Charlie Kirk’s mastery of social media was key to his rise as an influence in conservative politics. So the extent to which his death and its aftermath have played out on those forums shouldn’t come as a surprise.
In a microcosm of life today, social media is where Americans have gone to process last week’s killing in Utah and is the chief tool to police those they feel aren’t offering proper respect. Investigators are probing the time the man accused of killing Kirk, Tyler Robinson, spent in the 鈥渄ark corners of the internet鈥 鈥 anti-social media, if you will 鈥 leading up to when he allegedly pulled the trigger.
On the other side of the world, as the Kirk story , from a spasm of violence that erupted when the government tried to ban social media platforms.
All of this is forcing a closer look at the technologies that have changed our lives, how they control what we see and understand through algorithms, and the way all the time we spend on them affects our view of the world.
Cox emerges as powerful spokesman against social media
Utah’s governor, Republican Spencer Cox, believes 鈥渃ancer鈥 isn鈥檛 a strong enough word to describe social media. 鈥淭he most powerful companies in the history of the world have figured out how to hack our brains, get us addicted to outrage ... and get us to hate each other,鈥 Cox said Sunday on NBC鈥檚 鈥淢eet the Press.鈥
Democratic Sen. Brian Schatz of Hawaii, urged Americans via social media to 鈥減ull yourself together, read a book, get some exercise, have a whiskey, walk the dog or make some pasta or go fishing or just do anything other than let this algo pickle your brain and ruin your soul.鈥
of Kirk’s Sept. 10 assassination immediately overwhelmed sites like X, TikTok and YouTube, and companies are still working to contain their spread. Confrontational material and conspiracy theories are pushed into social media feeds because they do precisely what they’re designed to do 鈥 for longer periods of time.
鈥淚 do think we鈥檙e in a moment here,鈥 said Laura Edelson, a Northeastern University professor and expert on social media algorithms. 鈥淥ur country is being digitally mediated. Where we interact with other people, how we interact with broader society, that is more and more happening over feed algorithms. This is the most recent in a long line of ways that society has been changed by media technology.鈥
Divisive content and the proliferation of the video of Kirk’s death may not have been the goal but are the direct result of decisions made to maximize profits and cut back on content moderation, Edelson said.
鈥淚 don’t think there are people twirling their mustaches saying how great it is that we’ve divided society, except the Russian troll farms and, more and more, the Chinese troll farms,鈥 she said.
X owner posted on his site this past week that while discourse can become negative, 鈥渋t’s still good there is a discussion going.鈥 President Donald Trump, who created , was asked about Cox’s comments Tuesday before leaving for . He said that while social media can create 鈥渄eep, dark holes that are cancerous,鈥 it wasn’t all bad.
鈥淲ell, it鈥檚 not a cancer in all respects,” he told reporters. 鈥淚n some respects, it is great.鈥
Conservative media star , who considered Kirk a friend, admired how Kirk was willing to go to different places and talk to people who disagreed with him, a practice all too rare in the social media era.
鈥淗ow social media works is a disaster area, fully a disaster area,鈥 Shapiro said in an interview with on a Free Press podcast. 鈥淭here’s no question it’s making the world a worse place 鈥 and that’s not a call for censorship.鈥
How people act on social media is a bipartisan problem, said Shapiro. The most pervasive one is people who use the third-person plural 鈥 鈥渢hey鈥 are doing something to 鈥渦s,” he said. That’s been the case when many people discuss Kirk’s death, although haven’t become clear and there’s no evidence his actions are anything other than his own.
Collecting inflammatory posts from both sides
The liberal MeidasTouch media company has collected inflammatory social posts by conservatives, particularly those who suggest they’re at 鈥渨ar.鈥 Meanwhile, several conservatives have combed social media for posts they consider negative toward Kirk, in some cases seeking to get people fired. The Libs of TikTok site urged that a Washington state school district be defunded because it refused to lower flags to half staff.
GOP Rep. Randy Fine of Florida asked people to point out negative Kirk posts from anyone who works in government, at a place that receives public funding or is licensed by government 鈥 a teacher or lawyer, for instance. 鈥淭hese monsters want a fight?鈥 he wrote on X. 鈥淐ongratulations, they got one.鈥
A Washington Post columnist, , wrote Monday that she was fired for a series of BlueSky posts that expressed little sympathy for Kirk. But she wrote on Substack that 鈥渘ot performing over-the-top grief for white men who espouse violence was not the same as endorsing violence against them.鈥 A Post spokeswoman declined to comment.
So much of what people use to talk about politics 鈥 algorithmically driven social media sites and cable television 鈥 is designed to pull Americans apart, said James Talarico, a Democratic state lawmaker in Texas who recently announced a bid for the U.S. Senate. 鈥淲e’ve got to find our way back to each other because that’s the only way we can continue this American experiment,鈥 he said on MSNBC.
Among the most persistent examples of those divisions are the about elections that have spread for years through online social channels. They have in one of the country’s bedrock institutions and contributed to the rage that led to the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
Whether meaningful change is possible remains an open question. Nepal’s unrest illustrated the dangers of government involvement: Social media sites were shut down and users protested, suggesting it had been a way to stop criticism of government. Police opened fire at one demonstration, killing 19 people.
Persuading social media sites to change their algorithms is also an uphill battle. They live off attention and people spending as much time as possible on them. Unless advertisers flee for fear of being associated with violent posts, there’s little incentive for them to change, said Jasmine Enberg, a social media analyst at EMarketer.
Young people in particular are becoming aware of the dangers of spending too much time on social media, she said.
But turn their phones off? 鈥淭he reality of the situation,” Enberg said, 鈥渋s that there’s a limit to how much they can limit their behavior.鈥
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Associated Press writers Barbara Ortutay in San Francisco, Darlene Superville in Washington and Ali Swenson in New York and contributed to this report. David Bauder writes about the intersection of media and entertainment for the AP. Follow him at and .
