August 28, 2025 • 24 mins
A tragic shooting at a Catholic school in Minneapolis by a transgender individual is leading to some of the most obnoxious media coverage of all time, from both the liberal media and conservative media alike. I break it down in this episode of the Brad vs Everyone podcast.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
But since she identifies as a female and wants your
name to reflect that identification was underage.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
It's, now, Robin, just what we need after another national tragedy,
terrible media coverage that hopelessly divides our country. We're going
to break this down and so much more on today's
episode of The Brad Versus Everyone Podcast, my daily show
(00:29):
where we take on the craziest ideas from across the Internet,
our media, and our politics, all from an independent perspective.
Now we cover media insanity and terrible coverage and examples
of awful journalism on this show in great detail. So unfortunately,
there's a lot of that going on right now in
(00:50):
the aftermath of a horrifying mass shooting in Minneapolis targeting
a Catholic school, where two innocent young kids lives were
law and dozens and dozens more were hurt or scarred
or traumatized. It's one of those things that, just to
any normal person is so senseless and so heartbreaking. But really,
(01:13):
you would think it wouldn't have to become culture war
fodder or immediately be consumed by mediumlpractice, but you would
be wrong. First, here is a clip summarizing what happened
from the Minneapolis Chief of Police.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
Two young children, ages eight and ten, were killed where
they sat in the pews. Their parents have been notified.
Seventeen other people were injured, fourteen of them being children.
Two of those children are in critical condition. The coward
who fired these shots ultimately took his own life in
the rear of the church. Our hearts are broken for
the families who have lost their children, for these young
(01:53):
lives that are now fighting to recover, and for our
entire community that has been so deeply traumatized by this
senseless attack.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
Now, guys, the first thing, and this is going to
be very relevant throughout today's episode, that is already causing
chaos and controversy is that this shooter, whose name I
won't mention. I don't really believe in publicizing the shooters.
They often want that apparently I was transgender or identified
(02:21):
as transgender. So this was a male who at one
point identified as a woman and changed his name to
a more feminine name and changed his gender on some
documents or what have you. I will be referring to
him as a male because that's what he is. But
apparently CNN, at least CNN host Jake Tapper wants you
(02:42):
to remember the importance of respecting this mass murderer's identity
and feelings. Take a listen to this.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
Another piece of the puzzle as to who the shooter
was in Minneapolis, Starterbuting says, according to court records, because
there's been some confusion about what the shooter's name was, Yes,
Robin Westman's mother applied to change your child's name in
twenty nineteen. It was at one point Robert Paul Westman.
Speaker 4 (03:05):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
But since she identifies as a female and wants your
name to reflect that identification was underage, it's now Robin.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
Well, no, I will not be calling this person she
or her. This person is not and was never biologically female,
And frankly, I don't give a shit about respecting your pronouns. One.
This person is dead now, so they're not feeling anything
any type of way about anything except maybe in hell
(03:34):
where they're burning. But yeah, I don't care about your feelings.
I'm not trying to be polite or nice to you.
If you do a shooting at a school, I don't care.
I really don't. And frankly, intentionally I may disrespect you
because you are the textbook example of a human not
worthy of respect, not because you're trans, but because of
(03:56):
the actions that you've taken. And I'm willing to use
people's pronouns in many situations where you have an actual
trans person, which ender dysphoria. But we should all be
clear about what's happening there is we are engaging in
a social fiction for the purposes of being polite and
being courteous, and when you violate the social contract in
(04:18):
such an egregious way, I therefore feel no desire to
ever be courteous or polite to you ever again. And
then there's like an actual factual reality that becomes obfuscated
when media coverage bends to this kind of gender identity
as sancrosact philosophy. So the New York Times and it's
(04:40):
reporting on this shooter basically presented the story as if
a female, as if just an everyday woman had gone
out and committed a mass shooting, which, as you probably know,
is statistically incredibly rare. Here's their headline, Minneapolis suspect knew
her target, but motive is a mystery. The shooter who
attacked the Catholic school on Wednesday posted social media videos
(05:03):
and writings that betrayed a litany of grievances and obsessions. Now,
some people on the right have been attacking The Times
or other mainstream media outlets, were saying the motive is unclear.
