowed millions of people to realize that Kirk’s ideas were also their ideas. They were mainstream ideas. Not only were those millions outraged by Kirk’s assassination, they were also free to celebrate his teaching. At the same time, many on the left greeted the murder of Kirk with a snarling ecstasy of hatred. They were glad Kirk was murdered. Some hoped his wife and children would be, too. Others provided lists of people who should share his fate. As Reynolds observed, “These aren’t just a few wackos. These are large numbers of people in professional and managerial jobs… who genuinely believe that holding ideas they don’t like should carry the death penalty.”

Which brings me to Plato. In Book II of The Republic, Socrates says that one thing no one can abide is “deception in the soul about realities.” Ordinary lies are one thing.  People tell them all the time. But “everyone fears” the “true lie” that would disconnect one from the way things really are.

The commentator Scott Adams makes a related point when he talks about the people who are being fired or ostracized for saying hateful things about Kirk. The noteworthy thing, Adams says, is that they are surprised at the critical reaction to their vituperation against Kirk. They thought that the world at large would agree with them that Kirk, Donald Trump and their kith were fascists, Nazis, etc. They are shocked that this is not the case. They have been living in a media-nourished bubble in which Trump is the reincarnation of Hitler. They are, says Adams, “hypnotized Hitlerians.” They believe – because they have been assiduously instructed to believe – that America has been taken over by a Hitler-like figure. So in one sense, Adams notes, they are victims. Who wouldn’t want to get rid of Hitler? But the Hitlerians have been deceived in their souls about the truth. This does not mean they are not responsible for fomenting hate, only that their behavior can be explained.

More here: Scott Adams: Why Did People Think They Could Cheer Charlie Kirk’s Murder Without Consequences?

ADAMS: There are numerous stories of teachers and people associated with schools who are getting canceled—meaning fired—for saying horrible things: essentially being happy, or saying it was justified, that Charlie Kirk was assassinated. What do you think about that? People are losing their jobs all over the place.

Well, let me tell you the thing that is most shocking about that. The most shocking thing is that the people who spoke out that way believed they wouldn’t get fired. I think they were all surprised, which means they’ve been living entirely within a bubble in which they thought other people would agree with that. Are you kidding me?

They thought they were in the bubble of reality where—let’s say that Hitler was an American and he died—would you feel bad about saying, “Thank God Hitler died”? No, you wouldn’t, because you would assume that almost every single person would agree with you. So it would be easy to say that.

These people are saying it in public for the world to see, as if that’s what a normal person would think. How hypnotized would you have to be?

So, in my mind anyway—and I think I’ve said it online at least once—I think of these people as the “hypnotized Hitlerians.” You can drop the “hypnotized” if you need to. But the Hitlerians are people who live in this little world where they think Hitler actually came to power in the United States because so many bad people on the left have been saying that. People should know better.

But the DNC-MSM aren’t going to stop doing the “hypnotizing” anytime soon:

Posted at 4:14 pm by Ed Driscoll