From Utah to the UK: What Charlie Kirk’s Assassination Teaches Brits About Free Speech

Kirk was the founder and CEO of Turning Point USA, an incredibly influential conservative group on university campuses and in wider society. So influential was Kirk’s voice, he grew to call the likes of President Trump and Vice President J.D. Vance close friends. Like anyone else in a free society, he did not deserve to die for his politics. Most tragically, he was murdered at a place of education, Utah Valley University.

While Britain has not witnessed a campus killing of this kind, our own political climate is becoming increasingly tense and, at times, violent. Since October 7th, some student societies have openly expressed support for the terrorist group Hamas; at Durham University last summer, a debate on Palestinian peace was cancelled and postponed after protesters trapped students inside the debating chamber, forcing the police to intervene. If universities can no longer serve as marketplaces of ideas, both in the UK and in the US, what hope is there for wider society engaging in peaceful discourse?

Britain may lack American guns, but this does not mean our campuses are immune to violence and intimidation. Calls for violence and violent protests can have dangerous consequences, which universities should not be let off the hook for. Suella Braverman’s cancelled event – scheduled by the Cambridge University Conservative Association last year – is as an example. The university authorities warned the association to cancel the address because of a planned protest; they did, though it was later rescheduled successfully. Even if you disagree vehemently with her views, a former Home Secretary and leading politician from a mainstream party has a right to engage with students without threat – the right that Charlie Kirk should have been afforded.

Across the UK, student society presidents and officers are routinely given lengthy security frameworks to fill in by university executives, subjected to lengthy security calls and last-minute changes, and threatened with exorbitant security costs; symbolic of the growing threat. These pressures can place a heavy emotional burden on students and society leaders alike. Attendees may have to push through lines of protesters just to enter an event, while organisers risk being singled out for public ridicule in social media posts. Richard Tice, for example, often attends universities with a security detail akin to that of President Trump to protect him from protesters. The fear of violence, for speakers and attendees of events, is clearly apparent.

Cancelling and intimidation do not just impact political speakers. A building at Manchester University was occupied by students protesting the university’s partnership with the British multinational BAE Systems and its arms sales to Israel. These protests not only disrupt university life but also deter other societies and companies from hosting careers events, for fear of facing hostility.

I write as a Policy Fellow at the Pinsker Centre, an organisation born in the aftermath of a wave campus political violence and intimidation in the mid-late 2010s. This was a period which saw one student society ‘attacked by demonstrators’ at KCL, where windows were smashed by chairs being thrown at students attending an event. Another incident saw the former commander of British Armed Forces in Afghanistan, Colonel Richar Kemp, harassed by protesters upon entry to an event. When Kemp tried to engage is dialogue one protester who was shouting abuse, they simply responded ‘I don’t want to hear your voice’. This is symbolic of a dangerous erosion of the exchange of ideas.

Kirk’s death is a timely reminder that the heat needs to be turned down on campus; that means more discussions, not less, and not letting universities off the hook with administrative excuses – this is cowardice. If we truly want to honour Kirk’s legacy, British universities must foster more debates and allow the clash of ideas, just as his Utah address so starkly exemplified.

Charles Aldous is a Policy Fellow at the Pinsker Centre, a campus-based think tank, focusing on Middle Eastern and global affairs. Charles is a masters student at the University of Cambridge.

LBC Opinion provides a platform for diverse opinions on current affairs and matters of public interest.

The views expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the official LBC position.