Charlie Kirk: A Lesson in Ethics, Neutrality, and Freedom of Speech

Freedom of speech lies at the heart of democracy, but what happens when speaking your truth is met with violence and death? The tragic loss of Charlie Kirk has revealed a disturbing trend among mental health professionals who have abandoned their ethical obligation to neutrality, celebrating the death of a human being simply because they disagreed with his political views.

Drawing from our extensive experience as therapists in the prison system, where we worked with individuals who committed heinous crimes while maintaining professional neutrality, we examine the stark contrast between proper therapeutic ethics and the shocking behavior displayed by self-proclaimed mental health professionals on social media platforms following Kirk's death. When therapists can sit with violent criminals without judgment but cannot extend the same courtesy to someone with different political beliefs, we must question what's happening to our profession.

Charlie Kirk began his career at just 19 years old, standing before thousands to debate ideas and encourage critical thinking. Whether you agreed with his message or not, his ability to articulate his views without inciting violence demonstrated his commitment to peaceful discourse. In an era where reasoned debate often gives way to personal attacks, Kirk's approach to discussion—focused on ideas rather than individuals—offers an important lesson for all of us, regardless of political affiliation.

This episode isn't about red or blue politics—it's about respecting human dignity, upholding freedom of speech, and maintaining professional ethics in an increasingly pola

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Chapters

• 0:00 Episode Disclaimer and Purpose
• 2:14 Neutrality in Mental Health Practice
• 4:40 Prison Therapy and Extreme Neutrality
• 8:20 Therapist Ethics and Political Neutrality
• 16:11 Charlie Kirk's Critical Thinking Legacy
• 21:09 Truth-Telling and Trauma Support

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:02

Those who make peaceful revolution impossible will make violent revolution inevitable. A quote by John F Kennedy. This is a special episode about what's been happening around the Charlie Kirk story. We are your deep-throating informants, dr Tara Lynn and therapist Jen, and this is the Gaslit Truth Podcast.

Speaker 2: 0:22

Before we start this episode, we're going to just throw a disclaimer out here. Okay, the point of this episode is not for Terry and I to sit here and talk about our opinions on Charlie Kirk. This isn't a red or blue issue. This is not a liberal or conservative issue. Okay, this is an issue, more so surrounding the comments that are being made about the death of someone who is a human and some of the really gross, disgusting things that are coming from our own profession as therapists and mental health professionals.

Speaker 2: 1:00

So we are going to talk about that today. So we are going to talk about that today. This episode is to honor a human and not to have a ridiculous amount of judgment within this.

Speaker 1: 1:26

For me, I have to say, it's also to honor freedom of speech, and without freedom of speech, the Gaslit Truth podcast would fail to exist. And so, yeah, so that's that's what really hit me home. Hit home for me with this whole Charlie Kirk thing. Um is freedom of speech and how one person because he's not the only person in history that has spoke up and um been eliminated by speaking up or attempted to be eliminated by speaking up Um, and so I just that's. What really hit me is that when we speak up, we do put ourselves in harm's way, and Jen and I have done that. This podcast does that for us. Every time we release an episode, I've gotten death threats. I've gotten people saying I want to kill you right now on social media and I laugh it off and I do these things and I'm like, damn, maybe you know, maybe I shouldn't be, you know, laughing that off as much. Right, right, right.

Speaker 2: 2:18

Yeah, so we're going to talk about some of these things surrounding Charlie's death, but the point of this is to just know that. So this is the disclaimer that's going out there. Guys, this is about having some neutrality within some of this, which let's jump into that. That's the point of what mental health professionals are supposed to be doing, and I was telling Terry before we started here. I was going back and forth on whether or not we should throw this episode out there and do this, and what solidified this for me of really wanting to do that? It was about two hours ago. I spent time going down the TikTok rabbit hole. Oh man.

Speaker 2: 2:58

Typing in the words Charlie Kirk, and then a little plus sign, and then therapist. Therapist plus sign and then therapist. And I could not believe how cruel people are, whose job it is, in their everyday life and in their world, to be neutral. Now, terry and I were talking about this because, for those of you who have listened to us long enough, maybe you don't know this about us, but we were therapists in the prison system. We worked throughout the mental health prison systems in the state that we live in here. So our job was to work with the worst misfits of society and I'm air quoting this Violent criminals heinous acts against other people Most psychopathic individuals which, interesting enough, Terry and I were trained in that specific population.

Speaker 2: 3:44

Shocker, Right, Okay, that's what we worked with. The most psychopathic individuals which, interesting enough, Terry and I were trained in that specific population. Shocker, Right, Okay, that's what we worked with. The most psychopathic, antisocial personality, disordered evil. Put all of the words on it judgment words, whatever you want, DSM words, I don't fucking care. On these people. This is what we did and our job was to know their entire life story, know every little detail about the harm they've caused as some of you may believe Charlie has caused right and to be able to sit with them and be neutral without judgment.

