PROF. JENKINS: Channeling your anger for good

Rob Jenkins is a Higher Education Fellow with Campus Reform and a tenured associate professor of English at Georgia State University - Perimeter College. The opinions expressed here are his own and not those of his employer.

If you’re like me, the moment the sheer shock of Charlie Kirk’s brutal slaying subsided, you immediately found it replaced by anger—fierce, burning, righteous anger. 

Such anger was, and remains, thoroughly justified. The Left, in the person of a young man they had radicalized, murdered one of our most beloved figures and important leaders—then collectively danced on his grave with nothing short of demonic glee.

They mocked his grieving widow and two small children. And they made it abundantly clear they would like to kill many more of us conservatives, perhaps all of us. That’s enough to make anyone angry.

And yet….

Look, I know some of you might not be ready to hear this. Maybe you never want to hear it. But you need to. I believe it’s what Charlie would say, given the chance. And that is this: Long term, anger is not the answer. It is not the path forward.

Initially, at least, anger can be a powerful motivator, prompting us to take needed action, to do things we know we need to do but perhaps lack the courage or resolve. Righteous anger can give us the strength to stand against injustice and oppression.

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Eventually, though, if allowed to continue unabated, righteous anger becomes…just anger. And anger, as novelist and Daily Wire host Andrew Klavan has famously said, is “the Devil’s cocaine.” It makes us feel invincible in our own rightness while leading us to act irrationally and eventually hollowing us out from the inside.

In short, anger is a poison—and its ultimate victim is the one who harbors it, not the one at whom it is directed. If you let your anger overwhelm you, you risk becoming just like the people who murdered Charlie, full of bitterness and hate. 

So what do you do with that anger you’re still feeling? My counsel is to begin channeling it into more positive pursuits. Let me suggest three.

The first is activism. Let your anger at Charlie’s murder prompt you to take action. Stop sitting on the sidelines and get in the game, if you’re not already. We don’t all have Charlie’s gift for communicating, but some of you probably do, to varying degrees. Now is a good time to use that gift, to speak out on whatever platforms you have—and find new ones.

The Left may have silenced one voice, but in so doing they created a chorus. You are that chorus.

Others may have organizational, technical, or logistical skills. Operations the size of TPUSA, Students for Life, College Republicans, and similar groups have great need for those skills. Consider volunteering. 

If nothing else, just join one of those groups, attend their meetings and rallies, and take your friends. That’s doing something. 

Another good outlet for your anger is community service. The needs in our communities are great, and plenty of charitable organizations are desperate for volunteers. Most are non-political. But when you feed the hungry, visit the sick, or comfort a child, you are doing your part to advance the cause of truth.

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Finally, you can channel your anger into doing something Charlie always encouraged: becoming your best self. As the English poet Robert Herbert famously said, “The best revenge is living well.”

Perhaps “revenge” isn’t the best word in this context, but the point is well taken: When your enemies want you dead, your most effective response it not only to live but to live fully, deliberately, and joyously.

Find a vocation that gives your life meaning and purpose while providing value to society, then work hard to achieve excellence in your chosen field. Get married, stay married, remain faithful, have children, and raise them to be good people. That might be the single most important thing you can do.

This is what Charlie desired for you—for all of you. He would have fully understood your grief and anger, but he would not have wanted you to wallow in negative emotions. 

And while he would have expected you to take up the fight, his fight, he would have wanted you to approach it the way he did—as a happy warrior, always striving to turn conflict into understanding and enemies into friends.