Ryan Walters has finally entered the “Milk It For All It’s Worth” stage of Charlie Kirk grief!
Although he laid kind of low in the initial stages of Kirk’s assassination, Ryan has finally decided to open up a can of "rally the right / stick it to the libs” whoop-ass.
First, he gleefully announced he would come after any teacher that dared exercise their free speech rights and mock the death of Kirk on social media. Then, yesterday, he emailed Oklahoma parents announcing that all public schools will have a moment of silence in Charlie Kirk’s honor.
Ryan’s edict is unenforceable, and most schools and districts quickly assured parents they would not be participating in it, but it still quickly spread across social media, irking those it was intended to irk, rallying those it was intended to rally, and dividing all those it was intended to divide.
For example:
That’s a reaction to Ryan’s announcement that one of my friends from high school who joined the Navy and hasn’t lived in Oklahoma for 30 years shared on Facebook.
It’s a powerful, real-world reminder of the mental degradation that decades of right-wing media propaganda have had on the conservative general public, the normalization of religious authoritarianism, and why you should probably cleanse your friends list every couple of years or so.
Naturally, my friend’s post ignited a vitriolic debate in the comments section that we’ve all seen play out on the Internet over the past week or so.
You know the drill – someone shares an opinion about Kirk online, someone else responds with memes of vile things Kirk said, someone else then defends those things, and then someone else tries to refute them.
After that, an accusation or two gets lobbed, strawmen appear, loaded questions get asked, extreme hypotheticals surface, and before you can fall down a slippery slope, words like “fascist,” “dictator,” and “asshole” are thrown around, the original post is deleted, and everyone leaves angrier and more determined.
You know, the exact type of online division Ryan Walters is looking for when he announced this stuff.
In a normal situation, I would probably analyze Ryan’s letter and make fun of some of the dumber things in it. You know, like asking kids in the middle of lunch time or recess to have a moment of silence for a social media influencer their parents have maybe heard of.
Seriously, who organizes a moment of silence at noon? Does he want kids to remember Charlie Kirk, or be mad that their rectangular slice of pizza is soggy?
But I’m not sure I want to play that game today.
Although I like roasting Ryan like a batch of fresh beans at the Harbor Mountain Coffee House, I’m so burned out by the Charlie Kirk Assassination Overreaction Feedback Loop – a twisted, mutually hypocritical, online void where people who live in different political realities respond and overreact to the passing of a loved or loathed online social media propagandist – that I want to try and ignore it.
In fact, instead of shitting on Ryan Walters for being the terrible and unethical person he is, I'm going to have a moment of silence for all the people out there who believe and amplify all the stupid shit he says…
Stay with The Lost Ogle. We’ll keep you advised.