When this person attacked the Catholic school, they had all
these public statements about many charged topics. I think it's
somewhat defensible to say that the motive is unclear, though
from a journalistic perspective, because of all the possible motives,
(05:25):
all the uninsane hatred, and possible personal connections, were not
really sure which specifically one drove the event. So I'm
not even necessarily critiquing The Times for that part. But
when you put her in a headline, most people reading
that will think you are referring to a woman. But
in this case, you are referring to a male, a man.
(05:48):
And unfortunately most people don't read past the headline. But
even if they do, even if they read several paragraphs
into this story, they will come away with no idea
that the person who committed this shooting was a male,
which is relevant because biology affects rates of violence in populations.
It's just a fact males are much more likely to
(06:09):
commit these kinds of atrocities. Than females. Here are the
opening paragraphs of this Time story. The person who the
police say opened fire on a Catholic school in Minneapolis
on Wednesday appears to have known the school well. That
person who officials said strafed the church through the stained
glass windows, killing two children, was believed to have once
attended the school at Annunciation Catholic Church, according to a
(06:30):
law enforcement official with knowledge of the investigation. Her mother,
Mary Grace Westman, worked in the business office of the
church five years before retiring in twenty twenty one, and
Miss Westman, armed with three weapons, seemed to choose the
time carefully. She barricaded the doors during the first all
(06:50):
school mass of the academic year, but it is hard
to fathom what drove Miss Westman to attack before killing herself.
And then again they multiple times say Miss Westman is
the mis in the room with us, because this is
a male who, from what I've seen, hadn't even medically
transitioned and was just insane and confused and apparently also
(07:13):
thought they were transgender. The idea that The Times is
taking this person's preferences and presenting them as truth at
the expense of readers actually getting to know what happened
here is insane to me and is total medium malpractice.
I mean, you don't learn until the eighth paragraph of
(07:35):
this time story that this shooter is actually a male.
How is that accurate or correct? Seriously, I don't understand this.
And even then it's some sort of convoluted reference to
the fact that the shooter changed their gender on forms.
They don't even say this is a biological male who
identified as a woman. That would be accurate, right, that
would be a statement of fact. It is crazy to
(07:59):
let act activist ideologies warp your presentation of the truth
in America's most pre eminent newspaper still today, the New
York Times, And again I think it comes at the
expense of an important fact and reality about this. So
not only are you like accommodating the preferences of the deceased,
(08:21):
evil human, which I'm just not sure why we would do,
but you are also actually obviouscating an important reality because
what matters in terms of like rates of violence in
society is biology. Biologically speaking, males as a class of
humans versus females are much more violent and commit much
(08:42):
more violent crime in society, and that is like an
important statistical phenomenon that affects our approach to crime and
safety and many other things. And yet people are coming
away with the idea that women are committing crimes that
actually men are committing because reporters are so committed to
an activist ideology or so scared of the activists who
will attack them if they misgender a mass shooter. Tell
(09:06):
those people to go themselves, be disrespectful to mass shooters,
and report the truth. How is that a hot take?
I read? How is this even something controversial? I really
don't understand you, guys, though, let me know what you think.
You was horrified by this kind of mainstream media coverage
as I am. Let me know in the comments, make
(09:27):
sure subscribed, and do hit that like button while you
are at it. But guys, it is not just the
mainstream media or CNN that is misleading people or covering
this in a terrible way. Frankly, it is also almost
all right wing and conservative media and Republicans more broadly.
They are seizing on this horrific event to promote false
(09:51):
narratives that are just not based in facts and reality
about trans people, the trans population, the trans community, which
you all know. I'm very critical of very critical of
the trans movement, the transactivists, all of this. But ultimately,
my source that I come back to, my guiding principle
is truth and fact. And I'm also just against a
(10:13):
blanket demonizations of entire groups of people based on the
actions of individuals. But apparently many unconservative media are not
because they are taking this one horrific incident in Minneapolis
and a couple others like it that have occurred over
the last several years, and they are suggesting that the
entire trans population or movement or what have you, is
(10:36):
a violent and dangerous and that this is a trend
in a wave that is out of control. Don't take
my word for it. Here's a compilation of everybody from
Daily Wire to Fox News to Newsmax spinning this exact narrative.
The trans terrorism epidemic continues, and it's only getting worse.
It's time to be brutally honest about this problem.
Speaker 5 (10:58):
Statistically, the transpopulation has been prone to violence. That's not villainizing.
That's reality. And if you can't recognize reality, you're in danger.
Speaker 2 (11:08):
You see it, I see it.
Speaker 5 (11:09):
The trans clan has a militant wing and it's out
for blood. They're taking lives, defiling churches, and freaking everybody out.
