Arielle Scarcella Confronts Pratt Institute Art Students Who Cheered Charlie Kirk's Murder Over Free Speech
Enjoying this? Share it with someone who needs to see it.
Up Next
Cam Higby Presses a College Student Who Isn't Sad Charlie Kirk Was Killed Over ICE
6:41
Matthew Marsden and Sara Gonzales on Media Rhetoric, Political Violence, and the War on Free Speech
14:33
Brandon Tatum Condemns Montel Williams and Media Response to Charlie Kirk's Murder by Left-Wing Radical
8:08
Arielle Scarcella Confronts Pratt Institute Art Students Who Cheered Charlie Kirk's Murder Over Free Speech
Arielle and Savannah take their cameras to Pratt Institute, an art school in Brooklyn, to ask students what they actually think about Charlie Kirk's assassination and the wave of celebration that followed it online. What starts with one student saying she's glad Kirk died unfolds into a wider conversation about selective empathy, fear of speaking openly on a supposedly free-speech-friendly campus, and comparisons between America and authoritarian regimes some students grew up under. Arielle pushes back hard on the idea that violence is an acceptable response to disagreement, eventually getting a student who opened the interview celebrating Kirk's death to admit she wouldn't want the same thing to happen to Arielle. It's an unfiltered, sometimes uncomfortable look at how young people are processing political violence, free expression, and where they personally draw the line between hate speech and dissent.
Arielle and Savannah went to Pratt Institute, an Ivy League-caliber art school in Brooklyn, New York, to find out what students there actually think about Charlie Kirk's assassination and the broader culture war surrounding political violence. The goal, as Arielle put it, was to see whether students on one of the country's most supposedly free-expression-friendly campuses were being indoctrinated, and to hear directly what they had to say.
'I'm Glad That He Died'
The first student interviewed didn't hold back. Asked what she thought about people celebrating Kirk's death, she said she was glad he died, explaining that she felt he didn't care about people like her. She argued that right-leaning people in debates often refuse to meet others halfway and only accept their own way of thinking. She went on to say that queer people and people of color are killed regularly without making the news, and suggested Kirk was, in her view, indirectly supporting policies she believed were harmful. When Arielle pressed her on specific claims, including that the president was trying to bring back segregation, the student admitted she wasn't sure where she'd heard that, only that it seemed obvious to her.
Selective Empathy and Who Counts as Human
Several students expressed some version of the same idea: that Kirk's death was unfortunate but not something they felt compelled to condemn strongly, because they didn't personally know him or agree with his views. One student pushed back on that logic directly, asking why empathy should depend on personal familiarity or agreement. Everybody should feel offended by an assassination like this, the student argued, because if it's acceptable to kill Kirk over his words, the same logic applies to anyone else who speaks their mind, including the people being interviewed.
Fear on a Supposedly Free Campus
A recurring theme emerged: students, including international students, said they no longer feel comfortable speaking freely, engaging online, or even expressing opinions in class, partly out of fear of social backlash and, for some international students, concern over their visa status. One student originally from China said she came to the United States in part because she felt safer expressing herself here than she would at home, where criticizing the government isn't allowed. Another student who said they grew up in a country where people could only speak their minds quietly at home, comparing the atmosphere to living under authoritarian rule, said watching Kirk's public assassination made that fear feel newly real in America.
Comparing Rhetoric to History
Some students drew comparisons between the current political climate and historical authoritarianism, suggesting that a mindset of refusing to tolerate disagreement was creeping into American political culture. Others pushed back, suggesting that a comfortable, privileged country sometimes manufactures a sense of victimhood where none exists. The conversation circled back repeatedly to the same question: whether freedom of expression still functions in practice, even on a campus built around it.
Where Is the Line?
Much of the conversation turned to defining the boundary between free speech, hate speech, and incitement to violence. One student argued that Kirk had, in her view, promoted rhetoric around gun rights that ultimately circled back on him, since his accused killer reportedly had connections to the communities Kirk sometimes criticized. Others argued that laws need clear definitions, and that if offense alone were enough to justify violence, that standard could be stretched to justify almost anything. Students disagreed over whether being a Christian who doesn't personally support LGBTQ lifestyles is the same as hating gay people, with one arguing that disagreement with someone's choices doesn't require dehumanizing them as a person.
'Why Him?'
Multiple students noted the strangeness of singling out Kirk when, in their words, everyone expresses opinions online. One woman who said she had personally known Kirk, having met him about a month before he was killed, pushed back on the narrative that he hated women or minorities. She said his consistent message to her had been to pursue her goals, stay loyal, and build a life centered on faith and family, and that someone deciding it was acceptable to kill him over his words was, in her view, indefensible. Another student offered a blunt theory for the double standard: Kirk was making enough of an impact that people were afraid of it.
A Confrontation and a Shift
Arielle circled back to the student who opened the interview by saying she was glad Kirk died, asking her directly whether she could say the same thing to Arielle's face, since Arielle said she agreed with roughly 99 percent of what Kirk believed. The student said she would not be glad if that happened to Arielle, and ultimately agreed that murdering someone over disagreement is wrong regardless of who the target is or what they believe, including if the victim were gay or transgender. Arielle argued the goal of these interviews isn't to score points but to force people to see each other as human again, noting that the shift from casually celebrating a stranger's death to reconsidering that position took only a few minutes once a face and a name were attached to the question.
Not Just a New York Problem
Closing out the video, Arielle reflected that the views expressed weren't unique to a Brooklyn art school. The same mindset, she said, exists among neighbors and even fellow churchgoers across the country, which is part of why she said she now travels to left-leaning campuses with a hired security guard, something she said she wouldn't feel necessary at a conservative gathering. Despite the tension throughout the conversation, Arielle said she came away encouraged that not every student they spoke with agreed political violence was acceptable, even as she said it was genuinely unsettling how many did.
