The Absolutist Trap: How "Free Speech" Became Anti-Democratic

Charlie Kirk's assassination reveals how we've abandoned democratic thinking about discourse—and why that might be as dangerous as the violence itself

“I wanted Kirk to be safe for his sake, but I also wanted him to be safe for mine and for the sake of our larger shared project.” — Ezra Klein

As a public historian who has spent a career dismantling the mythologies that protect abusive power, I find myself watching the reactions to Charlie Kirk's assassination with grim recognition. We're witnessing the logical endpoint of a dangerous delusion: the idea that absolute free speech strengthens democracy, when historically and practically, it does the opposite.

Ezra Klein's argument that Kirk was "practicing politics in exactly the right way" perfectly embodies this destructive thinking. Klein celebrates Kirk's willingness to "show up and debate" as if the form of engagement somehow sanctifies whatever gets said, regardless of its content or effects. This is the abandonment of democratic values — or, at the very least, an ignorance of them — in favor of procedural worship. It’s a genuflection at the altar of democracy as ritual.

What's most striking about Klein's position—and the broader discourse around Kirk's assassination—is how it reveals our complete abandonment of the contested tradition that once defined American approaches to speech and power. Contemporary commentators treat absolute free speech as if it's some foundational American principle, when in fact it represents a radical departure from centuries of ongoing struggle over what speech deserves protection and why.