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“The former student of a Christian grade school in Nashville who killed three 9-year-olds and three adults in a shooting spree there was under a doctor's care for an ‘emotional disorder’ and had amassed a collection of guns, the city's police chief said on Tuesday…
“[Nashville Police Chief John] Drake said [assailant Audrey] Hale identified as a transgender person, and said investigators believe the suspect harbored ‘some resentment for having to go to’ the Covenant School as a child. The chief declined to elaborate and did not say what role, if any, Hale's gender identity, educational background or other social or religious dynamics might have played. Investigators ‘don't have a motive at this time,’ he said.” Reuters
The right asks why the shooter’s mental health issues didn’t show up in background checks, and criticizes media coverage of the incident.
“Tennessee does not have a ‘red flag’ law that would allow police to seize the firearms of individuals that are at elevated risk of harming themselves or others. However, under Tennessee law, anyone who has been deemed ‘mental defective’ cannot purchase a firearm in the first place…
“The Nashville shooter was, indisputably, a danger to others, and that threat to others was almost certainly connected to her mental illness. The evidence was there for her to be declared legally mentally defective and barred from owning firearms. The shooter’s parents believed she should not be allowed to own a firearm, indicating the shooter had said or done things that made her parents believe she was a potential threat to herself or others. But no one acted upon those concerns, and no one reached out to police… [These] laws only work if a concerned person goes to law enforcement.”
Jim Geraghty, National Review
“We don’t yet know to what extent Hale’s gender identity played a role in her mass murder spree. But we do know demands to sit on Hale’s words amount to a coverup, pure and simple. If Hale were a right-wing militia member, fundamentalist Christian or an ‘incel,’ her identity would be front and center of a million think-pieces blaming her whiteness, maleness or expressed beliefs for the massacre. Yes, there are significant moral questions around publishing any document of this kind. But if the media are going to hold Buffalo mass-shooter Payton Gendron’s racist beliefs under a microscope, they must do the same for Hale’s.”
Editorial Board, New York Post
“The legacy media have a preset narrative machine when it comes to mass shootings. That narrative machine takes into account the identities of the shooter and the victims, and then churns out an explanation for the shooting. White shooter, black victims: systemic racism. Black shooter, white victims: alienation caused by systemic racism. Muslim shooter, gay victims: Christian homophobia… This week, we are learning what pops up in the narrative machine when the inputs are ‘trans man’ and ‘Christian schoolchildren.’…
“NBC contributor Benjamin Ryan tweeted, ‘NBC has ID'd the Nashville school shooter... Nashville is home to the Daily Wire, a hub of anti-trans activity…’ Newsweek tweeted a story titled, ‘Tennessee Republicans' ban on drag shows criticized after mass shooting.’ ABC News correspondent Terry Moran stated that the shooter ‘identified herself as a transgender person. The State of Tennessee earlier this month passed and the governor signed a bill that banned transgender medical care for minors…’…
“A hate crime by a trans-identifying person against a religious group is immediately transmuted into a generalized societal crime against the mass shooter herself… In the perverse world of Leftist victimology, this makes sense: If you are a member of a supposedly victimized group, you cannot be the victimizer; there must be another victimizer who has victimized you, turning you back into a victim. But if we truly wish to prevent future acts of violence by unhinged lunatics, we ought to utilize a lens other than the lie of victimhood.”
Ben Shapiro, Creators
The left calls for ‘red flag’ laws to prevent the mentally ill from possessing guns, and a ban on assault rifles and high-capacity magazines.
The left calls for ‘red flag’ laws to prevent the mentally ill from possessing guns, and a ban on assault rifles and high-capacity magazines.
“[Republicans] have gotten almost everything they wanted on guns, and this nightmare is the result… Because of the Bruen case the Supreme Court decided last year, in which the conservative majority declared any contemporary restrictions on guns are unconstitutional if they don’t have a direct analogue to laws passed in the 18th century, state laws are being struck down left and right. Republican-run states are rushing to remove even the mildest restrictions on gun ownership…
“They don’t deny the carnage; just three months into the year, 10,000 Americans have been killed with guns… Instead, conservatives say that our gun violence problem has little, if anything, to do with guns and can be solved with measures that have little to do with guns either. We can improve mental health services or address the vulnerability of side doors in schools. Or, of course, we can just get more guns. The implication is that there’s a kind of ‘Laffer curve’ of mass slaughter whose benefits are waiting to be enjoyed. After a certain inflection point of firearm ubiquity, the number of murders will reverse course and rapidly head toward zero.”
Paul Waldman, Washington Post
"[Tennessee Gov. Bill] Lee and other Tennessee Republicans are burying their heads in the sand, insisting there was nothing they could have done to stop the shooting and that there is little they can do to prevent another one. In fact, they are skating around their own culpability in helping create the circumstances that allowed the shooting to happen…
“Lawmakers failed two years ago to pass a red flag law that would have prevented Monday’s shooter from legally acquiring seven guns, three of which were used in the attack. In the past few years, they loosened gun restrictions and focused their energy on attacking LGBTQ rights. Lee lost two friends, whom he said he has known for decades, in the shooting—and he still doesn’t feel spurred to action.”
Tori Otten, New Republic
“‘I don’t know why anyone needs an AR-15,’ President Donald Trump reportedly told aides in August 2019 after back-to-back mass shootings in Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso. There’s no good answer. The AR-15 was designed for soldiers, yet its associations with warfare eventually became a selling point for everyday buyers. ‘Use what they use,’ exhorted one ad displaying professionals wielding tactical rifles. Now, about 1 in 20 U.S. adults own at least one AR-15. That’s roughly 16 million people, storing roughly 20 million guns designed to mow down enemies on the battlefield with brutal efficiency…
“No single action will stop mass shootings, much less gun violence more generally. The Post’s reporting is only more evidence of the need for a ban on assault rifles. It’s evidence, too, of the need for a ban on high-capacity magazines. Rules restricting how many rounds a gun can fire before a shooter has to reload are more difficult to skirt than flat-out assault rifle bans, which sometimes prompt manufacturers to make cosmetic changes that will reclassify their products. A number is a number. These prohibitions might face legal challenges, but lawmakers in four states have recently added caps. More should follow.”
Editorial Board, Washington Post
