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Culture War Roundup for the week of March 27, 2023

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This could shape to be peak toxoplasma. A lot of things are still unknown so my thoughts are pure speculation.

28-year-old woman kills 3 students and 3 adults at private Christian school in Nashville, police say

An armed 28-year-old woman fatally shot three students and three adults at a private Christian school in Nashville before she was shot and killed by police, authorities said, in the deadliest school shooting in nearly a year.

The shooter, who was not identified, entered the Covenant School via a side door and was armed with at least two assault-style rifles and a handgun, said Metro Nashville Police spokesperson Don Aaron. She fired multiple shots on the first and second floors of the school, he said.

A five-member team of police officers heard the gunfire, went to the second floor and fatally shot the woman, Aaron said. The first call about the shooting came in at 10:13 a.m. and the shooter was dead 14 minutes later, he said.

Police initially said the shooter appeared to be in her teens but later said she is a 28-year-old White woman who lives in Nashville. Police Chief John Drake said his initial findings showed she was at one point a student at the school. A vehicle was located nearby and gave clues as to the suspect’s identity, he added.

  • The police seemed to have actually acted adequately. It was not Uvalde - so the only thing resembling a good thing in the situation.

  • This is the first mass school shooting by a woman that I know. Probably the first mass shooting I hear at all committed by a woman.

  • The police released the race and age of the shooter, but not name or picture. There was a macabre joke that if the picture is not shown - the shooter is black. She is unidentified so far - which decreases slightly the chances the shooter was far right.

  • Two AR-15 and a handgun ... probably a loadout a bit high unless you are Caleb. (if you get the Blood reference - sorry buddy - you are officially in the risk cohort for covid by age)

  • Low body count - unexperienced shooter.

So I have the suspicion that either the shooter is trans or someone radicalized over Roe v Wade overturn. Also some last minute news outlets started saying female instead of woman. So I guess trans. Anyway CW-wise - will be toxic as hell.

Edit: NBCNews and NYPOST openly call it transgender woman. Not clear if MtF or FtM. And there seems to be manifesto.

If trans-men committed mass shootings at the rate of cis-men how many trans-men mass shooters would we expect?

The Williams Institute study says 1.3% of the pop 18-24 are trans and 0.4% of the pop 25-64. The shooter is 28, my guess is more than 0.4% of 28 year olds are trans. Education Weekly says there have been 157 school shootings with a fatality since 2018, though usually we think of a school shooting as a multiple fatality event. Cis-men commit 98% of mass shootings so just really rough back of the envelope math here 157 shootings * 98% done by men * 0.4% share of men that are trans, so there's a ~61% chance of a trans-masc shooter every five years? Given that this is the first trans-masc mass shooter I've heard of they probably do mass shootings at a lower rate.

That's rough math though, I don't have too much time right now but if someone has a better number for mass casualty school shootings that would be relevant.

The Williams Institute study says 1.3% of the pop 18-24 are trans

I dispute this number. Not that I have quantified values on hand contradicting this, but I just don't believe it. I'm going to interpret this number as "youths enormously over-report being trans".

I'm going to interpret this number as "youths enormously over-report being trans".

This might be correct, but also not contradictory to Williams Institute's claims. There's no strict definition of "trans," and I don't know what Williams Institute considers "trans," but one mainstream view among people who consider themselves as "pro-trans" is that reporting oneself to be trans means that one is trans. Under this framework, youths enormously over-reporting themselves as being trans would be equivalent to youths being trans at a higher rate than if some other (transphobic, by the POV of the people who push this standard) standards were used, such as experiencing gender dysphoria or socially/medically transitioning.

For ecgtheow's analysis, I don't know what definition of "trans" would be most relevant, though.

Yeah my guess is that the number of people who self-ID as trans is a bit higher than the number of people who are on HRT and/or have socially transitioned.

If you think testosterone levels rather than XY chromosome or male socialization is the key driver of aggression/violence/criminality than the # of trans identifying vs. # receiving HRT is important. But I also think the Williams Institute's 25-64 binning is annoying and the number of 25-40 year old trans people vs. 40-64 trans people is probably pretty different.