this post was submitted on 12 Jul 2026
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I was in the "who?" crowd and when I read up on it involuntarily everywhere I also saw nobody sad. All who stated how sad it was were clearly using it as a tool for forwarding an agenda or because they felt they needed to. Non-emotional sadness.
Sure, there might be people who felt truly sad because they had a constructed image of him in their heads.
Just like a crappy 90s boyband had women deeply in love with their artificial personas.
But people emotionally sad who knew the guy well? No, not that I could see in a remotely believable way.
Ah, so you didn't find anyone that passed your standards for sounding genuine, that means no-one was genuinely sad for Kirk's death. Come off it.
And you know, I don't think it means that much even when few people are sad at a figure in politics (if we can say that about him) is murdered. But you know what I can guarantee? A whole bunch of people were angry that he was killed.
This whole thread is just someone who said something they thought was profound but didn't think through. Controversial figures are loved by people on their side and loathed by people on the other side. You don't hear as many of the people that are on the other side to you, so OP's thinking is just an excuse to further hate on people you already hate. Sloppy thinking for people who'd rather simmer in the hate-bath of online rage.
Yes, by my standards.
We are humans. We need standards we define to measure against in all aspects of life. And I have had many, many years to refine my standards and so I trust in them.
And yes, lots of people were indeed angry. Just like I have seen people be genuinely over the top angry because of other people.... Not being religious, choosing an abortion, being nice and inclusive to a specific minority, etc.
Being angry can very much be used for measuring my standards too.
If you set your own standards, then yeah... you can tell "a lot" about someone by how people react to their death, if what you want to be able to tell is a mere reinforcement of your existing beliefs.
Because you can interpret every statement of grief as genuine (if sympathetic) or manipulative (if not); every statement of anger as an expression of genuine grief (if sympathetic) or impotent rage (if not); every statement of hatred as despicable exploitation (if sympathetic) or righteous (if not).
And then you can, like the OP, post about how this is an amazing rule of thumb, that it offers amazing insight, as if it were anything other than a mirror for your preconceptions.
Here's an honest question: have you ever applied OP's rule of thumb after someone died and thought, "huh, guess I was wrong about them?" Or did it always confirm what you already believed?
It fully depends on the available information, doesn't it?
Without information there cannot be judgment.
And if the information I get shows that a person was a bad person by my standards then my opinion sure doesn't discriminate between them still being alive or not.
If someone I liked dies and suddenly it turns out they were only likable in pretense or were secretly an asshole to others then that is new information that changes how I regard them. Yes, absolutely.
And when I got to see information on this Kirk person I could not see how his existence improved any lives except those who were like hom who didn't really care about him as much as they did regard him as a tool for their agendas.
At most they are sad to have lost a pawn.
This all seems to be in theory.