Reflecting on Charlie Kirk's Death, Purple Politics & the Lost Art of Listening

I didn’t expect to find myself agreeing with Charlie Kirk. In fact, until this past summer,

I didn’t even know who he was. But somewhere between debates about Epstein, Israel, and the kind of country we want to live in, I started listening.

Charlie Kirk's Impact on "the other siide"

And listening changed me.

Purple has always been the color of blending. Red and blue — opposites on the spectrum — becoming something new. We talk about red states and blue states, but the only way forward is purple. Not because it’s easier, but because it’s the only color that lets us share the same canvas.

I had just launched Spicy Living when all of this hit. Years of dreaming and writing finally made real. I was excited. I had content ready to publish, ideas pouring out of me. Then I got buried in the messy middle of SEO and schema code, the behind-the-scenes work that feels endless. And in the middle of that exhaustion, Charlie Kirk was murdered.

It happened just days before my fifty-ninth birthday, when I was already reflecting on how different life looks compared to what I thought my fifties would be. His death jolted me. It cracked something open.

Back in June, when Elon Musk accused Trump of hiding the Epstein files because he was in them, it dragged the case back into the light for me. I hadn’t thought about it in a while, but suddenly I was reading, watching, listening. That’s when I first stumbled into Charlie Kirk’s voice.

I didn’t know him. But I listened.

And what I heard surprised me.

He was furious about the cover-up. So was I. He asked why the largest trafficking ring in recent history was being brushed aside. I was asking the same question. For the first time, I realized I was standing on common ground with someone I never expected to.

That doorway opened to other voices — even Tucker Carlson, someone I had dismissed outright in the past. And though I didn’t agree with everything he said, I found points of overlap, questions worth considering, and places where I had to admit I might have been too quick to shut the door.

But it was Charlie who stayed with me.

He was younger than my own children, yet he was showing up on campuses, standing in front of people who disagreed with him, and debating ideas instead of throwing insults. He was willing to do what so few seem able to anymore — argue without dehumanizing. Challenge without annihilating. That struck me. Because isn’t that what politics is supposed to be?

I didn’t agree with all his views. Some made me cringe. Some may have evolved. Others may not have. But what I saw was a young man making it cool to choose differently. To go to church. To be a good husband. To be a present father. To live with conviction instead of indulgence.

And when he was killed, I watched the internet celebrate. Comment after comment: “Good, one less.” “He deserved it.” “Another one down.”

It sickened me.

Because whether you loved him or hated him, you probably only heard a soundbite. Maybe the worst thing he ever said, stripped of context. Or maybe it was something awful he truly believed. But either way, it wasn’t the whole story. None of us are the whole story.

That’s the part that matters.

If we are ever going to come back together as a country, we cannot keep talking to only fifty percent of people. I believe there are people on the left who feel lost, like I do. And I believe there are people on the right who feel lost, too.

The only way forward is purple.

Purple means listening. Purple means respecting perspectives that aren’t our own. Purple means remembering that debate is not the enemy — silence is.

I don’t have military experience. I get nervous when I hear planes flying overhead here in Puerto Rico. I worry about climate change and reefs dying. I worry about children in Gaza. I worry about neighbors both here and in the States. I worry because I care.

And I want us to remember what it feels like to belong to each other again.

Maybe that means returning to the old dinner table rules: no talk of sex, politics, or religion if it keeps the peace. But at the very least, we need to stop celebrating each other’s destruction.

Because respect is the only path forward.

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