Ayaan Hirsi Ali, the author and former Dutch parliamentarian, wrote in the Daily Mail that the reaction to the assassination of conservative activist Charlie Kirk highlights a growing intolerance in Western public life and raised concerns about campuses and the political culture that shaped them.
In the opinion piece published Saturday, Hirsi Ali recalled the 2004 killing of Dutch filmmaker Theo van Gogh — who was murdered after making a film critical of Islam's treatment of women — and said she had received death threats herself after renouncing Islam. She wrote that Kirk, who was shot while speaking at a Turning Point USA event on the Utah Valley University campus in Orem, Utah, was “executed for speaking what he believed.” Hirsi Ali described social-media responses and some commentary in mainstream media as celebratory or dismissive in the wake of the killing.
Hirsi Ali said she saw parallels between Islamist violence she has faced and what she termed a mirror of cruelty on the activist Left. She cited, and attributed to Kirk, polls and public statements that he used to warn of an "assassination culture" on parts of the Left. She also referenced recent online reactions to other killings and incidents, arguing the responses exposed a willingness in some quarters to celebrate violence against political opponents.
The column recounts Kirk’s campus work, saying he had built a presence on university campuses by debating students and promoting conservative positions. Hirsi Ali described him as "unapologetically pro-American, pro-Christian, pro-Israel, and pro–nuclear family" and said he had become a symbolic defender of what she called Western civilisation. She argued that this made him a target for hatred, and that the broader response to his death — including messages she said denigrated him as merely "controversial" — revealed a dangerous double standard.
Hirsi Ali named specific incidents and figures in her account, including a May debate at the Oxford Union between Kirk and George Abaraonye, whom she said reportedly posted a message on WhatsApp after the shooting. She wrote that vigils and tributes for Kirk were held internationally, while online celebrations, she said, demonstrated a fracturing of public norms about acceptable political conduct.
The column also criticised what Hirsi Ali described as a culture on some campuses that prioritises ideological conformity over free inquiry. She urged reform of higher‑education institutions, saying the struggle for the future of the West would be waged in classrooms where young people are formed and political views take shape.
Hirsi Ali’s piece frames her personal experience of threats and her collaboration with van Gogh — whom she said she worked with on the film Submission — as qualifying her to draw comparisons between Islamist‑motivated killings and the contemporary reaction to Kirk’s death. In the op‑ed she maintained that both forms of violence reject reasoned debate and aim to annihilate opponents rather than engage them.
The Daily Mail published Hirsi Ali’s commentary amid continuing national discussion about the shooting, which prompted vigils across several countries and renewed debate about political rhetoric, campus security and the role of social media in amplifying polarised responses. The opinion piece places responsibility for the tenor of public reaction on political movements and institutional actors, calling for a reclamation of universities as places of open inquiry.
The piece is an opinion column and reflects Hirsi Ali’s interpretation of events and responses. It attributes assertions about social‑media reactions, individual postings and the broader cultural trends to her perspective and to sources she cites in the column.
Public officials, university leaders and civil‑society groups have urged calm and condemned political violence since the shooting. Investigations and legal proceedings related to the suspect in the Utah attack were underway at the time of Hirsi Ali’s column; her essay says little of the specifics of the suspect beyond noting that details available then did not, in her view, alter the broader lesson she drew from the reactions.
Hirsi Ali concluded by calling for renewed attention to educational institutions and public discourse. She wrote that to honour those killed, including Kirk, society must restore spaces for robust debate and push back against what she described as a culture that normalises violence toward political opponents.
The column ran in the Daily Mail and has added to a flurry of commentary across the international press about political discourse, campus culture and the boundaries of acceptable public reaction to political violence.