Speaker 1: 4:14

Now I do want to say I don't believe Charlie Kirk has ever acted in violence towards someone. That's the difference is words versus violent acts. Here you are not going to get thrown in prison because you said a word.

Speaker 2: 4:26

No, right, that's why he wasn't thrown in prison. That's why he wasn't thrown in prison. Yes, right, yes, exactly yes. So the people took lives, but the one thing.

Speaker 1: 4:34

Yeah, the one thing that Jen and I were maybe to our detriment trained to do was put the inmates as people first all the time. Humanity comes first, and even sometimes that went against ethical beliefs of my own. So when I remember one time we were talking about trauma treatment and when the trauma that you're treating the person for is the actual crime, the violent act that created trauma for the perpetrator, wrap your mind around that. And we had to do that, and so that meant we had to sit in the space of non-judgment all the time. So when I see these therapists and I'm going to generalize, they seem kind of young, most of them seem relatively youthful. I think you have never really practiced in an environment that you have to be non-judgmental, in, that you have to sit in neutrality, like we did, and maybe all therapists need to do that, you know, because that is I.

Speaker 1: 5:50

I, I talk about that in our training as being extreme, but but it's, it was. I talk about it in terms of being extreme in the mental health space, but it was actually really extreme in the learning how to be neutral space, but it was actually really extreme in the learning how to be neutral space.

Speaker 2: 6:05

So here you are, right, trying to. You know you're on social media looking at this. Okay, for me this morning it was TikTok, yesterday was YouTube. Okay, and going through all of this and the inability for a mental health professional to sit in a neutral space to view a human life as a human life, okay, um, and some people are going to argue this and go into well, now we're going into morality and your brain. Okay, fine, okay, fine, all right, um, you know, charlie, charlie Kirk put a lot of videos out there about argumentation around morality, um, and he would. He would talk about comparing abortion to Auschwitz and loss of life and what he would neutralize this into. Truly was life, truly a human life. And I think that the inability for people who are I mean, we are the trained professionals in this right, like, talk about the most ridiculous amounts of training in one area, really truly goes into ethics and into guess what? If you have an opinion, it doesn't fucking matter, right? You check that shit at the door.

Speaker 1: 7:25

Right when you're operating as a therapist as a therapist Right when you're operating as a therapist as a therapist.

Speaker 1: 7:28

Right, and I'm going to make the argument that if you're on social media and you've got your credentials next to your name, you've got therapists in front of your name, or counselor behind your name, or social worker somewhere you are operating as a therapist or a social worker. You can't now suddenly say, but I'm not, this is my personal social media, it's not your personal social media, when you've got your credentials attached to it. So in those spaces you are operating. In this space that's supposed to be neutral and they do that with politics too. The whole argument about therapy is political. Well, yes, I mean, on some levels it is. The DSM is fucking political, diagnosing is political. But when we say that it's not about the political party you choose and that has been conflated into that, that you must only vote on certain political lines or you're operating as an unethical therapist I just did a whole video on this on because I felt like the time was right, because that is completely actually that's unethical.

Speaker 1: 8:34

When you coerce or push someone into, uh, a political party as and when you're operating as a therapist or social worker, that is actually unethical practice. So you're supposed to remain neutral in the therapy room, right, like in the context of being a therapist. It's clear the ACA and the APA say those things. So this is so fascinating to me that so many I'm going to call some of them self-professed therapists. I don't know if they really are or not. Who knows right.

Speaker 2: 9:02

People ask me all the time what's your credentials? I go, I don't know Go look it up Right, exactly, exactly.

Speaker 1: 9:10

I don't know I don't have to answer to you, but yes, like some of them may not be Right who the hell cares Like I don't know who cares.

Speaker 1: 9:16

Who cares? I would hope that therapists are on there celebrating freedom of speech, like celebrating that idea that somebody can come forth and say what they're saying in a nonviolent way. He never incited violence. He never did. If your interpretation was to meet him with violence, that's on you. He did not incite violence in any way. Your thoughts and beliefs don't incite violence, right that's a great distinction.

Speaker 2: 9:45

I think that is a very significant distinction, because even when you Wikipedia Charlie Kirk, there's a couple words in there, the way it's written, and that mighticed, and actually, though, it's a very slippery slope with semantics here, and I think that that leads to opinion, that leads to judgment. Okay, so what is so difficult about viewing a human life as a human life and bringing neutrality into this, and especially from someone who's a mental health professional? I don't know why is that difficult? What is this? What is this? And I don't want people to believe that you need to lose yourself and use your beliefs within the context of your career because you don't how I operate right here on the Gaslit Truth podcast. I'm going to operate a little different in the therapy room, because there's a ton of opinion that comes out here, and any of my clients know that it's painstaking to do psychotherapy with me because they ask me what's your opinion? I look at them and I go well, what's your opinion?

