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But "the morality of a child" is, I think, putting it too kindly. Kirk was not a child, he was a cynical propagandist in the job of training unprincipled partisans, ever changing his tune precisely in alignment with the party line and President's whimsy (see the pivot on H1Bs). I admit I despised him and his little, annoying gotcha act of "debating" infantile leftists, milking them for dunk opportunities. They deserved the humiliation, but the pretense of "promoting dialogue" was completely hollow, and the massive number of shallow, cow-like people in the US for whom it is convincing depresses me. I find his more resolute enemies still significantly more repulsive, and more so now that they're libeling him with absurd exaggerations of his less liberal views and gloating about a callous murder (of a man who was quite aware that political violence is a risk in his line of work, yet did public appearances; so at least in bravery quite deserving). But it is what it is. It's the morality of a soldier. You want to be a soldier in a culture war, because it's easier this way. Soldiers are obligated to suspend most of their moral judgement that is not directly instrumental to following orders, and this makes things so much easier.
Kirk was recruiting soldiers. He didn't care about Israeli victims of Oct 7, he cared that Israel is Our Greatest Ally (according to the President and GOP consensus; he started calibrating this message to go with the times recently). Kirk certainly didn't care about civilians in Gaza and anywhere else. He wasn't very sharp, but I think he understood well that a war with a just cause is not necessarily a just war, that even a just war can be fought by unjust people and with unjust methods. That it is possible for "good guys" to turn into "bad guys" depending on how they act in pursuit of their alleged goodness, and that remaining marginally better guys on the balance of evidence can still be not good enough to justify participating in a race to the bottom.
I much prefer the types of Fuentes or, better yet, Sam "Hitler's Top Guy" Hyde to those disingenuous establishment figures who pollute the commons with fake debate, fake intellectual engagement, fake morality. Kirk, PragerU, Bari Weiss stuff, it's all such fraud. Better yet have some beliefs and openly say what you mean. Even if you don't seek debate, it at least becomes possible in theory.
P.S. mild suspicion of Hlynka resurgence
I’m going to take the Ezra Klein-Hanania line and, without any sappy respect for a dead man, I’ll say these ‘dunking’ debates are good, actually. Literal marketplace of ideas, forum of democracy. Though it may offend your snobbish sensibilities, that’s how ideas trickle down to the little guy.
The idea is great, being open your ideas being challenged in public, and being able to argue for them. But in practice, that's not how it goes. Whoever talks faster, and is more skilled with "debating" has a clear advantage, regardless of whether they actually believe in their ideas or not. Regardless of whether their ideas are good. As long as you can present them as being such, you can have the upper hand.
I didn't know a thing about Charlie Kirk before he got shot. But you have a similar example in the streamer Destiny. He does the same thing, primarily does online "debates", but he's also visited a few colleges. But in the end, it's literally his job, it's his life mission to do this, he knows his subject well, he knows the tricks of the trade, he has great control of his emotions, all of which give him a huge advantage over anyone else. If you pit him and some random college student up against him, the student will almost certainly look worse by the end.
The same can happen even with people more educated than him.
Debates have flaws that can be exploited, but so does every other manner of exchanging ideas. Writing off this style of debate enitrely just sounds like sour grapes.
How effective any particular debate tactic is depends on the audience. For mass appeal, sure, it's all theatrics. But convincing idiots is only useful for getting their votes or their money. They are memetic dead ends.
Politicians are optimized for this type of debating, because they're optimized for winning votes. When was the last time you heard any interesting arguments in a Presidential debate? It's not a flaw of the format, but the audience. When was last time a politician ever changed your mind? That's not their job.
Convincing intelligent people is trickier, but also a force multiplier on your ideas. Moldbug has a much smaller audience than Kirk did, but the former is more influential. Scott is even more influential. Hasan has a bigger audience than Destiny, but Destiny is more influential.
These people can't really roll over serious opposition. Look at how Rogan tried to handle Flint Dibble. Amongst Rogan's fans, Dibble was discredited. But outside that bubble, it was just another case of what everyone already knows: Rogan is a loud conspiracist with a loose grasp on reality.
People have poopooed Jubilee's surrounded format for being all theatrics, and it mostly is. But I've never seen a more metaphorical destruction than that kid telling Peterson "you're really quite nothing." The memetic power of that moment is hard to overstate. The stock of Peterson's brand of Christianity went into the toilet overnight.
The tactic of concern for me is cherry picking opponents. Kirk had been dodging Fuentes for months knowing full well a debate on Israel would leave him fumbling. Destiny has been eternally dodging debates on HBD knowing full well the subject collapses his world view. People like Tim Pool, Sam Seder, Crowder, F&F, etc. build their shows around the image of being all about open debate but only engage with opposition when they're screened as losers, i.e. mostly debate morons.
Kirk was at least holding open mic challenges in a real physical space. He could still control the frame to some degree, but much less than other formats. We'll see less of that now.
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