Speaker 4 (11:18):
There is a trans violence crisis in this country and
half the country. Many of the same people who voted
for Kamala Harris just don't seem to care. A transshooter
in a state where Democrats have made it perfectly clear
that they support the insanity that this has become what
we now call the trans community in this country.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
It's not just them. This is all over social media
and some of the biggest voices on the right online
are spreading this exact message. Elon Musk shared the news
of the transshooter being trans and said, there is a
clear pattern here. Bennie Johnson, them star Maga YouTuber wrote,
one thing is very clear. The trans movement is radical
(12:00):
the mentally ill into becoming violent terrorists who target children
for murder. The pattern is undeniable. It's actually not undeniable
because I deny it. It's not happening. It's not supported
by the actual facts and statistics when you look into it.
This is not correct. The data do not support this narrative.
(12:21):
They love to share these cherry picked lists of trans
or non binary shooters, but they often list several that
actually aren't. To be very clear, there are five confirmed
examples where mass shooters are either identified as transgender or
non binary. That is, out of a population that consists
of more than two point eight million people over the
(12:42):
age of thirteen according to the Williams Institute, five people
out of nearly three million. And you are drawing sweeping
conclusions about a whole population and community that is statistically illiterate,
wildly unfair, and frankly they're all to do to castigate
millions of people because of the actions of a few
(13:04):
same way it would be to look at all these
mass shooters and say, oh, they're almost all male. I
guess all men are violent and dangerous and bad. Of
course that's not true, and at least in that case
you even have an underlying overrepresentation. You don't have that
when it comes to trans people. It's just the facts.
I do not ever shy away from criticizing trans and
(13:26):
transactivism and all that, but at the end of the day,
the facts are not there behind all these claims. Many
of these monologues don't even reference statistics at all. They
just assert the claim as fact. And when you look
at the actual statistics that we have about this, it's
just not true. For example, the Violence Project, which defines
(13:48):
a mass shooting as four or more people being shot
and killed excluding the shooter, in a public location with
no connection to underlying criminal activities such as gangs or drugs.
They identified out of a list of nearly two hundred
mass shootings that ninety eight percent were committed by people
who were male, two percent were committed by people who
(14:10):
were female, and less than one percent were committed by
people who identified as transgender. Obviously, the numbers there are
rounded up. Now. I prefer those numbers because when we
talk about a mass shooting, we are really we're not
talking about gang drive bys or kind of drug deals
gone wrong, or other things which if you just look
at shooting and don't really have any nuance to it,
(14:32):
that is counted. And we're also not talking really about
incidents where people don't die, where they're just injured. But
some more expansive databases like the Gun Violence Archive, which
we're about to look at, they just look at any
instance where four more people are shot, and they don't
really add much qualifiers to it, even instances where no
(14:52):
one died, even instances where it's related to like a
gang or something like that. They just cast a very
wide net. So we have data source that kind of
narrowly looks at it, and then another one that casts
a very wide data set. And they have mass shootings
by gender status. Twenty eighteen to twenty twenty three, they
have two thousand, eight hundred and twenty six mass shootings
(15:15):
under their expansive definition committed by people who were not transgender,
and three that were committed by people who were confirmed
to be transgender, even if you add in the instance
that just happened, even if you count a couple of
these ones that are not verified that they like to
put in their lists that they share, and they're infographics.
(15:35):
The people spreading this narrative, the numbers are not there
to suggest that trans people are massively overrepresented in mass shootings.
They the facts just don't support this claim. And guys,
it would be very easy for me to lean into
this narrative for clicks and just be like the trans
agenda out of control. They're getting violent. But I respect
(15:59):
you far too much to lie to you, and I
can only tell you what the factual truth is, and
it is not what these people are saying. Now, all
across right wing internet circles. They're sharing this graph that
they say proves what they they're claiming, but it really doesn't.
I want to show it to you. It says mass
shooting rates by demographic twenty fifteen to twenty twenty five
(16:22):
public incidents with four or more fatalities, expressed as rates
per million population. They then compare trans slash non binary
to Asian, Black, White, Hispanic, and Native American. Do you
see the problem with that. We're comparing races to genders,
and then the people who are trans are also going
(16:43):
to be counted in the races. This makes no sense.
And also I still I've looked and I see them
sharing this everywhere. It has no data sources cited for
any of the numbers. It's just a graph some dude
made and posted on acts as far as I can tell.
