In a recent interview with The New York Times, Sean Penn shared his thoughts on the recent death of conservative activist Charlie Kirk. The “Next Battle” star said he opposed “almost everything” that Kirk believes, but he argued that people like Kirk need it to promote open debate on social issues.
“We need that discussion,” Penn said. “We have to fight it. (Acts of political violence) will become fashion. And the way we kill fashion in it is people of conscience on both sides, realizing that if someone really believes something, it’s your friend.”
Penn added that the country is in desperate need of mutual understanding across political boundaries and that people need to begin to recognize different perspectives as “valid opinions.”
“If someone believes that a human begins with conception, if you can’t understand that concept, you’re just stupid,” Penn said. “And if you are not going to accept the concept as a concept that is held as deeply as I believe, let me make a woman decide. All of these are valid opinions.”
Penn is not the first person to talk about Kirk in Hollywood. Stars like Stephen Colbert, Whoopi Goldberg, Jamie Lee Curtis, Michael Keaton, Arnold Schwarzenegger and Amanda Seyfried shared their thoughts in the weeks since his death.
Kirk passed away on September 10th in a speech at Utah Valley University in Orem, Utah. He was 31 years old.
Donald Trump has announced Kirk’s death in a true social society that writes, “Even the great and legendary, Charlie Kirk is dead.”
