From the mass killings last Tuesday.
San Francisco ChronicleBy Katelyn BurnsMarch 28, 2023In Nashville on Monday, a devastating school shooting appears to have been perpetrated by a 28-year-old transgender man named Audrey Hale. According to media reports, Hale was autistic, though high functioning, and only recently came out as trans. Many conservative figureheads, however, like the Daily Wire’s Matt Walsh and Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-N.C., have already jumped on the bandwagon of blaming the shooting on Hale’s gender identity, sparking panic among many in the trans community over potential conservative reprisals.“How much hormones like testosterone and medications for mental illness was the transgender school shooter taking? Everyone can stop blaming guns now,” tweeted Greene, shortly after police revealed the suspected shooter’s identity in a news conference.There’s no actual evidence at this point that Hale was taking testosterone. Instead, it appears from initial police reports that the suspect’s motive came largely from grudges held from his attendance at the private Christian school. Facts, of course, will make little difference to the Republicans who have waged a culture war against trans people for most of the past decade.It’s crucial that trans allies see through the GOP rhetoric on all of this.
Yep, there sure has been a lot of BS from this and they are milking this for all they can get out of it.
Expect Republicans to use the Nashville shooting to attempt to add “gender dysphoria” — the clinical term used to describe the incongruence between a trans person’s physical sex and their gender identity — or the taking of cross-sex hormones, to the list of reasons to deny a gun license to citizens.
The Republicans are jumping up and down over President Biden trying to ban assault type weapons but they are considering violating the Second Amendment for us. Two faced hypocrites!
After each of those shootings, the stock Republican response was to chide the left and claim that now was not the time to politicize shootings or to claim that the shooter was mentally disturbed or a lone wolf. They reached for anything that might disassociate their own politics from the motives of these shooters.Yet, mere minutes after discovering this latest shooter belonged to one of their already favorite targeted minorities, they immediately sprang into action, seeking to further inflame their culture war on trans people.
It is not about guns for the Republicans it is about votes! They are only pro-guns because their base is, they couldn’t care one way or another about guns… it is the right-wing votes that they care. Every elections… the Democrats are going to take away your guns! Vote for us.
As usual the right-wing propaganda machine are cranking out the lies.
AP NewsBy Sophia TulpMarch 30, 2023Moments after the assailant who killed six people at a Nashville private school was identified as transgender, a baseless narrative emerged: that there has been an incredible rise in transgender or nonbinary mass shooters in recent years.Some pundits and political influencers on social media went further, suggesting that movements for trans rights are radicalizing activists into terrorists.The data tells a different story, according to gender and criminology experts. Mass casualty shootings perpetrated by someone identifying as trans or nonbinary are rare, and in fact, those groups are far more likely to be the victims of violence. Here’s a closer look at the facts.CLAIM: Four recent shootings show there has been an “incredible rise” in transgender or nonbinary mass shooters in the past few years, making the group “by far the largest group committing as a percentage of the population.”Donald Trump Jr. spread the narrative widely on Twitter, claiming the supposed “incredible rise” and later saying there was a clear trend forming. The idea was amplified by hundreds of other social media users. Trump Jr. did not respond to a request for comment.THE FACTS: While specific data on transgender and nonbinary mass shooters can be hard to isolate, available information shows that the overwhelming majority of assailants in mass shootings are cisgender males.In making the claim, social media users are citing four examples over the past five years in which the assailant in a shooting identified as trans or nonbinary: the November killing of five at a gay nightclub in Colorado Springs, Colorado; a 2019 shooting at a Denver-area school by two shooters, one of them a trans man, that left one student dead and eight wounded; a 2018 shooting at a Maryland warehouse that left four dead, including the shooter; and the shooting Monday in Nashville.The number of mass shootings committed by those identifying as trans or nonbinary — and their ratio compared to mass shootings committed by other groups — is hard to quantify. It depends on the database used, how the act is defined and how gender identity is recorded — for example, transgender males may statistically be counted as just men. But experts agree that the most reputable information still shows a clear pattern that cisgender males are the most likely to commit such an act of mass violence.
The Republicans and the right-wingers are doing what they do best... spreading lies and innuendos to create fear.
Back down to our favorite villain… DeSantis. I don’t know if you knew that Florida just passed a “new and improved” school voucher program that critics say harms education.
Lawmakers are using the public schools to separate society.Tampa Bay TimesEditorialMarch 29, 2023School vouchers. The voucher bill that Gov. Ron DeSantis signed Monday will cost the state hundreds of millions of dollars, providing wealthier families a tax subsidy while tilting the scales further away from public education. The measure provides every K-12 school-age child in Florida a voucher or education savings account regardless of family income. That clears the way for tens of thousands of children already in private schools to reap about $8,700 annually apiece. How is Florida expanding school choice by rewarding families who have already opted for private schools? Lawmakers haven’t even agreed on what the expansion would cost or how to pay for it; the estimates are so wildly varying that sponsors put hundreds of millions of dollars into reserves. This is a wholesale giveaway of tax dollars to private industry. And whatever one’s view of the merits, it will siphon resources, students and community support for traditional schools, worsening their ability to compete.
Also consider that voucher programs fave the rich and not lower income communities. If you are making around minimal wage you can’t afford private schools even with the vouchers. Private schools can discriminate! They refuse LGBTQ+ students, they can refuse someone not of their religion, they can refuse minorities. They are private and are exempt the non-discrimination laws. If there is a referendum on building a new school in town, how do you think those who can afford private schools will vote?
The editorial goes on to say,
Stigmatizing gays. State Education Commissioner Manny Diaz, a former Republican legislator whom DeSantis tapped for the post, is looking to broaden Florida’s Parental Rights in Education Act — also known as the Don’t Say Gay bill — by expanding the restrictions on sexual discussions from grades K-3 (where it already applies) through the 12th grade. The 2022 law, which Republicans defended as protecting parental rights, restricts a teacher’s ability to discuss matters pertaining to sexual orientation or gender identity. The law is purposely vague to create a chilling effect so teachers self-censor; extending that climate of fear into middle and high schools will create new anxieties for children and erode a climate of trust between students and the role models they interact with every day. It also will further stigmatize minorities and the LGBTQ+ community. Adolescence is tough enough; this adds to it.
And note the ban goes all the way though college! Speaking of college the editorial goes on to say how the laws are banning free speech that the First Amendment protects! How the state is voiding state employment contracts by ignoring tenure professors rights in their contracts.
These radical changes are only a new floor for Republicans going forward. And while that agenda is playing out in the schools, the health of Florida’s public education system invariably impacts all of society.
What type of educators will be looking for jobs in Florida? Somehow I feel that all the best and brightest will look elsewhere, the only conservative educators will look to Florida for jobs. Only the radical right will look at Florida’s colleges.
Update: 4/10/23 2:30PM
Since I wrote this there has been another shooting!
WLKYBy Curadhan PowellApril 10, 2023Four people are dead and at least eight others are wounded after a shooting Monday morning at a downtown Louisville bank.Police said that when officers arrived around 8:30 a.m. at Old National Bank on Main Street, not far from the Louisville Slugger Field, they encountered an active shooter inside.Officers exchanged fire with the shooter, who police said appears to be an employee or former employee of the bank. It’s unclear if the shooter died from police gunfire or a self-inflicted gunshot wound.Eight people are being treated for wounds, including two police officers. One Louisville Metro Police Department officer was critically injured and taken for surgery at UofL Hospital.
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