But none of the numbers are cited or sourced in
any way. Even Taking this number, which I do not
think is correct or real, this graph that they are
(17:05):
showing to prove this point, what they have found is
zero point seven one eight per million trans slash non
binary mass shooters. Round that up to one. Then what
you are saying is one out of one million trans
or non binary people are shooters. You do really think
(17:27):
that proves that this is an inherently dangerous, violent radical community.
Do you hear yourself? Do you know how many people?
A million people is that you have nine hundred and
ninety nine thousand plus nine hundred and ninety nine more,
and just one of them is an evil, violent psychopath
who would do a mass shooting. Taking these I totally unverified,
(17:51):
I don't think are correct numbers. Taking them as true
totally decimates the narrative they're citing this graph to prove.
Because one, they're not even comparing it to men and women,
which is what you would actually compare it to trans
men women. That would be the interesting comparison. Why aren't
they doing that? Probably because the men would be higher
than the trans that if we're being so forur real,
if we're keeping it one hundred. But regardless, this bizarre, unsited,
(18:16):
totally unverified graph they're citing does not in any way
lead credence to the claims they are making about trans
epidemic of violence. What a violent radical community. I do
not understand this as an expression of anything other than
raw emotion and outrage and frankly motivated by animus. But
(18:39):
to quote these same types, facts don't care about your feelings,
and the facts do not support this blanket demonization of
transgender people because of the actions of a few fringe individuals.
I'm just trying to be honest with you, guys. I'm
just trying to tell you the truth as I see it,
and I don't think these people care. I think I
(19:00):
think they just have landed on a narrative and decided
to run with it, and that narrative is impervious to
statistics or facts. I mean, you even asked groc Elon
Musk's hand designed AI to fact check this. I'll come
back with the same information I showed you, not anything
proving these people's claims. But I will always be honest
(19:21):
with you. Whether you agree with me or you disagree
with me, I will always give you my honest opinion
about what is happening and what's happening right now. I've
been so critical of transactivists in the community. I think
is wildly unfair to them. I've known trans people over
the years, but even if I'd never had a transgender
friend or anyone, I would never support blanketly blaming or
(19:44):
condemning millions of people because of the actions of a few,
whether that was being done to Catholics, whether it was
being done to gay people, black people. I think people
are individuals and they are responsible for themselves and their
own action, not for the actions and behavior of people
that check off the same box on the census system.
(20:05):
And I will stick to that, and frankly, I would
argue that even if they were massively overrepresented, still not
really on anyone's shoulders except the people that did it
and people who encouraged it explicitly. Anyone else is not
to blame for it. But even now, that's not even
the underlying case. The numbers are not there. And again,
I respect you guys too much to lie to you,
(20:28):
Whereas I think a lot of these people just hop
on a narrative and tell you what they think will
go viral, will resonate, will rile people up. I'm never
going to do that, And if you don't agree with me,
that's always okay. I'm always open to hearing about it
from you guys. But all I can do is tell
you the truth is I see it, and on this one,
I think they are totally wrong and I just can't
(20:49):
get on board with this narrative that's emerging. But what
do you guys think? Let me know in the comments,
Make sure subscribed if you aren't yet, and do hit
that like button while you are at it. Now. One
final piece of this I want to talk talk about
is the truly bizarre take that Candace Owens put out
after this shooting. You probably know of Candace. She is
a super popular right wing YouTuber and influencer, very controversial
(21:14):
over the years. She loves herself a good conspiracy theory,
and I think she's finally taken that too far. I mean, honestly, frankly,
she took it too far a while ago in my view,
But after this, you should change how you look at
her after this. Here is how she responded to this
shooting at the Catholic School in Minneapolis. She tweeted on
August twenty seven, the day of the shooting. The government
(21:37):
is behind this period, Oh evidence, nothing to back up
that claim. That extraordinary claim, just asserting it blindly to
millions of people. She continued, Each shooting is more traumatizing
than the last because the goal is to scare us
into compliance. It is the tried and true strategy of
(21:58):
nine to eleven and the Manson murders, both CIA operations
do not ever agree to hand over your Second Amendment rights.
