In the days following the tragic assassination of Charlie Kirk last week, dozens of workers have been fired over repulsive social media posts celebrating the killing and stating that the 31-year-old father of two had it coming. Whining from the left that these terminations are “right-wing cancel culture” further reveals just how morally debased liberals are, given that they apparently can’t comprehend the difference between punishing someone for expressing a political opinion and punishing someone for applauding cold-blooded murder.
As The Washington Post reported over the weekend, “At least a dozen employers, including the Carolina Panthers, the University of Mississippi, and the Federal Emergency Management Agency, have put staff members on leave or dismissed them for their online activity, as well as apologized for and publicly disavowed their remarks.”
One of the first to go was now-former MSNBC analyst Matthew Dowd, a one-time consultant to Republican President George W. Bush. Moments after the shooting occurred, Dowd suggested that the shooting could’ve been a Kirk supporter shooting off his gun in the crowd as a “celebration.” He then stated that Kirk was “constantly sort of pushing this sort of hate speech aimed at certain groups. And I always go back to, hateful thoughts lead to hateful words, which then lead to hateful actions.”
The list of fired workers also includes individuals like Laura Sosh-Lightsy, the assistant dean of students at Middle Tennessee State University, who posted on Facebook that Kirk deserves “ZERO sympathy” and “spoke his fate into existence.” The school terminated Sosh-Lightsy’s contract shortly thereafter. In another case, an anesthesiologist in Virginia was fired for her post about the assassination.
Perhaps most alarmingly of all has been the flurry of public school teachers who have been fired or placed on leave for their hateful posts. According to NPR, at least 21 educators have been let go or placed under investigation. One teacher in New York likened Kirk to a Nazi. Another in Texas wrote, “#karma is a b*tch.” In Virginia, a school board official who has since said she will resign at the end of this year opined, “Call me old-fashioned, but I remember when we used to be ok with shooting Nazis.”
Many on the left and in the corporate media have suggested or outright asserted that these firings are an example of right-wing cancel culture.
The Post, for instance, stated that “the rash of disciplinary actions… highlight the tension between employees’ right to free speech and employers’ need to protect their reputations.” NBC reportedly provided a platform to “critics warning that disciplinary actions are creating a chilling effect on open expression.” Ex-CNN anchor Don Lemon, meanwhile, claimed that “it is the cancel culture on the right that is now leading the charge.” Journalist Michael Tracey likewise bemoaned “right-wing cancel culture.”
On the one hand, it would be easy and satisfying for conservatives to sit back and say that liberals are getting a taste of their own medicine. In some cases, the hypocrisy is indeed too blatant to ignore. Rolling Stone, which in 2023 ran an opinion piece making the case that “cancel culture is good for democracy,” is now lamenting that “people are losing their jobs for criticizing slain ‘free speech’ advocate Charlie Kirk.”
But describing what is happening now to those rejoicing over Kirk’s death as “cancel culture” is not quite right. What conservatives are engaged in – accountability – is far different from the cancel culture that liberals have wielded as a censorship weapon against their political enemies for years.
A few examples of actual cancel culture immediately illustrate the difference. Back in 2022, Jennifer Sey, a former executive at Levi’s, was pushed out of her role for vocally opposing school closures during the COVID-19 pandemic. In 2017, software engineer James Damore was famously fired from Google for criticizing the company’s DEI culture, which he said discriminated against white men. Back in 2016, a local news reporter in Houston was fired for posting on Facebook that she was “happy and relieved” by President Donald Trump’s victory over Hillary Clinton.
In 2013, Atlanta, Georgia, fire chief Kelvin Cochran was terminated for writing a book critical of same-sex marriage for a Christian men’s group he led (Cochran later won a $1.2 million lawsuit against the city). In 2016, ESPN fired former Red Sox legend Curt Schilling after he posted a meme critical of allowing men who claim transgender status to use women’s restrooms. In 2020, New York Times senior editor James Bennet was pushed out of the paper after publishing an op-ed from Senator Tom Cotton supporting President Trump’s decision to use federal forces to quell the wave of riots then terrorizing American cities.
In some cases, liberal cancel culture has even reared its ugly head against those seeking accountability for celebrations of Kirk’s death. In New Jersey, nurse Lexi Kuenzle reported a doctor who allegedly “cheered and celebrated” the news “in front of patients and staff.”
“You’re a doctor. How could you say someone deserved to die?” Kuenzle recalled saying. But instead of punishing the doctor, Kuenzle claims that the hospital suspended her without pay. She has since filed a lawsuit against Englewood Health.
It shouldn’t need to be said, but firing someone for opposing pandemic lockdowns, stating that men don’t belong in women’s restrooms, or supporting Donald Trump is far different than firing someone for vocally supporting the assassination of a public figure.
As the “Not the Bee” account (the non-satirical page for the satirical news outlet The Babylon Bee) put it on X, “Cancel Culture targets those whose legitimate views or opinions are deceitfully represented to a mob and the person faces societal consequences that aren’t warranted.” Free speech does not mean freedom from consequences.
If a teacher is fired for gleefully cheering on someone’s murder just because he is a conservative, she most certainly receives a warranted consequence. How could she ever be trusted to educate students in an unbiased manner or treat students who express conservative beliefs fairly?
In the same vein, a doctor who is fired for saying that Charlie Kirk had it coming receives a warranted consequence. How could he ever be trusted to care for conservative patients when he himself says it is ok to kill conservatives for their beliefs?
The left may try to blur the line between cancel culture and accountability, but the distinction is plain. A free society cannot function if violent hatred is excused as just another “opinion.” Similarly, a free society cannot function if basic common sense (like stating that men cannot become women or that DEI is anti-white racism) is treated as “hateful” rhetoric.
When applause for assassination enters the public square, consequences must follow – because unlike cancel culture, accountability is not about silencing dissent, but about upholding the most basic standard of human decency.
Shane Harris is the Editor-in-Chief of AMAC Newsline. You can follow him on X @shaneharris513.
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