Speaker 2: 10:59

And I do the whole question with the question, because my truth is not your truth and I'm not going to bring my judgment be no, it doesn't have to be Um you know, and so I think that there's, there's, it's like what is so difficult about this and what is it that strikes people who are supposedly experts in the ability to remain in a neutral space? What strikes you to be I will use the word cruel uh, in your comments and in your videos that you put out when a loss of life happened with someone who, clearly, you probably don't agree with some of their opinions.

Speaker 1: 12:05

Well, what strikes you to tell other people that they're unethical if they believe that person or if they support that person? What strikes you to do that? You shouldn't be doing that either, because I think about things like religion. Do you know how many-.

Speaker 2: 12:22

Huge platform.

Speaker 1: 12:23

Charlie stood on oh yes, but I think about Jen and I too, working in the prison. How many religions were there?

Speaker 2: 12:32

There were 16 religious diets, so there's probably at least 100 religions.

Speaker 1: 12:37

What was the weirdest religion or the most I don't know controversial religion that you came across? Do you recall?

Speaker 2: 12:46

Probably the Wiccans Right, and they weren't allowed to practice. Like you know, it's not like we can have a sweat lodge but the Wiccans couldn't go, and I don't know the verbiage, I can't, you know. You know it's not like we can have a sweat lodge but the Wiccans couldn't, couldn't go, and I don't know the verbiage can't you know not the next word and I remember couldn't go and do fill in the blank, Um, but probably that, for me at least, what I for you personally, right?

Speaker 1: 13:08

Maybe not. If you were, you know of that religious belief, right? So so the idea that even let's say you're a staunch Catholic and you come across somebody that practices that religious belief in the prison or in your own practice, are you allowed to be like you're wrong, unless you say in your bio and all this stuff that I am a Catholic and my beliefs are of Catholicism or whatever it is. You know, unless you identify yourself that upfront, so people know um, or I'm, you know, I vote on this party line or that party line. If you want to make that part of your therapeutic intervention, I think I don't know. I think we're conflating, like my personal beliefs are now part of a therapeutic intervention. To me it's weird. Why does that even matter in the therapy room? It shouldn't matter.

Speaker 2: 14:06

Well, and I also think something that Charlie did very well is that he was very transparent and very honest, like I, don't. I don't think this man stood on a platform of things.

Speaker 1: 14:21

Yeah. I think he didn't believe in um and also, I have to say, though, I want to interview in here for a second, because that would make it really difficult if he ever did change his mind, by the way, right.

Speaker 2: 14:33

And he'd have to explain. He'd have to explain it, he'd have to justify it. Um, and I just I think that he was very passionate about what he stood for and it wasn't lies to him, it wasn't a bunch of bullshit coming out of his mouth how important it is for certain things. We need to be transparent if we know that we can't hold ourselves in a neutral space. If you can't do that, then you need to be honest about that.

Speaker 1: 15:08

That's actually a conversation which goes back to the ethics that we did Honest to yourself and your clinical supervisor, not to the client. You don't take clients.

Speaker 2: 15:16

On that you can't be neutral with. Okay, I got to a point in my career where, when I was in the women's system, one of the harder spaces I had was working with some of the clients whose women exploited their own children. They would traffic there and sell their own children. They would exploit their children in ways that I had a really hard time with, and so that was a level of transparency I could have, especially a couple times with those inmates, when I would see them, I would tell them I'm not going to be the clinician for you, I'm having a hard time with this, and I will tell you that, and they'd get reassigned. It's no different in private practice. We take on clients and if there is a limitation and we can't hold ourselves to it and we cannot be neutral, you step away. There's a level of transparent honesty that you have to have Charlie brought that he could bring, that he was not standing up there bullshitting himself Right no, or bullshitting other people.

Speaker 1: 16:17

You knew exactly where he stood. Yep, and he was only 31 years old and, by the way, I just have to roll back time he started when he was 19,. Doing this at 19 years old, we sit here behind a camera with a microphone. We don't sit in front of thousands of people sharing our truth or our version of the truth and debating people on it. We really don't. As a matter of fact, when we bring in people, there's really not much debate there. Right, and I'm probably not a great debater.

Speaker 1: 16:52

Dude was a great debater. He could debate and think critically, and I think in that debate he was helping other people to think critically as well, and that was the thing that I do admire the most with his presentation. It wasn't about his message. It was about how he gave his message right. You don't have to agree with him to take a step back and go. He knew how to debate and he knew how to talk and he knew how to think critically and he knew how to get other people to think. The problem is is the other people when they were thinking. They would get so mad that they couldn't articulate a response back.

