I have already written about how I feel about the role of violence in the society, and that it is not the solution to any problem and does not have any place in a civilized and democratic society. And by “violence,” here I really mean any kind of violence, be it political, ideological, or even in the name of law enforcement. I know this probably sounds too idealistic or futuristic, but most criminal activities, be it violent or otherwise, are likely mental health issues that need to be treated not punished. The same way that punishing a cancer patient for having cancer, and hence possibly causing financial burden to the society for the costly treatments of their serious illness, sounds outrageous, violently punishing someone for a crime just for the sake of punishing them, without investigating the root causes of their criminal behavior and taking meaningful actions to address them in the society, is both inefficient and ethically unbecoming of a true civilized society. In many cases, those root causes may be poverty, childhood abuse, other traumatic experiences, or, of course, in some cases, serious mental illnesses without any apparent cause. But even that last category of individuals belong in a medical facility for treatment, and preferably identified before committing any crime, rather than spending time in a prison cell that does not really help with effectively addressing the issue at the larger scale of the entire society. I understand the deterrent effect of the punishments imposed by the legal systems, but I consider it a shortcut or a workaround, and not a real solution.

I can take it even one step further and say that, in my opinion, there should not be any place for violence between or among civilized societies either. There is absolutely no justification for one nation using aggression and violence towards another, be it in the name of nationalism to claim lands that historically belonged to their ancestors, or in the name of religion to claim lands that, according to their believes, God has promised to them and no one else, or for any other self-serving or grandiose reason. If the leader of a supposedly democratic and civilized society feels very strongly along the lines of the above arguments to invade or otherwise exert violence towards another nation for some fantastically holy cause they believe in, I think such societies should require those leaders to personally participate on the front lines of the combats, to demonstrate their devotion to the cause they (pretend to) believe in. Sending innocent soldier to pointless wars while sitting back at one’s warm shelter, and claiming that to be a noble war, is the most cowardice act one can do, and certainly unbecoming of a leader of a democratic nation.

But I digress, as usual. The point I wanted to make here was not about international order or world peace. Quite frankly, I have lost hope on anything meaningful happening anytime soon on that front. What I wanted to highlight here is this important point that condemning a violent act does not necessarily mean or require condoning the actions or speech of the victim of that violent act. One can disagree with everything another person says or does, and still not wish any physical harm or violence towards them. No one deserves to be killed for what they say, but just because someone was assassinated does not make them a saint or a hero, or their speech holy and unquestionable. There is no contradiction between condemning one’s murder and at the same time criticizing their opinions, speech, or actions. But somehow, for a certain party or group of people in our society, the wrongful and unjustifiable killing of a social media influencer or political activist has become the “turning point;” an incident that, without any real evidence yet provided by the investigators, they use to claim to must have been carried out, or at least, caused, by their political opponents, and as an opportunity to score political points. Even worse, the administration is not missing any opportunity for taking advantage of this incident for advancing its authoritarian agenda of silencing anyone who dares to criticize it, in the name of respect for that individual’s ideas or speech; extending to the ridiculous point where simply quoting, and by that I really mean quoting precisely how it was said, of some statements from the victim of that violent act, is considered a hostile act. (I know this sounds too outlandish, but there are indeed websites that track what they perceive as negative or celebratory comments about the incident, and they include instances of someone directly quoting the victim himself. And then we have the Vice President and the Attorney General of the United States who either ask their supporters to report such cases to the employers and encourage them to fire their employees for making such comments, or even worse, claim that the employers have an obligation for firing such individuals.)

It’s perfectly fine for the elected officials or political appointees to have respect for certain type of speech or ideology. But threatening others, using the powers they have in their official capacity, with retaliation if they don’t respect that speech, is undemocratic and outright authoritarian. Aside from the outrageous comments of the attorney general about the difference between “free speech” and “hate speech” and how one is protected and the other is not (while the same party has spent years advocating for the freedom of hate speech, and calling social media moderation and policies against hate speech a form of censorship), the recent abhorrent and mobster-like comments of the FCC commissioner represent a new low in the coordinated efforts of the administration to silence any criticism. The comments were in response to Jimmy Kimmel’s comments during his opening monologue on Monday, when he addressed the killing of Charlie Kirk by saying:

“We hit some new lows over the weekend with the MAGA gang desperately trying to characterize this kid who murdered Charlie Kirk as anything other than one of them, and doing everything they can to score political points from it.”

