Editorial: Sending the letter, what this moment actually means

The assassination of Charlie Kirk, swattings at college campuses across the U.S. and a ceremony remembering 9/11 are the cited inspirations of President Joseph Helble’s 473 word “personal reflection,” delivered to the inboxes of those of us lucky enough to have a Lehigh email address.  

In his email titled “What this moment asks of us” sent on Sept. 19, he connects these three unrelated events to talk about our increased political polarization. Not about gun violence, not about attacks on higher education and not about memorializing those lost in 9/11, but about how we should all be nicer to each other. 

“I am asking each of us to think about what it means to lead with curiosity,” Helble wrote. “To pause for a moment, and listen, truly listen.”  

The email is filled with cliches like this. 

The issues that Helble is discussing are vastly different and each require their own, and different, levels of nuance rather than a “What this moment asks of us” string of Facebook mom quotes. 

Similarly, the events that Helble picked to discuss, while leaving out others, leads us to raise our eyebrows and wonder if it would’ve been better to release no letter at all. 

Sept. 10th, the same day that Charlie Kirk was assassinated, there was a school shooting at Evergreen High School in Colorado, where the perpetrator was a 16-year-old student at the school who had been radicalized by white supremacist online content and forums.

Similarly, two other school shootings, one in December 2024 at Abundant Life Christian School in Wisconsin and the other in January 2025 at Antioch High School in Tennessee, were both carried out by teenagers who had been radicalized by the alt-right through the internet. 

There’s a global rise in white supremacist terrorism, according to the Brookings Institute, and much of the radicalization is happening through the internet. For many teenagers the first step falling down the alt-right pipeline, are videos just like that of Kirk’s. 

The shooting of Kirk was tragic. He had a family, and he died an awful and sudden death. It’s true and imperative to recognize that many who disagreed with his politics are disrespectful in the way they discuss his assassination. Further, his death is a symptom of a larger issue of gun violence and mass shootings in the U.S.

The tragedy doesn’t mean those that agreed with his politics should be freed from criticism.

“The past few days, I have heard stories of students who appreciated some of what Charlie Kirk had to say, felt uncomfortable saying that openly, worried that they would be labeled and shut down,” Helble wrote. 

Some of Kirk’s most repeated controversial stances, according to The New York Times, included calling The Civil Rights Act of 1964 an “anti-white weapon” and Martin Luther King Jr. an “awful” person. He also was a proponent of replacement theory, the idea that Jewish people were allowing immigrants into the U.S. to “dilute” the white race. 

After lamenting that some students “felt uncomfortable” publicly admitting that they agreed with Kirk’s messaging, Helble details that for many, Lehigh is the most diverse community they will ever be a part of. 

“We can embrace these differences and seek to understand different views, as a true community of learners,” Helble wrote. “Or we can surround ourselves only with those who think alike, dismissing or demonizing anyone who thinks differently.” 

The message that Helble is trying to convey is, at its core, a good one.

Political polarization is at an all-time high and is fueling much of the politically motivated violence ravaging headlines. 

On the other hand, the death of an alt-right influencer who, according to talks with debate experts at The Guardian, spent his career using the conversations he was a part of to spread misinformation and intentionally elicit strong emotions from his college-aged opponents may not be the appropriate excuse to discuss this topic. 

In The Guardian article “The Students Who Debated Charlie Kirk: ‘His Goal Was to Verbally Defeat Us,’” Dr. Charles Woods, a professor of rhetoric and composition at East Texas A&M University, described Kirk’s debate style as intentionally combative and binary. 

After reading Helble’s reflection, we didn’t feel solidarity or a call to action, but rather, a sense of confusion. The examples brought up at the beginning of his message outside of Kirk’s death, like swatting incidents and the memorialization of 9/11, all disappear after the first paragraph. 

Helble’s call for civility, while well-intentioned, rings hollow when it’s framed around the death of a man who built his platform by stoking fires of division. 

If Helble wanted to discuss polarization, he should’ve begun by naming the real forces behind it — online radicalization, extremist violence and the platforms that profit from both — instead of simply urging students to “listen.” 

That’s what can create an environment of true empathy and understanding, and as stated in Helble’s letter, that is the Lehigh he wants and asks us to be.