When the news broke that conservative activist Charlie Kirk had been assassinated in Utah, the reactions were swift, the headlines were grim and the vigils began. And then, on Bluesky, the plucky X alternative once billed as a gentler, saner home for free expression, the celebrations started.
Yes, celebrations. Murder memes. Snarky quips. Open glee that a man, with two children and a wife left behind, was dead. The alleged shooter was Tyler Robinson, a 29-year-old who appears to have inscribed bullet casings with anti-fascist messages. Before this became known, the more immediate story was what happened in the digital public square after the shots were fired: a feeding frenzy of schadenfreude, performed in plain sight.