That tweet has more than one and a half million
views from Candice Owens, and I don't even want to
get into the nine to eleven conspiracies of it all,
them Anson murders. I don't know anything about that one,
but there is zero evidence at all that this terrible
(22:21):
shooting in Minneapolis of this Catholic school was orchestrated by
the CIA or by the government. She just made that up,
asserted it as fact to millions of people. That is
so grotesque, That is so irresponsible of a way to
use your platform. That is so insulting to the victims
(22:42):
and their families that you are using the tragedy they
are still reeling from to go viral for conspiracy clickbait.
It is genuinely disgraceful. And I just think that if
you are a person with a public platform, you have
a responsibility to only assert things you know to be
(23:03):
true or have some reason to believe are true, not
to just wildly spout off and pop off and say
random shit and potentially mislead millions of people in the process.
But frankly, Candace Owans does a lot of that these days,
and I think it's to her eternal shame. Honestly, if
this is just obviously one story, it's just one post.
(23:25):
Though I imagine she'll double down on this on her
podcast the next time she drops an episode. But this
is the kind of thing that if somebody like this
makes a claim like this that is just so baseless
and is never able to prove it or back it up,
you can't just keep continuing to trust them, right if
they would lie to you once, or if they would
be so reckless once, you've got to stop trusting them
(23:47):
because that means they would do it again, and they
probably have done it many times. So it's up to you, guys.
But millions of people still tune into Candace, and I
think they should not. I think that is a serious
stake because a person this detached from reality and a
person this willing to throw around grave and seismic allegations
(24:09):
with no evidence in not even bothering to try to
pretend to present some that is not a person you
can trust as a source for information or perspectives. That's
my opinion At least, but you guys, let me know
what you think in the comments and guys, that'll be
it for today's episode of the Brad Versus Everyone podcast.
Thank you all so much for tuning in. Please do
(24:29):
make sure subscribed if you aren't yet, do it that
like button while you are at it, and we will
talk again real soon
But since she identifies as a female and wants your
name to reflect that identification was underage.
Speaker 2 (00:06):
It's, now, Robin, just what we need after another national tragedy,
terrible media coverage that hopelessly divides our country. We're going
to break this down and so much more on today's
episode of The Brad Versus Everyone Podcast, my daily show
(00:29):
where we take on the craziest ideas from across the Internet,
our media, and our politics, all from an independent perspective.
Now we cover media insanity and terrible coverage and examples
of awful journalism on this show in great detail. So unfortunately,
there's a lot of that going on right now in
(00:50):
the aftermath of a horrifying mass shooting in Minneapolis targeting
a Catholic school, where two innocent young kids lives were
law and dozens and dozens more were hurt or scarred
or traumatized. It's one of those things that, just to
any normal person is so senseless and so heartbreaking. But really,
(01:13):
you would think it wouldn't have to become culture war
fodder or immediately be consumed by mediumlpractice, but you would
be wrong. First, here is a clip summarizing what happened
from the Minneapolis Chief of Police.
Speaker 3 (01:28):
Two young children, ages eight and ten, were killed where
they sat in the pews. Their parents have been notified.
Seventeen other people were injured, fourteen of them being children.
Two of those children are in critical condition. The coward
who fired these shots ultimately took his own life in
the rear of the church. Our hearts are broken for
the families who have lost their children, for these young
(01:53):
lives that are now fighting to recover, and for our
entire community that has been so deeply traumatized by this
senseless attack.
Speaker 2 (02:00):
Now, guys, the first thing, and this is going to
be very relevant throughout today's episode, that is already causing
chaos and controversy is that this shooter, whose name I
won't mention. I don't really believe in publicizing the shooters.
They often want that apparently I was transgender or identified
(02:21):
as transgender. So this was a male who at one
point identified as a woman and changed his name to
a more feminine name and changed his gender on some
documents or what have you. I will be referring to
him as a male because that's what he is. But
apparently CNN, at least CNN host Jake Tapper wants you
(02:42):
to remember the importance of respecting this mass murderer's identity
and feelings. Take a listen to this.
Speaker 1 (02:49):
Another piece of the puzzle as to who the shooter
was in Minneapolis, Starterbuting says, according to court records, because
there's been some confusion about what the shooter's name was, Yes,
Robin Westman's mother applied to change your child's name in
twenty nineteen. It was at one point Robert Paul Westman.
Speaker 4 (03:05):
Correct.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
But since she identifies as a female and wants your
name to reflect that identification was underage, it's now Robin.
Speaker 2 (03:13):
Well, no, I will not be calling this person she
or her. This person is not and was never biologically female,
And frankly, I don't give a shit about respecting your pronouns. One.
