There is an old assumption that death softens even the hardest of conflicts. When a public figure dies, we expect a pause, a suspension of judgment, and a willingness to remember the person with at least a measure of grace. We may argue about policies or choices while they live, but in the moment of death, hostility is supposed to yield to humanity.
The death of Charlie Kirk revealed how fragile that assumption has become. Instead of silence or mourning, a wave of commentary appeared that was not only critical but openly cruel. Writers announced they would not mourn him. Some even mocked the fact of his death. For those who looked for compassion, the absence was chilling.
What was striking was not simply disagreement. It was the loss of any sense that death demands respect. Even if one opposed his politics, the willingness to mock his passing suggested that compassion itself had been withdrawn. The cruelty felt like a breach of something deeper than politics. It was a sign that the ground of shared humanity is crumbling beneath us.
The Vanishing Point of Compassion
Many of those who refused to mourn Kirk belong to circles that pride themselves on compassion. They speak passionately about the rights of immigrants, the dignity of minorities, or the plight of people suffering in Gaza or Ukraine. Yet the same voices could not bring themselves to express even the smallest sympathy for a man who died.
This reveals a pattern of selective compassion. Within the moral boundaries of their group, kindness flows abundantly. Outside those boundaries, compassion dries up completely. The in-group receives warmth, the out-group receives mockery. What looks like compassion, when examined closely, turns out to be partisanship wearing the mask of care.
True compassion cannot be so narrow. It is easy to care for those who agree with us or who belong to communities we admire. The test of compassion is whether it extends beyond our sympathies. When mourning is denied to an opponent, it means compassion has been captured by ideology. It is no longer universal, but a tool of tribal loyalty.
This is why the reaction to Kirk’s death was disturbing. It showed not just dislike for a man, but the shrinking of moral imagination. When compassion becomes rationed, society loses the ability to see every human being as worthy of dignity. That loss is more dangerous than any one politician or activist.
The Theater of Mockery
The case of Donald Trump reveals the same pattern from a different angle. Trump’s style is blunt, provocative, and often offensive. He has insulted opponents, mocked rivals, and spoken without filters. But the way the mainstream media and many commentators responded often went far beyond critique.
Instead of focusing on the consequences of his policies, media outlets devoted endless energy to ridiculing his mannerisms, his family, his weight, and his way of speaking. Late-night shows turned him into a running joke. Articles mocked not only his choices but his very existence. The effect was to reduce him to a caricature, someone to laugh at rather than to engage with.
There is a difference between criticizing actions and mocking a person. Critique can be sharp and relentless, but it still respects the dignity of the person being critiqued. Mockery strips that dignity away. It tells the audience that this is not a fellow human being to be debated, but an object of entertainment.
What makes this especially dangerous is that mockery is contagious. Once society grows accustomed to laughing at a leader, it becomes easier to laugh at anyone who supports him. The habit of ridicule spreads from the top figure to the broader community. Soon, respect is gone from the public square, replaced by sneers and sarcasm.
Two Paths of Criticism
This is why the example of respectful critics stands out. Franklin Graham, for instance, has spoken about Trump in ways that neither excuse nor belittle. He may disagree, but he does not turn disagreement into humiliation. His tone carries gravity, not mockery. He demonstrates that one can be firm without being cruel.
Respectful criticism is not weakness. It does not mean overlooking flaws. It means choosing to address a person as a person, not as a symbol to be destroyed. This form of criticism protects the dignity of the critic as much as of the target. It prevents us from being dragged into the spiral of insult.
Dehumanizing criticism, by contrast, feels powerful in the moment but erodes moral clarity. It indulges anger at the cost of principle. When critics join the culture of mockery, they surrender their independence. They allow their tone to be dictated by the one they oppose.
The choice between these two paths is more than tactical. It is moral. Respectful criticism keeps alive the possibility of dialogue, even in conflict. It reminds us that opponents remain human. Dehumanizing criticism may feel satisfying, but it leaves behind a legacy of bitterness.
Lessons Written in Blood
History shows how selective compassion and ridicule can prepare the ground for darker events. In fascist Europe, Jews and other minorities were mocked relentlessly in posters, films, and school textbooks. The notorious Nazi newspaper Der Stürmer published grotesque cartoons portraying Jews as vermin and parasites. Laughter made cruelty easier. Once people became accustomed to mocking a group, they were less shocked when violence followed.
In communist revolutions, the same mechanism appeared in different form. During Stalin’s show trials in the 1930s, defendants were paraded before crowds, mocked as enemies of the people, and forced to confess crimes they did not commit. The audience jeered as they listened. Compassion was reserved for the proletariat, while anyone labeled bourgeois was denied dignity. Children were encouraged to denounce their own parents in the name of ideological purity. The result was the collapse of trust even within families.
In revolutionary France, satire and ridicule played a key role in hardening the climate before the Reign of Terror. Pamphlets and plays portrayed aristocrats as greedy monsters and traitors to the people. By the time Robespierre declared that “pity is treason,” the ground had been prepared. Crowds laughed as neighbors were led to the guillotine. Ridicule stripped the condemned of humanity before the blade finished the work.
The pattern is unmistakable. When compassion becomes selective and ridicule becomes normal, cruelty follows. The line between words and violence is thinner than it appears. Societies that train themselves to laugh at enemies soon lose the ability to mourn anyone.
Why It Feels Scary Today
This is why the present climate feels frightening. The reactions to Kirk’s death and the constant mockery of Trump are not isolated moments. They reveal a deeper shift, where compassion is no longer assumed to apply to everyone. They show a willingness to strip opponents of humanity, even in death.
The echo of history is faint but unmistakable. We are not living in the 1930s or the height of the purges, but the mechanism is the same. Once people learn that some lives do not deserve respect, the circle of exclusion can widen quickly. Today it is one politician, tomorrow it may be anyone who falls outside the moral tribe.
What is chilling is the speed at which cruelty spreads online. A mocking article is shared thousands of times. A joke about death becomes a trending topic. The scale of amplification means that ridicule becomes not only common but celebrated. What was once shameful is now normal.
When you see this, it is natural to lose confidence in the authenticity of compassion expressed elsewhere. If kindness disappears so quickly when ideology shifts, then what is left of its depth? What prevents this selective compassion from collapsing into open cruelty again? These are the questions that haunt our moment.
Holding On to a Higher Road
Yet there is still hope, and it lies in the refusal to descend. We do not have to mirror the cruelty of our opponents. We can choose respect, not because the other deserves it, but because it protects our own humanity.
To respond with respect is to resist the corrosion of discourse. It is to say that even when disagreement is fierce, dignity will not be abandoned. This is not only a moral stance but also a cultural one. Societies that preserve respect preserve the possibility of healing.
Compassion must be universal, or it is no compassion at all. The real test is whether we can extend it to those who offend us, to those whose politics we dislike, even to those who would not extend compassion to us. If we fail that test, we repeat the mistakes of history. If we pass it, we lay a foundation for a more humane future.
The higher road is not easy. It requires patience when others indulge anger. It requires calm when others mock. But it is the only road that leads away from the cycles of cruelty that scarred the last century. To take that road is to guard the fragile dignity of human life, even in an age when respect is ridiculed as weakness.
Image by Claudia Schmalz
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