Even before the assassination of Charlie Kirk, an influential right-wing activist, there were signs of a looming political crisis. Rising polarization and the coarsening of public discourse left little room for shared understanding. Acts of violence, targeting figures on the left and the right, had begun piling up.

甚至在有影响力的右翼活动人士查理·柯克被暗杀之前，已有迹象表明一场政治危机正在逼近。日益加剧的两极分化以及公共话语的粗鄙化让人们几乎无法形成共识。针对左翼和右翼人物的暴力行为也已经开始不断累积。

But the killing of Kirk on a Utah college campus Wednesday — shortly after he began speaking to a young crowd on a sunny afternoon — raises the possibility that the country has entered an even more perilous phase.

但柯克在犹他州一所大学校园被杀——就在一个阳光明媚的下午，他刚开始对一群年轻人发表演讲后不久——这一事件让人们开始担心，美国可能已经进入了一个更加危险的阶段。

On social media, it was easy to find left-wing posters reveling in Kirk’s death and suggesting he got what he deserved. On the right, initial expressions of grief and shock were overtaken by open calls for political reckoning and vengeance. There were ominous proclamations that the country was on the brink of civil war — or should be.

在社交媒体上，不难看到一些左翼网民为柯克的死亡幸灾乐祸，暗示他是罪有应得。而在右翼阵营，最初的悲痛和震惊很快被公然要求政治清算和报复的呼声所取代。还有一些不祥的言论声称，美国正处于内战的边缘——或者说，应该进入内战。

The outbursts worried experts, who warned that Americans’ tolerance for politically motivated attacks has been growing at a striking pace.

这些激烈反应令专家感到担忧，他们警告称，对于出于政治动机的袭击，美国人的容忍度正以惊人的速度上升。

31岁的柯克中枪的过程被人从多个角度拍摄了下来；他脖子喷血的骇人画面很快在网上流传开来。

“We’re basically a tinderbox of a country,” said Robert Pape, a political science professor at the University of Chicago who has been conducting regular polls to measure attitudes toward political violence since supporters of President Donald Trump attacked the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. “We are seeing more radicalized politics and more support for violence than at any point since we’ve been doing these studies in the past four years.”

“我们基本上是一个随时可能引爆的火药桶国家，”芝加哥大学的政治学教授罗伯特·佩普说。自2021年1月6日特朗普总统的支持者袭击国会大厦以来，他一直定期进行民调，以衡量公众对政治暴力的态度。“自从四年前我们开始做这些研究以来，从未看过政治激进化程度以及对暴力的支持像现在这样高。”

The shooting of Kirk, 31, was captured from multiple angles on video; gruesome footage of blood spurting from his neck quickly went viral. A few days earlier, many Americans had watched similarly disturbing footage of a young public transit rider in Charlotte, North Carolina, who was stabbed to death by a stranger in an unprovoked attack.

31岁的柯克中枪过程被人从多个角度拍摄了下来；他脖子喷血的骇人画面很快在网上传播开来。就在几天前，许多美国人也看到了另一段同样令人不安的视频——在北卡罗来纳州夏洛特市，一名乘坐公共交通的年轻乘客被一名陌生人无端刺死。

That killing had become entangled in an escalating national debate over Trump’s desire to send the military into Democratic-led cities to combat crime. In a country where the president calls his opponents “scum,” and opponents accuse him of fascism, it already seemed to many that the fabric of public discourse had hopelessly frayed.

那起凶杀案也卷入了一场日益激烈的全国性争论——这场辩论的焦点是特朗普希望出动军队进入由民主党领导的城市打击犯罪的主张。在这个总统会称政敌为“人渣”，而反对者则指责他是法西斯的国家里，许多人似乎已然觉得公共话语的基本结构已经无可挽回地瓦解了。

Kirk, who was prolific on social media, was himself deeply engaged in the conversation about crime, posting on the social platform X just hours before he was shot that it was “100% necessary to politicize” the Charlotte murder.

柯克本人在社交媒体上非常活跃，也深度参与了有关犯罪问题的讨论。就在他遇害前几个小时，他还在社交平台X上发文称，将夏洛特的谋杀案“政治化是百分之百有必要的”。

“I think that you have a cultural civil war underway,” Newt Gingrich, the Republican former House speaker, said in an interview on Wednesday afternoon. Gingrich said he fully supported Trump’s efforts to upend the American status quo. But he acknowledged that they were rocking the ship of state.