Speaker 2: 17:33

Well, yeah, all people, not all of them their whole limbic system went nuts, the prefrontal cortex shut down, they went into fight or flight and higher order thinking went to shit and you were like, and he'd say he would say that and that was such a beautiful thing that he could do. The beauty of what he could do is what I think we try to channel on this show. Is we, because there's people that listen to this that do not agree, there's people that listen to this that do not agree, or they, it's like, give us the opportunity to listen, cause we're going to bring a side to this, whether it's whether it's based in science, whether it's subjective, everything in between, to get you to pause for a hot second, to put you in fight or flight, to shut your fucking prefrontal cortex down, that's probably been damaged by psych meds anyways, right, like mine is, and you stop and you go wait a minute.

Speaker 2: 18:30

What if that's true? What if eugenics is real? What if, like, just for a hot second? And that's what he had the ability to do, and I think that that's really important because it pauses people long enough to slow down once your brain starts working again to get your critical thinking back and go okay, wait a minute. This isn't maybe so much a red or a blue issue or so much of which party you affiliate with, or if you are a Christian or an atheist, if you are a liberal or a conservative. You just said something that's intriguing that maybe I need to pause and think about. That's what we do here. It's exactly what we do here on the show.

Speaker 1: 19:10

Well, and the reason we do it in part, is because our clients and listeners and even ourselves, have been shut down so many times in a doctor's office, in a therapy office, with just singular thinking right. And so, people, you're dangerous, your words are dangerous. Not having these words is dangerous, which is how we got here. People weren't getting the right words, they weren't given informed consent and so they were just accepting things as the full truth because there was not never another side presented. And to me, that's the most dangerous part. It's not sharing what I call alternative truth, but it's not alternative, it's just a truth that you don't know. It's a truth that you don't know, you don't understand, you've not lived it. But we can't shut that stuff down, because this is how we are in the crisis that we're in now with mental health care Because clinicians have shut down alternatives. They've shut down other sides. They've shut down informed consent. It doesn't matter. In lieu of manipulation, in lieu of coercion, right, when you fucking tell somebody that taking a psych med is just like a type one diabetic taking insulin, you are lying, you're coercing, you're not giving informed consent. This is what this is about is sharing actual truth, the truth that I see right, and my truth is important. It doesn't have to be the truth, it is just a truth. It's truth for me and it's truth for many others. And I feel like that's what Charlie Kirk was doing. He was sharing his truth. He was not inciting violence. People met him with violence because of that whole limbic system thing. Right, like when you are so dysregulated you know, this happens to me too Instead of people debating me, I'll be like open debate on my stuff, like let's hear it, let's hash it out in the comments.

Speaker 1: 21:10

I'll say hash it out in the comments. You're a stupid fucker. That's not what I mean. You know you need to die. That's not what I'm talking about. You know, like, give me something else. And the problem is is that they can't. You know, that's the thing. They can't give me something else. And I think that's because critical thinking is a lost art, and Charlie Kirk was one to try to bring that back, and I think he did it pretty well. To be honest, like his message or not, the message really is let's start critically thinking again, folks, and let's start exercising our rights to freedom of speech. And so, in his death, that's what I want to take from this. Is that it kind of gives me a little bit more power to be like all right, we just got to keep talking, keep talking until you're sick of us and Keep listening until you're sick of us. But if you want to debate us, bring the debate. Don't bring the insults and don't bring the violence. Bring the debate.

Speaker 2: 22:09

Right. Can you do it without judgment? Can you do it without using things that are just non-factual right, Like an opinion, sheer opinion?

Speaker 1: 22:20

Disparaging us. What are your credentials? How do you know? You know it doesn't matter. I could be an MD, a PhD, an LPC, an MS, a BA, and it still wouldn't be enough for you. So, instead of disparaging the person, how about you listen to the message and ask a question, or tell your belief or your side? But I feel like you don't have a side when you can't articulate it without disparaging the messenger. So if you want a side, then create a side, but your side is not a side of disparagement. So, anyway, that's it.

Speaker 2: 22:53

I think that's it, and from both of us, to not only the family of Charlie and the friends of him, but to everyone that saw this tragedy occur, this heartfelt extension of our arms, our hearts, our arms, our hearts and please I see I've been seeing people who are at the event, who witnessed what happened firsthand, and they're sobbing and they're crying.

Speaker 1: 23:26

If that is you or you know someone that was there, please get trauma treatment ASAP. This does not need to stick with you for a lifetime. So take care of yourself. If you witnessed that act Even witnessed it on social media it was horrific. I saw the video and I had to stop. So, yes, so please take care of each other, take care of yourselves and use your freedom of speech for good.