This person is dead now, so they're not feeling anything
any type of way about anything except maybe in hell
(03:34):
where they're burning. But yeah, I don't care about your feelings.
I'm not trying to be polite or nice to you.
If you do a shooting at a school, I don't care.
I really don't. And frankly, intentionally I may disrespect you
because you are the textbook example of a human not
worthy of respect, not because you're trans, but because of
(03:56):
the actions that you've taken. And I'm willing to use
people's pronouns in many situations where you have an actual
trans person, which ender dysphoria. But we should all be
clear about what's happening there is we are engaging in
a social fiction for the purposes of being polite and
being courteous, and when you violate the social contract in
(04:18):
such an egregious way, I therefore feel no desire to
ever be courteous or polite to you ever again. And
then there's like an actual factual reality that becomes obfuscated
when media coverage bends to this kind of gender identity
as sancrosact philosophy. So the New York Times and it's
(04:40):
reporting on this shooter basically presented the story as if
a female, as if just an everyday woman had gone
out and committed a mass shooting, which, as you probably know,
is statistically incredibly rare. Here's their headline, Minneapolis suspect knew
her target, but motive is a mystery. The shooter who
attacked the Catholic school on Wednesday posted social media videos
(05:03):
and writings that betrayed a litany of grievances and obsessions. Now,
some people on the right have been attacking The Times
or other mainstream media outlets, were saying the motive is unclear.
When this person attacked the Catholic school, they had all
these public statements about many charged topics. I think it's
somewhat defensible to say that the motive is unclear, though
from a journalistic perspective, because of all the possible motives,
(05:25):
all the uninsane hatred, and possible personal connections, were not
really sure which specifically one drove the event. So I'm
not even necessarily critiquing The Times for that part. But
when you put her in a headline, most people reading
that will think you are referring to a woman. But
in this case, you are referring to a male, a man.
(05:48):
And unfortunately most people don't read past the headline. But
even if they do, even if they read several paragraphs
into this story, they will come away with no idea
that the person who committed this shooting was a male,
which is relevant because biology affects rates of violence in populations.
It's just a fact males are much more likely to
(06:09):
commit these kinds of atrocities. Than females. Here are the
opening paragraphs of this Time story. The person who the
police say opened fire on a Catholic school in Minneapolis
on Wednesday appears to have known the school well. That
person who officials said strafed the church through the stained
glass windows, killing two children, was believed to have once
attended the school at Annunciation Catholic Church, according to a
(06:30):
law enforcement official with knowledge of the investigation. Her mother,
Mary Grace Westman, worked in the business office of the
church five years before retiring in twenty twenty one, and
Miss Westman, armed with three weapons, seemed to choose the
time carefully. She barricaded the doors during the first all
(06:50):
school mass of the academic year, but it is hard
to fathom what drove Miss Westman to attack before killing herself.
And then again they multiple times say Miss Westman is
the mis in the room with us, because this is
a male who, from what I've seen, hadn't even medically
transitioned and was just insane and confused and apparently also
(07:13):
thought they were transgender. The idea that The Times is
taking this person's preferences and presenting them as truth at
the expense of readers actually getting to know what happened
here is insane to me and is total medium malpractice.
I mean, you don't learn until the eighth paragraph of
(07:35):
this time story that this shooter is actually a male.
How is that accurate or correct? Seriously, I don't understand this.
And even then it's some sort of convoluted reference to
the fact that the shooter changed their gender on forms.
They don't even say this is a biological male who
identified as a woman. That would be accurate, right, that
would be a statement of fact. It is crazy to
(07:59):
let act activist ideologies warp your presentation of the truth
in America's most pre eminent newspaper still today, the New
York Times, And again I think it comes at the
expense of an important fact and reality about this. So
not only are you like accommodating the preferences of the deceased,
(08:21):
evil human, which I'm just not sure why we would do,
but you are also actually obviouscating an important reality because
what matters in terms of like rates of violence in
society is biology. Biologically speaking, males as a class of
humans versus females are much more violent and commit much
(08:42):
more violent crime in society, and that is like an
important statistical phenomenon that affects our approach to crime and
safety and many other things. And yet people are coming
away with the idea that women are committing crimes that
actually men are committing because reporters are so committed to
an activist ideology or so scared of the activists who
will attack them if they misgender a mass shooter. Tell
(09:06):
those people to go themselves, be disrespectful to mass shooters,
and report the truth. How is that a hot take?