“我认为我们正在经历一场文化内战，”共和党籍前众议院议长纽特·金里奇周三下午在一次采访中表示。金里奇说，他完全支持特朗普颠覆美国现状的努力，但他也承认，这些行动正在动摇国家之船。

“You have very profound differences about the very basics of life,” he said, referring to partisan divisions. “And the country has not figured out how to sort it all out yet. We felt like we were under enormous pressure from the Obama-Biden cycle. The left feels like it’s under tremendous pressure from the Trump cycle. And we don’t know how this is all going to play out.”

“在生活的根本问题上存在着深刻分歧，”他说道，这里指的是党派之争。“而这个国家至今尚未找到解决之道。我们曾觉得奥巴马-拜登时期带来了巨大的压力，左翼则觉得特朗普时期让他们承受着极大的压力。我们不知道这一切将如何发展。”

Among those studying the public’s appetite for political violence — a fast-growing discipline in American academia — the mood on Wednesday was grim.

在研究公众对政治暴力接受度的学者中——这是美国学术界一个快速发展的领域——周三的事件引发了极为严峻的反响。

在发生查理·柯克枪击事件后，犹他州州长斯宾塞·考克斯在犹他州奥勒姆市犹他谷大学举行的新闻发布会上发言。

In Pape’s most recent survey in May, nearly 39% of Democrats agreed with the idea that removing Trump from office by force was justifiable. At the same time, nearly a quarter of Republicans said it was justifiable for Trump to use the military to crack down on protests against his agenda.

在佩普今年5月最新的调查中，近39%的民主党人认为通过武力让特朗普下台是合理的；与此同时，近四分之一的共和党人表示，特朗普动用军队镇压反对其议程的抗议活动是正当的。

Garen Wintemute, a physician and the director of the Violence Prevention Research Program at University of California, Davis, argued that a spiraling cycle of violence is not a foregone conclusion.

加州大学戴维斯分校暴力预防研究项目主任加伦·温特穆特医生认为，暴力的恶性循环并非不可避免。

“The task we face now is to not let the people at the extremes pull the rest of us over the edge with them,” Wintemute said. “We need to make our rejection of political violence clear.”

“我们现在面临的任务是，不能让极端分子把我们其他人也拖入深渊，”他说。“我们必须明确表达对政治暴力的拒绝。”

Kirk was a committed partisan. In the immediate aftermath of the shooting, Matthew Dowd, a political analyst on MSNBC, called him a “divisive” figure who had engaged in “hate speech.”

柯克是个坚定的党派支持者。枪击事件发生后不久，MSNBC的政治分析师马修·多德称他为一个“煽动分裂”的人物，曾发表过“仇恨言论”。

“You can’t stop with these sort of awful thoughts you have and then saying these awful words and not expect awful actions to take place,” Dowd said on the air. “And that’s the unfortunate environment we are in.”

“你不能仅仅是有这些可怕的想法，说出这些可怕的话，却想不到会发生可怕的行动，”多德在节目中表示。“可悲的是，这正是我们所处的环境。”

Rebecca Kutler, the MSNBC president, called Dowd’s comments “insensitive and unacceptable.”

MSNBC总裁丽贝卡·库特勒称多德的言论“缺乏同理心且不可接受”。

On conservative Fox News, Jesse Watters, the popular prime-time TV personality, spoke passionately about the attack, and the need to somehow strike back.

在持保守派立场的福克斯新闻频道，知名黄金时段主持人杰西·沃特斯对这次袭击发表了激烈言论，强调有必要以某种方式进行反击。

“We’re sick, we’re sad, we’re angry, and we’re resolute, and we’re going to avenge Charlie’s death in the way Charlie would want it to be avenged,” he said Wednesday.

“我们感到痛心、悲伤、愤怒，同时也很坚决，我们将以查理希望的方式为他的死复仇，”他周三表示。

Watters listed a number of threatening or violent acts perpetrated in recent years by the people on the left: the armed man arrested in 2022 who wanted to kill Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh. The shooting of two Israeli Embassy aides in Washington in May. The vandalizing of Teslas to protest Trump’s sometime ally, Elon Musk. The 2017 shooting of Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La.

