When I go out and about, there is no talk of Charlie Kirk

[Hellbound Hellhound]

27. 11 million currently viewing JD Vance on the Charlie Kirk Show with 30m views total.

That's just live, off peak hours, on one platform. Kirk himself only had like, 2m subs. Similarly, 4500 new "Turning Point USA" chapters have opened up on college campuses everywhere since his death.

You may not have known him, and even my right wing parents may never have known him up until his death, but if he didn't have an audience, he does NOW.

It remains to be seen what his death changes if anything.

Kirk wasn't an "Adult" influencer, he was an "Up and coming" influencer; He influenced young adults, aged 14-26. So while you may not know who he is, the youth certainly does, and in five days he's quintupled his viewership on purely his initial channel. His secondary channel is up ten mil. Those minor right-wingers responding to him have gone from 20k views to a million views each. In the meantime, left wing news anchors are getting fired, people who use social media to condemn Kirk are getting fired even as private citizens... Kirk wasn't "Cable News", he was a youtube and podcasting personality. I mean shit, we've got people in fucking IRELAND pulling Stephen Kings books, because Stephen King mentioned (Admittedly falsely and apologized afterwards) that " Charlie Kirk wanted to stone gay people". Australians held vigil for him. New Zealanders marched for him. The London rally was inundated with Charlie Kirk signs. Chinese voiced support for him. Say what you will, but he mattered to right wingers not just here, but across the world, and in many different countries, people are getting censored and or fired or similar for saying essentially "He deserved it". There's a website devoted to getting anyone who speaks about it axed.

It's no small thing. He's a martyr, and his death has galvanized the right wing through and through.

NOTE: I say this as one who observes social media impartially. I don't use Bluesky, I don't use mainstream media, I don't log in to ANY of them to see what the "Neutral" response is. TikTok is fully right wing. Reddit is banning anti-Kirk messages and people completely. 4chan is right wing already but it's even more now. Youtube, anti-Kirk gets demonitized if not banned outright.

"Most people don't know who he is" may be true, but the people who DO know are infecting the people who DON'T know. For instance, if you didn't know who he was, now you do. And no one's gonna talk about him, especially around people outspoken in their political views, because they have opinions on one side or another and don't know who to trust.

The man's a martyr now. I mean shit, you say "I've been here most every day" and Kirk has been a presence for a goddamned DECADE. That's not him being ineffectual or having no reach, it's DU being out of touch with social media.

Thankfully the violence seems pretty tame for now. I've only seen a few people get the shit beaten out of them, tossed in fountains, kicked and arrested. But it's fairly tame all things considered, so that's at least some small blessing.