Fear as a Tool of Control

I think we all heard the news of the assassination of Charlie Kirk.

As a young political science student, when my professors asked me to write papers, I tried to push myself across the spectrum from the left to the right. Political commentators became my study material. They helped me understand the lenses people use to interpret policies, politics, and even law.

Listening to commentators like Kirk offered me a window into what shaped people’s convictions. It’s still too early to say what the motive behind the shooting was. But one thing is certain: deciding someone is not worthy of life because you disagree with their views is abhorrent. It betrays not only the inability to deal with adversity but also a dangerously childish worldview. A worldview that assumes life should never offend you.

When I first heard the news, shock gave way to something bizarre: fear. Why was I afraid? I wasn’t there. I wasn’t involved. And yet, the thought that someone who made a career out of speaking sometimes on college campuses (which are supposed to be safe), sometimes in hostile environments could be killed for it made me uneasy. The idea that words alone could be a death sentence is unnerving.

This is not just about one man, or one incident. It’s about how fear is used as a weapon.

In George Orwell’s 1984, fear is the very foundation of totalitarian control. The Party doesn’t just punish dissent, it conditions people to fear even the thought of dissent. The Thought Police make sure that rebellion dies not in action, but in imagination.

A “thoughtcrime” isn’t about what you do, but what you dare to think. It may sound extreme. But think about it: when violence is used against speech, the message is the same, don’t even think about saying something that could offend the wrong person. Fear seeps in. Self-censorship follows behind. Debate shrinks. And what remains is not freedom, but silence.

That’s why what happened horrifies me. Because it wasn’t just an attack on an individual; it was an assault on the very idea of dialogue itself. When disagreement turns violent, the pursuit for truth collapses, because fear takes its place. Regardless of whether or not we agreed with Kirk’s politics, we should all be asking ourselves: what kind of society are we creating if the price of disagreement is death?

Fear may control the masses, but only if we let it. The harder path, or what I like to call the braver path is to deny fear’s control on dictating which conversations we can have, which people we can listen to, or which ideas are allowed to exist.