RIP Charlie Kirk

When I was a little girl, I would spend summers with my extended family in France. There was a beautiful rhythm to life then, centered around meals. I recall evening-time, when we would all be assembled for dinner, on the terrace with the swallows swooping in large loops near the mountain near us. I recall how we would eat well, and what I recall the most, were the vigorous discussions and debates which would often take place.

So, in hearing about Charlie Kirk's death, I was gutted. Assassinating someone for resurrecting the art of face-to-face debate is so basely counterproductive, a stupidity only confused and arrogant evil can stoop to. I have tremendous sadness in thinking that such an assassin (or assassins), in trying to silencer somfy eone who was going to college campuses to entertain discussing critical topics with young people and persuading them to think more for themselves, to question mindless dogma, who was doing what my elders did for me at a tender age, allowing me to shape my mind by hearing actively challenged and dissenting points of view around a meal of reunification and connection, never got such a magical upbringing as mine. I am sure that the individual who took Charlie Kirk's life in sharpshooting depravity is so far astray from what matters in this world - beautifully discussing our passionate opinions over a perfect dinner in the waning evening, and then wrapping it up at the end by sipping thé a la menthe, a soothing balm to calm everyone into satisfactory, contemplative silence at having spoken and been heard - that he will never find peace.

Dearest readers, we have prematurely lost a strong voice of interest in this world; one that was trying to get us to refine our beliefs by seeing if they would hold up when spoken aloud. We have lost someone who might have differed from us, but was always interesting and thought-provoking to listen to.

And that is always a bad thing.