The assassination of prominent American activist and Trump ally Charlie Kirk, 31, became a trending topic on social media all over the world, including on Chinese social media platforms Weibo, Douyin, Toutiao, and Zhihu.
Kirk was shot on September 10 while speaking at an event at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah. At the time of writing, a suspect was apprehended after a manhunt of two days (#特朗普称柯克枪击嫌疑人已被拘留#).
Using hashtags such as “Trump’s Political Ally Shot While Speaking” (#特朗普政治盟友演讲时遭枪击#), Chinese media outlets, online commentators, and regular netizens have been discussing Kirk’s death, with a focus on Kirk’s ideologies and the deeper issues in the United States that may have contributed to him being shot.
Although Charlie Kirk (查理·柯克) is not widely known among the mainstream Chinese audience, avid social media users are familiar with him. His past videos, with added Chinese subtitles, are popular on platforms like Bilibili, and his persona and viewpoints have sparked debate on sites like Zhihu.
Charlie Kirk is a highly visible figure on global social media for engaging in face-to-face debates with left-leaning students (or anyone who disagrees with him) on university campuses in the United States and even in the United Kingdom. These debates often became heated, as they touched on some of the most polarizing political issues.
Kirk defended his anti-abortion, pro-gun, pro-Trump, and anti-immigration stances and criticized transgender identities and same-sex marriage.
There are various discussions on Chinese social media related to his death.
1. No Sympathy: Linking Kirk’s Death to His Pro-Gun Advocacy
A central part of the discussions surrounding Kirk’s death on Chinese social media focuses on American gun laws and Kirk’s own views on gun control.
On Zhihu and Weibo, many commenters echoed a sentiment also seen on Western social media, noting the irony of Kirk being killed while advocating for gun rights. In 2018, Kirk tweeted about a mass shooter being shot, writing: “guns save lives” (#查理柯克宣扬枪支拯救生命#).
Kirk was discussing and defending his pro-gun stance in Utah at the moment he was shot.
With this in mind, as well as taking Kirk’s other conservative viewpoints into account, many Chinese netizens do not necessarily empathize, with some even creating light banter around his death.
One popular comment on Weibo said:
“This person once publicly stated that in order to uphold the Second Amendment, having some shootings occur each year is a price worth paying.”
Others claimed that Kirk “got what he wanted”:
“This guy really achieved the gun freedom he always talked about; this is what he supported, and he got what he wanted, serving as an example.”
This sentiment was quite prevalent on Chinese social media, where others also stressed that the very gun freedoms Kirk advocated for ultimately killed him, calling it the “gunshot of freedom” (“自由的枪声”).
Another commenter (元锡损) on Zhihu even described the killing of Kirk as a form of “art,” presuming that he was shot by someone who opposed gun ownership:
“Kirk was just a sophist. The person who hit him with a bullet in the throat was an artist. What makes this art is how the actions of both sides were the exact opposite of the ideas they each claimed to support, yet this very contradiction ironically proved each side’s point. Charlie claimed guns save lives, but he died. The other side believed guns should be banned, yet they shot and killed someone. Charlie’s death shows that having guns really can be used to fight for your interests. The killer’s act shows that only banning guns can actually protect people’s lives. And the fact that the shot hit his neck — whether or not it was by chance — is deeply symbolic: guns mute people.”
But some argue it all goes beyond a pro-gun stance, like the international news commentator Zhu Xi Er Ming (@逐汐而鸣), who also showed little empathy for Kirk:
“Many people in China keep saying Kirk was “pro-gun” and that’s why he got killed, which just shows how ignorant they are about America. In my view, Charlie Kirk’s greatest offense was that for over a decade he relentlessly pushed far-right MAGA extremism and conspiracy theories to American youth, deepening social division. Let me repeat: I don’t feel even a bit of sympathy over his death. There’s no need to fake sympathy just to perform cheap correctness.”
These kinds of reactions often appear on Chinese social media whenever political unrest or major incidents occur in the United States, with netizens expressing anti-American sentiments and criticizing America’s “so-called freedom” — especially since human rights are a sensitive topic in China–US relations.
Criticism of America’s gun laws is often part of such criticism, such as after the Orlando shooting or other major shootings. This, in part, has to do with how US and China are practically polar opposites on the issue of gun control and what it means for ‘freedom.’
As one Xiaohongshu blogger (@民间观察员张向强) wrote, before news of the suspect’s apprehension came out:
“It’s 2025, and a quarter of the 21st century has passed, and yet physically eliminating a person is still somehow an option in America. And because of privacy protections and no cameras, no security checks, the shooter hasn’t even been caught yet. If this were here, first of all, it likely wouldn’t have happened at all; and even if it did, the perpetrator would have been executed and cremated within a month.”
China has some of the world’s strictest gun control laws and the ban on civilian gun ownership – as well as extensive surveillance systems for public safety – is generally supported by the public.
2. Calls for Compassion and Condemnation of Violence
But reactions are mixed; not everyone is unsympathetic toward Kirk, nor do all commenters link his pro-gun stance to his death. Many voices also pushed back against claims that Kirk “got what he deserved.”