沃特斯列举了近年来左翼人士实施的一些威胁性或暴力行为：2022年一名持枪男子企图杀害最高法院大法官布雷特·卡瓦诺，随后被逮捕；今年5月，华盛顿以色列大使馆两名助理遭枪击事件；为了抗议特朗普的前盟友埃隆·马斯克而破坏特斯拉车辆；以及2017年路易斯安那州共和党众议员史蒂夫·斯卡利斯遭枪击事件。

“Whether we want to accept it or not, they are at war with us!” Watters said. “And what are we going to do about it? How much political violence are we going to tolerate?”

“无论我们愿不愿意接受，他们都在和我们开战！”沃特斯说道。“要我们怎么办？我们还要容忍多少政治暴力？”

Federal and local authorities have not yet identified a suspect in the shooting, yet far-right activist Laura Loomer, with no evidence, called it a “professional hit.”

联邦和地方当局尚未确定枪击案的嫌疑人，极右翼活动人士劳拉·卢默却毫无证据地称这是一次“职业暗杀”。

Still, one prominent right-wing figure, Nick Fuentes, a notorious racist and antisemite, beseeched his followers to be calm amid the persistent calls for violence.

不过，一位知名右翼人物、臭名昭著的种族主义者和反犹主义者尼克·富恩特斯在持续的暴力呼声中恳求他的追随者保持冷静。

“The violence and hatred has to stop,” he wrote. “Our country needs Christ now more than ever.”

他写道：“暴力和仇恨必须停止。我们的国家比以往任何时候都更需要基督。”

周三，在亚利桑那州菲尼克斯市“美国转折点”总部外的临时纪念地。

Ruth Braunstein, an associate professor of sociology at Johns Hopkins University who studies political violence and polarization, said she was concerned that the slaying of someone she described as a “pivotal figure” on the American right could mobilize groups that have been waiting for just such a catalyst.

研究政治暴力和两极分化的约翰斯·霍普金斯大学社会学副教授鲁思·布劳恩斯坦表示担忧，称这位她形容为美国右翼“关键人物”的遇害可能会激活那些一直在等待类似催化剂的团体。

“The right,” she said, “has well-organized and trained groups, including militia organizations, that are basically waiting for a moment to be called into action in defense of what they view as the nation.”

她说：“右翼阵营有着组织良好且训练有素的团体，包括民兵组织，他们基本上一直在等待时机，希望被召集起来捍卫他们所认为的国家。”

She added, “All it will take is the slightest hint from the political leaders, including the president, but also anyone else, that this is the moment that they’re needed.”

她补充道：“只要政治领导人——包括总统以及其他任何人——稍微暗示一下这是他们需要行动的时刻，这些团体就会立即响应。”

Though Trump has engaged in the most incendiary rhetoric of any president in recent memory, his initial reaction to the news was restrained. He ordered flags across the country lowered to half-staff until Sunday.

尽管特朗普发表了近年来所有总统中最具煽动性的言论，但他对这条消息的最初反应却相对克制。他下令全国各地降半旗，直到周日。

27岁的白人民族主义者、深夜网络节目主持人尼古拉斯·富恩特斯周一在他家中的演播室接受肖像拍摄。

On Truth Social, he praised Kirk as “legendary” and offered his sympathy to his wife and family.

他在Truth Social上称赞柯克为“传奇人物”，并向他的妻子和家人表达了慰问。

Later, though, Trump blamed Kirk’s murder on the news media and the “radical left” for “demonizing those with whom you disagree.”

不过，后来特朗普将柯克的谋杀归咎于新闻媒体和“激进左翼”，指责他们“妖魔化与自己意见不合的人”。

“For years, those on the radical left have compared wonderful Americans like Charlie to Nazis and the world’s worst mass murderers and criminals,” Trump said. “This kind of rhetoric is directly responsible for the terrorism that we’re seeing in our country today, and it must stop right now.”

“多年来，激进左翼一直将像查理这样出色的美国人比作纳粹以及世界上最恶劣的大规模杀人犯和罪犯，”特朗普表示。“这种言论直接导致了今天我们国家出现的恐怖主义行径，必须立刻停止。”