When I wrote about Charlie Kirk being shot, I thought I made myself clear. Violence is not the answer. A bullet does not win an argument. Murder is tyranny, no matter who pulls the trigger.
But then
came into the comments and pushed back. Hard.I have known Terrell since I was nineteen. That is fourteen years of conversations, debates, and straight-up disagreements about how the world really works. We have never agreed on everything. Sometimes we barely agreed on anything. But he has always been someone who challenges me, someone who forces me to see things I would not see on my own.
I am a straight white man. I come from Michigan. My story is complicated in its own way. I grew up with abuse. I got manipulated by a therapist who drained me of money and dignity. I battled alcoholism and clawed my way back. I carry scars that shape how I see everything. My trauma makes me different. It makes me raw. It makes me cut through bullshit. But it also means I still carry privilege. My scars never came with the extra weight of being Black in America.
That is where Terrell comes in. Because when he speaks, he speaks from a place I will never live in. I cannot feel what he feels. I cannot know what it is like to walk in his skin. But I can listen.
And listening does not mean agreeing blindly. Listening means sitting in discomfort. It means hearing words that clash with my worldview and not running from them. It means acknowledging that truth is bigger than me, and sometimes it takes someone else’s pain to show me what my own eyes missed.
Who Terrell Is
Before I get to his words, you need to know who he is. Terrell Groggins is not just some guy on the internet leaving comments. He is an artist. A photographer. A man who has dedicated his life to capturing truth through a lens.
He built his reputation documenting Detroit boxing. He followed the rise of Claressa Shields, the greatest female boxer alive, and he put his whole heart into telling her story. His photograph “Shields Strikes Back” went around the world and won awards from World Press Photo, Smithsonian Magazine, the Istanbul Photo Awards, and the International Photography Awards. His work is respected on a global scale.
But Terrell does not shoot for trophies. He shoots because of what he lived through. In 2008, he lost his brother. That loss marked him forever. He has described it as the moment that changed him, the point when his art became more than pictures. It became testimony. It became a way to carry grief into purpose. Instead of letting the pain swallow him, he used it to sharpen his mission. He turned his camera toward human struggle, injustice, and resilience because he knew firsthand what it was like to have something ripped away too soon. That death was not just tragedy, it was a turning point that forced him to create or drown.
That is why his work carries so much weight. Every photo is built on a promise he made to himself after that loss — a promise to make sure lives and stories do not disappear without being seen.
Terrell’s art is not just visual. It is spiritual. He does not just capture light on a subject. He captures weight. He documents lives people would rather ignore. He forces uncomfortable truths into the open. And he does it because he knows silence is deadly.
So when he shows up in my comments, it is not noise. It is not trolling. It is a man who has built his life on truth-telling, cutting straight through the bullshit.
What He Said
Terrell went all in. He said Charlie Kirk was not some innocent voice silenced in the marketplace of ideas. He said he was a man who built a machine rooted in Christian nationalism, white grievance, and intimidation.
That stings because he is right. Kirk did not just say controversial things. He built an entire platform that targeted people. He went after DEI, Black professors, LGBTQ communities, anyone who dared to push back against the supremacy he was peddling. His version of free speech was never about all voices. It was about silencing some voices so his could dominate.
And when I described Kirk as effective, Terrell was quick to check me. He said it was not brilliance that made him effective. It was indoctrination. It was taking young people and feeding them a steady diet of grievance, teaching them that systemic racism is fake, that Black professionals don’t deserve their success, that equality is a threat. He said Kirk did not create free thinkers, he created echo chambers. He created extremists.
That is not comfortable to hear. But comfort is overrated. Growth never comes from echo chambers. Growth comes from confrontation, from friction, from someone you respect telling you to stop polishing the edges of the truth.
Violence and Harm
This is where Terrell’s words hit me the hardest. He said political violence is dangerous, but it cannot be used as a shield to protect the legacy of someone who spent his life promoting white supremacy. He said speaking the truth about what Kirk represented is not disrespect. It is refusing to let his machine rewrite history in death.
And he is right again. Both things are true. Nobody should be assassinated for their words. But words can also wound like weapons. They can strip dignity, radicalize the next generation, destroy the chances of people ever being seen as equals. Violence corrupts debate. But debate was already corrupted long before the sniper fired.
That is what Terrell is saying. He is saying you cannot call Kirk just a victim and ignore the harm he left behind.
And here is where I have to sit in my own contradiction. I believe deeply that violence cannot be the way. But I also know that for Terrell, violence is not abstract. He has lived the cost. He lost his brother in 2008. He sees political violence not as a debate on Twitter but as a wound that never closes. When he says he will not extend empathy to the family of someone who worked to strip his own community of dignity, it comes from that raw place. I cannot argue with that. I can only acknowledge it.
Christianity and Power
Terrell also drew a line that matters. He separated Christianity from Christian nationalism. Christianity, in its best form, is about humility. It is about compassion, forgiveness, caring for the least of these.
