As media declines, gory Charlie Kirk video spreads on ‘unrestrained’ social sites
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A makeshift memorial for Mr Kirk at Orem City Centre Park in Utah, a day after he was shot during a public event at Utah Valley University, on Sept 11, 2025.
PHOTO: AFP
Washington - Traditional news outlets were cautious not to broadcast the moment conservative political activist Charlie Kirk was assassinated, but it mattered little in an age of declining media influence.
Within minutes, millions of people – including children – watched the graphic footage automatically play across social media platforms.
The amplification of the video showing Mr Kirk’s final moments
Most newspapers and television networks – long-time gatekeepers with editorial guidelines to shield audiences from graphic content – chose not to show the moment Mr Kirk was shot dead. Instead, many outlets focused on the calm leading up to the attack and the chaos that followed.
That discretion was largely absent on social media, a fragmented digital landscape shaped by smartphones and instant uploads, where graphic footage showing Mr Kirk’s body recoiling and blood pouring from a wound spread rapidly.
The footage, which mostly lacked content warnings, was instantly accessible online and often automatically played before viewers had a chance to consent or look away.
“Journalists draw lines for a reason. We know how trauma seeps in through a screen. We know that immediacy without context is its own kind of harm,” said Mr Ren LaForme, managing editor at non-profit media institute Poynter.
“Social media has no such restraint. It promises unfiltered access, but without guarantees of truth and without protection from harm. The cork is off the bottle and everything spills out: real or fabricated, searing or false.”
‘Shocked and dismayed’
The graphic visuals flooded children’s devices and social media feeds, sparking anxiety among parents and prompting bipartisan calls from lawmakers for tech companies to take swift action.
“Last week, countless children witnessed the assassination on the portable devices they carry everywhere, in addition to a murder on public transportation, reports of mass shootings and school gun violence,” Ms Titania Jordan, from parental controls app Bark, told AFP.
“Childhood was never meant to include graphic violence or murder. Parents are rightly shocked and dismayed,” she added, advising families to log off social media and make room for “real-time conversations as kids process what they’ve seen”.
The virality of the video of Mr Kirk – alongside the amplification of extreme posts glorifying his death – comes as many platforms scale back content moderation and, in some cases, eliminate human fact-checkers and moderators, even as their algorithms reward engagement.
Mr Imran Ahmed, chief executive of the watchdog Centre for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH), told AFP: “The way algorithms have flooded our timelines with posts celebrating Charlie Kirk’s horrifying assassination is a damning indictment of the way social media works.
“It lays bare how platforms are designed to reward extreme emotion over empathy or integrity.”
‘Whims of algorithms’
Posts on social media platform X that celebrated Mr Kirk’s assassination racked up 52 million views, according to CCDH’s research – evidence that “policy enforcement is not just broken, but has been abandoned”, Mr Ahmed said.
The posts violated X’s guidelines, which allow users to post graphic imagery only “if it is properly labelled” and forbid material explicitly “glorifying or expressing desire for violence”.
The trend comes as surveys show that traditional media is battling record-low public trust, and as a growing number of Americans, especially young adults, get their news from platforms such as TikTok.
“At a time when more Americans are tuning out credible news for social media, it’s worth remembering that they’re leaving behind not just reporting, but (also) the discipline of restraint,” said Poynter’s Mr LaForme.
“Journalistic restraint still matters. Someone has to decide what should be witnessed and what scars can be spared.”
Mr Peter Adams, senior vice-president of research and design at the News Literacy Project, said the widespread exposure to the assassination video – which could cause vicarious trauma – offers an opportunity for people to reassess their relationship with social media.
“These platforms are hyper-addicting because they are personalised, giving everyone little tailor-made hits of dopamine,” Mr Adams told AFP.
“We all have a responsibility to ourselves not to hand our consciousness over to the whims of algorithms designed to keep us scrolling, regardless of what it might cost us.” AFP