Yan Feng (严锋), a prominent commentator and Professor of Chinese Literature at Fudan University, called for a more compassionate response. He wrote:
“American right-wing influencer Charlie Kirk has been shot dead. Regardless of one’s viewpoint or what they have said, it is never a reason to kill someone while they are giving a speech, nor to rejoice in their death. This is the bottom line of human civilization.”
In other comments, he said he opposed private gun ownership, but also suggested he did not believe Kirk was shot due to his pro-gun stance, while also stressing that Kirk never supported the use of guns to kill people with opposing views.
Luo Yiming (@罗祎明医生), a medical doctor at Mount Sinai St. Luke’s, wrote:
“So what if he supported gun rights? That may seem unthinkable to many Chinese people, but in America, guns carry deep historical roots and symbolic meaning. I support banning high-powered semi-automatic rifles, but harboring such hatred for a conservative who supports gun rights is no different from the hatred spread by far-right extremists. On most issues, I support moderate Democrats and progressives, and that means there shouldn’t be double standards when it comes to opposing hate.”
There were also posts highlighting how Dean Withers, a left-wing influencer and long-time opponent of Charlie Kirk, reacted to the news of his death during a livestream — with shock and tears. That reaction also sparked discussions about how, even if you hold opposing views, you can still feel sorrow over someone being killed.
3. “More Charlies Will Stand Up”: American Dysfunction ad Division
Although the initial discussions over Kirk’s death on Chinese social media seem to remain a bit on the surface, focusing on gun control and going from questions of karma to compassion, there are also other discussions placing his assassination more into a context of American social and political polarization.
One of China’s most famous online political commentators, Hu Xijin (@胡锡进), argued that political assassination is an inherent, dark part of American modern history. He wrote a lengthy column on Kirk’s death, calling it “a crash of the software of American democracy” (“这是美国民主软件的一次死机”) and also saying:
“Political assassination has always been a shady side path in American politics: if you can’t win, can’t out-argue, and can’t beat your opponent, you just eliminate their physical existence. From Lincoln to McKinley, from the Kennedy brothers to Martin Luther King, and later Reagan and now Trump, they have all constantly faced the threat of a bullet.”
Well-known Chinese internet commentator Wanghu de Jianqiao (@王虎的舰桥) blamed American social governance for Kirk’s killing. He wrote:
“Although it is said that this young man, being part of the hard-core pro-gun clique, got ‘what he asked for’ by being killed by a gun, I’d like to repeat my stance, which I’ve said before: America’s problem never really was about guns. Even if you exclude shooting cases, the incidence of murders and other serious violent crimes in the US is still far ahead of the rest of the world, especially among industrialized nations. The number of people killed by other means than guns is ten, even nearly nine times more. What’s more, given the population distribution and natural environment of the United States, the problems and losses caused by a strict gun ban could actually be much greater. America’s real problem is actually about social governance. It’s a problem of how basic-level communities are organized, how the police is organized, how education is organized, how Wall Street is… But these real problems are all taboo topics; it is the invisible elephant in the room. So no matter how fiercely politicians and voters from both parties argue and fight, the focus of controversy can only fall back on this issue of ‘gun control.’”
Others agree with the notion that something is inherently amiss in American society, with some suggesting that the shooting shows the “unusually intense class struggle in the United States” (“凸显了美国阶级斗争的异常尖锐”).
Zhihu user Wenhou (文猴), who also runs a WeChat account focused on men’s self-improvement, blamed Kirk’s death on leftist policies and suggested that American feminism was complicit in the country’s “social decay.”
Hu Xijin, as well as other commenters, think that the Charlie Kirk shooting might be a turning point for what is yet to come. On Zhihu, some predict an ideological hardening that could push America closer to more political violence and societal fragmentation. Others think that it will weaken the radical left and unite the modern right-wing factions.
Some commentators are especially pessimistic about America’s future. One example is the active Weibo commentator, entrepreneur and public persona Xiang Ligang (@飞象网项立刚), who tied Kirk’s assassination to the recent shocking murder of Ukrainian refugee Iryna Zarutska while driving a train home in Charlotte, North Carolina.
Xiang wrote:
“I believe that one day the US will face major problems, and in the end this country will head toward division. A huge country like this — without a dominant ethnic group, without shared values, only believing in fists and force — when it can no longer project power outward and begins to shrink inward, they will surely start slaughtering each other within America. In fact, this has already started.”
Zhihu blogger ‘Patrick’ wrote:
“In recent years, the ideological conflict between left and right in Western societies has reached a boiling point (..) This ‘terrorist-style assassination’ allegedly led by far-left forces has placed Kirk on a pedestal, making him the first ‘saint’ of the modern right wing, on equal footing with Martin Luther King Jr. This not only strengthened the unity of the right but also exposed the weakness of the left: from verbal protests to acts of violence, the increasingly radical left is losing the support of the political center. Kirk’s death has once again widened the rift between the American left and right. (..) The right and conservatives will see a resurgence. Historically, the death of a figure has often accelerated political movements (..), and Kirk’s sacrifice will drive a revival of conservatism.”
One anonymous Weibo commenter wrote:
“Because of this one shot, more Charlies will stand up, more young people will wake up, regardless of what color.”
By Manya Koetse
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