You don’t have to agree with Jimmy Kimmel’s political leanings to acknowledge that using a brutal murder, by someone whose motives are yet to be determined by the investigators, to score political points is a low point for a democratic society. Although one might argue that “one of them” may not have been the best choice of words to describe the identity of that individual, in all honesty, and based on what is known at this point, the killer seems to have been raised in a very right leaning and Trump supporting family. In fact, his own grandmother has been quoted to say that she does not know anyone in the family who is not a Republican. But that’s beside the point. For someone who was introduced as a “warrior for Free Speech” when was named the commissioner of the FCC back in January, saying the following (quoted from a New York Times article) is not just hypocritical, it is mobster-like threatening:

In the podcast interview on Wednesday, Mr. Carr described Mr. Kimmel’s remarks as part of a “concerted effort to lie to the American people” about the beliefs of Mr. Kirk’s killer. He said the F.C.C. was “going to have remedies that we can look at.”

“Frankly, when you see stuff like this — I mean, we can do this the easy way or the hard way,” Mr. Carr told the podcast’s host, Benny Johnson. “These companies can find ways to change conduct and take action, frankly, on Kimmel, or there’s going to be additional work for the F.C.C. ahead.”

Call me naive or ignorant, but being a telecommunications engineer, I was always under the impression that the FCC was mainly in the business of regulating airwaves and frequencies or frequency bands, and establishing limits on the amount of electromagnetic radiations from the telecommunications devices, etc; things that seemed to be some of the least political areas under the control of any administration. But Mr. Carr has taken the weaponization of the leavers under the control the current administration to new levels, and so far, seemed to have been more interested in acting as an enforcer of the President’s personal agenda, especially in using the powers that he has in his official capacity as the FCC commissioner for issuing licenses to broadcasters, to help the president win or settle his personal lawsuits against the media companies. While those thinly veiled pressures or threats from the FCC commissioner against the media companies seemed to have already been disgusting enough, Mr. Carr appears to now envision himself as the “Content Moderator In Chief,” a typically unofficial and behind-the-scenes post in authoritarian regimes. Below is from the same New York Times article:

While the F.C.C. cannot directly ban a news network for its content, Mr. Carr has argued that he can withhold licenses that aren’t being used in the public’s interest.

The public interest standard can be broadly defined and many telecom experts say that more than any other F.C.C. chair, Mr. Carr has used his position to crack down on speech he finds offensive.

If you were raised or have ever lived in a country with an authoritarian regime, the above is likely to sound very familiar to you. You don’t need to be a noble prize winning genius to appreciate that using vague standards such as “public interest,” whose definition is apparently under the sole discretion of the FCC commissioner, to withhold licenses or ban news networks for their content, is a very effective authoritarian tactic to silence the opponents and criticism.

Over the past eight months, this administration has never failed to prove that, just when you felt we had hit the bottom, they were capable of creating new lows, even at the expense of acting in ways that diametrically oppose what they campaigned for, and without the slightest regard or respect for their own supporters, let alone the rest of the country. What is even more astonishing is to realize that apparently there is no shortage of individuals who are still willing to do the biddings of an authoritarian president who has proven, time and again, to have no respect or loyalty for those who have once served him, and would throw them under the bus in a heart beat if that’s in his best interest at any point in time.

Yes, the outlook for the next three and a half years is quite grim. But not all hope is lost. Courts have been mostly courageous and have held the grounds for this system of democracy that has survived other tumultuous times including a civil war. And still (hopefully) the true power is in the hands of the people who elect the officials, not the other way around.