Christian nationalism is the hijacking of that. It fuses faith with power. It says that real Americans are conservative Christians, specifically white ones, and everyone else is a threat. It uses churches, schools, and laws to dominate. It turns humility into arrogance. It turns faith into exclusion.
Charlie Kirk thrived in that current. He did not just swim in it. He built with it. He profited from it. That is a fact. And pretending otherwise because he died violently is dishonest.
Terrell’s point forced me to face something I would rather avoid: when faith is weaponized, it does not just corrupt politics. It corrupts hearts. It teaches generations to see enemies where there should be neighbors. It teaches kids to inherit fear instead of empathy. It cloaks hatred in scripture. That is not Christianity. That is control.
Hypocrisy and Silence
Terrell went further. He called out my hypocrisy and I appreciate him for it. He pointed to the assassination of Emerita Melissa Hortman and her husband earlier this summer. That was political violence too. That was a family destroyed too. But where was the coverage then. Where was the outrage. Where were the essays and the handwringing.
He is not wrong. Outrage in this country is selective. Sympathy is selective. Mourning is selective. Who gets remembered with dignity is not equal. The silence around some victims and the noise around others says everything.
And when Terrell says silence speaks volumes, he is right. It does. Because it is not just media. It is us. It is me. It is people like me who could have spoken louder but did not.
And that is the part that makes me flinch. Because silence is not neutral. Silence sides with power every single time. And the truth is, silence is easier for people like me. That is privilege. I can step away from the conversation when it gets too heavy. Terrell cannot. That is why his fire matters.
Where I Stand
So here is where I land. I will never celebrate Charlie Kirk’s murder. I will never celebrate anyone’s murder. Violence poisons everything. It silences possibility. It kills not only a voice but the chance for persuasion, debate, and growth. It shuts doors forever.
But I cannot ignore what Terrell said. His words carry truths I will never feel on my skin. I can defend free speech while admitting that speech can wound and indoctrinate. I can condemn assassination while still saying Kirk’s machine was harmful as hell. Both are true.
I am not Terrell. I cannot know what it is like to wake up in his body, in his skin, in his America. I cannot feel what he feels when rhetoric and policy tell him his life has less value. But I can listen. I can amplify. I can admit that my view is shaped by being white, by my scars, by my past, by my survival. And I can admit that he sees truths I would never see on my own.
And admitting that does not make me weaker. It makes me honest.
What Friendship Looks Like
This is what friendship looks like. It is not nodding along to keep the peace. It is not pretending to share the same feelings when you don’t. It is being willing to argue, to disagree, to listen, to be uncomfortable, and to keep showing up anyway.
Terrell is not an echo chamber for me. He is not here to polish my arguments or stroke my ego. He is here to challenge me. He is here to bring fire when I slip into comfort. He is here to remind me that silence is not neutral. Silence kills too.
The silence of ignoring voices like his. The silence of pretending history is cleaner than it is. The silence of refusing to face hypocrisy when it is right in front of you.
We do not have to hold the same feelings to stand together. We do not have to agree on every word to call each other family. That is what makes it real. That is what makes it matter.
I may not share every feeling Terrell has, but I respect the man, his art, his voice, and his fire. He is my friend. He is my teacher. And at the end of the day, he is my brother.
Do no harm. Take no shit. Welcome disagreement. Be willing to learn and grow from people even if you don’t completely understand them or agree. That is what it means to me.
—Cody Taymore
Kill The Silence
When a Voice Is Shot, We All Bleed
Charlie Kirk was shot and killed while speaking at Utah Valley University. A suspect is now in custody. Officials say a single round from distance ended a life in front of an audience that came to hear ideas, not gunfire. That is the headline. It is also the warning. Political bullets do not stop at one target. They tear holes in the space where disagre…
Cody, let me explain something to you it’s called perspicacity. This post is about just that. It means sharp insight, the ability to cut through noise and see the truth.
For me, it’s iron sharpening iron. I live with a level of perception shaped by a world you don’t have to survive in.
There can be empathy, but if you aren’t Black if you don’t carry ancestors who were enslaved you can’t fully understand this reality.
You see the world from a vantage point built on privilege. Some people are waking up to that privilege, but most don’t give a damn.
I’ve always spoken with you because you actually want to understand. Even if we don’t talk every day, I knew that when I pushed back, you’d at least see why. Meanwhile, I argue daily with people who defend Kirk or minimize what his movement stood for and truthfully, Kirk isn’t even the worst of them.
As long as you stay open to learning, the world has a chance to shift. But understand this I’m actively fighting not just opinions, but systems.
I’ve been blackballed, discriminated against, and shut out by the biggest corporations.
I’ve won awards on the level of the Pulitzer, yet in this anti-Black, anti-DEI landscape, the white male gaze still dictates who gets to sit at the table.
Every day I fight for my right to be great and for the chance to stand alongside peers who are too often elevated simply because of their skin color.
That’s the reality I carry into every conversation.
Very, very powerful. I admire your willingness to accept and honor feedback. We don't have to be perfect; just willing to listen, learn, and respect other people's perspective.