I read? How is this even something controversial? I really
don't understand you, guys, though, let me know what you think.
You was horrified by this kind of mainstream media coverage
as I am. Let me know in the comments, make
(09:27):
sure subscribed, and do hit that like button while you
are at it. But guys, it is not just the
mainstream media or CNN that is misleading people or covering
this in a terrible way. Frankly, it is also almost
all right wing and conservative media and Republicans more broadly.
They are seizing on this horrific event to promote false
(09:51):
narratives that are just not based in facts and reality
about trans people, the trans population, the trans community, which
you all know. I'm very critical of very critical of
the trans movement, the transactivists, all of this. But ultimately,
my source that I come back to, my guiding principle
is truth and fact. And I'm also just against a
(10:13):
blanket demonizations of entire groups of people based on the
actions of individuals. But apparently many unconservative media are not
because they are taking this one horrific incident in Minneapolis
and a couple others like it that have occurred over
the last several years, and they are suggesting that the
entire trans population or movement or what have you, is
(10:36):
a violent and dangerous and that this is a trend
in a wave that is out of control. Don't take
my word for it. Here's a compilation of everybody from
Daily Wire to Fox News to Newsmax spinning this exact narrative.
The trans terrorism epidemic continues, and it's only getting worse.
It's time to be brutally honest about this problem.
Speaker 5 (10:58):
Statistically, the transpopulation has been prone to violence. That's not villainizing.
That's reality. And if you can't recognize reality, you're in danger.
Speaker 2 (11:08):
You see it, I see it.
Speaker 5 (11:09):
The trans clan has a militant wing and it's out
for blood. They're taking lives, defiling churches, and freaking everybody out.
Speaker 4 (11:18):
There is a trans violence crisis in this country and
half the country. Many of the same people who voted
for Kamala Harris just don't seem to care. A transshooter
in a state where Democrats have made it perfectly clear
that they support the insanity that this has become what
we now call the trans community in this country.
Speaker 2 (11:38):
It's not just them. This is all over social media
and some of the biggest voices on the right online
are spreading this exact message. Elon Musk shared the news
of the transshooter being trans and said, there is a
clear pattern here. Bennie Johnson, them star Maga YouTuber wrote,
one thing is very clear. The trans movement is radical
(12:00):
the mentally ill into becoming violent terrorists who target children
for murder. The pattern is undeniable. It's actually not undeniable
because I deny it. It's not happening. It's not supported
by the actual facts and statistics when you look into it.
This is not correct. The data do not support this narrative.
(12:21):
They love to share these cherry picked lists of trans
or non binary shooters, but they often list several that
actually aren't. To be very clear, there are five confirmed
examples where mass shooters are either identified as transgender or
non binary. That is, out of a population that consists
of more than two point eight million people over the
(12:42):
age of thirteen according to the Williams Institute, five people
out of nearly three million. And you are drawing sweeping
conclusions about a whole population and community that is statistically illiterate,
wildly unfair, and frankly they're all to do to castigate
millions of people because of the actions of a few
(13:04):
same way it would be to look at all these
mass shooters and say, oh, they're almost all male. I
guess all men are violent and dangerous and bad. Of
course that's not true, and at least in that case
you even have an underlying overrepresentation. You don't have that
when it comes to trans people. It's just the facts.
I do not ever shy away from criticizing trans and
(13:26):
transactivism and all that, but at the end of the day,
the facts are not there behind all these claims. Many
of these monologues don't even reference statistics at all. They
just assert the claim as fact. And when you look
at the actual statistics that we have about this, it's
just not true. For example, the Violence Project, which defines
(13:48):
a mass shooting as four or more people being shot
and killed excluding the shooter, in a public location with
no connection to underlying criminal activities such as gangs or drugs.
They identified out of a list of nearly two hundred
mass shootings that ninety eight percent were committed by people
who were male, two percent were committed by people who
(14:10):
were female, and less than one percent were committed by
people who identified as transgender. Obviously, the numbers there are
rounded up. Now. I prefer those numbers because when we
talk about a mass shooting, we are really we're not
talking about gang drive bys or kind of drug deals
gone wrong, or other things which if you just look
at shooting and don't really have any nuance to it,
(14:32):
that is counted. And we're also not talking really about
incidents where people don't die, where they're just injured. But
some more expansive databases like the Gun Violence Archive, which
we're about to look at, they just look at any
instance where four more people are shot, and they don't
really add much qualifiers to it, even instances where no
(14:52):
one died, even instances where it's related to like a
gang or something like that. They just cast a very
wide net. So we have data source that kind of
narrowly looks at it, and then another one that casts
a very wide data set. And they have mass shootings
by gender status. Twenty eighteen to twenty twenty three, they
have two thousand, eight hundred and twenty six mass shootings
(15:15):
under their expansive definition committed by people who were not transgender,
and three that were committed by people who were confirmed
to be transgender, even if you add in the instance
that just happened, even if you count a couple of
these ones that are not verified that they like to
put in their lists that they share, and they're infographics.
