Part VII: Rethinking the Definition of Political Violence
If the analysis so far exposes the weaknesses of our current narratives, the next step is to ask a harder question: Should lone-actor shootings ever be called political violence at all?
Today’s loose application of the term political violence makes the threshold dangerously low. Too often the threshold is: a perpetrator, an oppositional-identity victim, and a scrap of rhetoric—a meme, a tweet, a note. Add these together and the act is quickly elevated to political violence.
This relaxed definition has two effects:
It creates distortion. Personal collapses wrapped in borrowed rhetoric are miscast as ideological battles. The costume is mistaken for the cause.
It fuels polarization. Once an act is labeled political violence, it is absorbed into the partisan binary. One side claims victimhood, the other claims vindication, and the deeper realities of the attacker’s collapse are erased.
Political violence must be more than a crime plus a manifesto. It must meet a higher bar: organized, targeted, collective, and aimed at influencing policy or power. Without that bar, the term collapses into a slogan rather than a diagnosis.
This does not mean political violence is rare or unreal. It exists, and it is deadly. Organized terror cells, extremist militias, and coordinated campaigns that target communities or governments for the purpose of power and policy change must be confronted as political violence. The standard should be high—but not impossible.
Between those poles lies a gray area. Lone-actors sometimes borrow heavily from extremist movements, or even coordinate loosely with them. In such cases, intent and affiliation may elevate an act from grievance violence to political violence. But drawing that line requires careful evidence, not reflex.
A sharper definition strips away the prestige attackers gain when their personal collapses are treated as ideological battles. It also avoids dividing the public into groups of political victims and aggressors. That in turn reduces fear, tension, and outrage—and creates space for diagnosis and understanding. By reframing these attacks not as partisan warfare but as individual calamities, society may find the unity needed to address their roots: mental health decline, alienation, and the erosion of social anchors.
The Environment That Fuels Violence
No discussion of lone-actor violence is complete without acknowledging the environment that surrounds it. In America, guns are ample and access is relatively easy. This means that personal crises and grievances can all too quickly escalate into deadly acts. A despairing individual armed with rhetoric and resentment is only one step away from tragedy when weapons are so available.
But guns are only part of the story. Rhetoric is the accelerant. The level of tension in this country is already high, and the divide is wide. Yet our language of political conflict routinely pushes it further. Opponents are not debated; they are dehumanized. Citizens are not wrong; they are cast as racists, Nazis, fascists, antisemites. These words, when used carefully, describe precise and terrible realities in history. When used loosely, as partisan epithets, they inflame rather than clarify. They cheapen meaning, harden division, and make violence against “the other side” feel righteous to someone already in collapse.
Words are not violent. But words can prepare the ground for violence by stripping opponents of their humanity. A collapsing individual, primed by despair, does not need detailed instructions. All it takes is permission—an atmosphere in which silencing the enemy feels not only justified, but virtuous.
That places a particular responsibility on public figures. Politicians, pundits, and cultural leaders cannot control every interpretation of their words, but they can control the standards they set. To attack the person rather than the policy, to vilify the opponent rather than argue the issue, is to hand a loaded script to those least capable of resisting it.
Policy Implications (What to do differently—now)
Adopt a rigorous definition of “political violence.”
Reserve the label for organized, collective, strategic acts aimed at policy or power. Require explicit evidence of coordination or directive intent before using the term in official communications and headlines.
Standardize “motive discipline” in newsrooms and briefings.
Set internal rules to avoid premature motive claims within the first 48–72 hours. Replace speculative labels with “motive under investigation,” and prohibit embedding screenshots of manifestos unless clearly necessary for public safety.
Stand up prevention pipelines in public health, not just policing.
Fund community-level threat assessment and care-pathways (crisis response, clinical care, family supports, employment and schooling reintegration) keyed to recurring warning signs: acute isolation, rapid status decline, leakage, and weapons access.
Target access, not abstractions.
Implement narrowly tailored gun-access interventions (e.g., extreme-risk protection orders with due-process safeguards, secure-storage campaigns, point-of-sale waiting periods for high-risk profiles) that interrupt the crisis-to-weapon pathway.
De-incentivize performative martyrdom.
Law enforcement and media should minimize the attacker’s name, image, and “lore” (no-name policies; blur faces; avoid manifesto excerpts). Focus coverage on victims, community recovery, and concrete prevention lessons.
Rebuild guardrails where people actually live.
Invest in belonging infrastructure—youth mentoring, faith-community partnerships, civic associations, voluntary service corps, and peer-led support programs—so isolated young men encounter norms, accountability, and meaning before collapse scripts take hold.
NEXT POST
Conclusion: Beyond Lazy Frames
Charlie Kirk’s killing was horrifying not only for what it was, but for what it instantly became. Within hours, it was framed as evidence of America’s descent into political violence, proof of one side’s hatred and the other side’s victimhood. Politico’s analysis, published forty-eight hours later, echoed that framing, placing the act in a narrative of escalation.