(15:35):
The people spreading this narrative, the numbers are not there
to suggest that trans people are massively overrepresented in mass shootings.
They the facts just don't support this claim. And guys,
it would be very easy for me to lean into
this narrative for clicks and just be like the trans
agenda out of control. They're getting violent. But I respect
(15:59):
you far too much to lie to you, and I
can only tell you what the factual truth is, and
it is not what these people are saying. Now, all
across right wing internet circles. They're sharing this graph that
they say proves what they they're claiming, but it really doesn't.
I want to show it to you. It says mass
shooting rates by demographic twenty fifteen to twenty twenty five
(16:22):
public incidents with four or more fatalities, expressed as rates
per million population. They then compare trans slash non binary
to Asian, Black, White, Hispanic, and Native American. Do you
see the problem with that. We're comparing races to genders,
and then the people who are trans are also going
(16:43):
to be counted in the races. This makes no sense.
And also I still I've looked and I see them
sharing this everywhere. It has no data sources cited for
any of the numbers. It's just a graph some dude
made and posted on acts as far as I can tell.
But none of the numbers are cited or sourced in
any way. Even Taking this number, which I do not
think is correct or real, this graph that they are
(17:05):
showing to prove this point, what they have found is
zero point seven one eight per million trans slash non
binary mass shooters. Round that up to one. Then what
you are saying is one out of one million trans
or non binary people are shooters. You do really think
(17:27):
that proves that this is an inherently dangerous, violent radical community.
Do you hear yourself? Do you know how many people?
A million people is that you have nine hundred and
ninety nine thousand plus nine hundred and ninety nine more,
and just one of them is an evil, violent psychopath
who would do a mass shooting. Taking these I totally unverified,
(17:51):
I don't think are correct numbers. Taking them as true
totally decimates the narrative they're citing this graph to prove.
Because one, they're not even comparing it to men and women,
which is what you would actually compare it to trans
men women. That would be the interesting comparison. Why aren't
they doing that? Probably because the men would be higher
than the trans that if we're being so forur real,
if we're keeping it one hundred. But regardless, this bizarre, unsited,
(18:16):
totally unverified graph they're citing does not in any way
lead credence to the claims they are making about trans
epidemic of violence. What a violent radical community. I do
not understand this as an expression of anything other than
raw emotion and outrage and frankly motivated by animus. But
(18:39):
to quote these same types, facts don't care about your feelings,
and the facts do not support this blanket demonization of
transgender people because of the actions of a few fringe individuals.
I'm just trying to be honest with you, guys. I'm
just trying to tell you the truth as I see it,
and I don't think these people care. I think I
(19:00):
think they just have landed on a narrative and decided
to run with it, and that narrative is impervious to
statistics or facts. I mean, you even asked groc Elon
Musk's hand designed AI to fact check this. I'll come
back with the same information I showed you, not anything
proving these people's claims. But I will always be honest
(19:21):
with you. Whether you agree with me or you disagree
with me, I will always give you my honest opinion
about what is happening and what's happening right now. I've
been so critical of transactivists in the community. I think
is wildly unfair to them. I've known trans people over
the years, but even if I'd never had a transgender
friend or anyone, I would never support blanketly blaming or
(19:44):
condemning millions of people because of the actions of a few,
whether that was being done to Catholics, whether it was
being done to gay people, black people. I think people
are individuals and they are responsible for themselves and their
own action, not for the actions and behavior of people
that check off the same box on the census system.
(20:05):
And I will stick to that, and frankly, I would
argue that even if they were massively overrepresented, still not
really on anyone's shoulders except the people that did it
and people who encouraged it explicitly. Anyone else is not
to blame for it. But even now, that's not even
the underlying case. The numbers are not there. And again,
I respect you guys too much to lie to you,
(20:28):
Whereas I think a lot of these people just hop
on a narrative and tell you what they think will
go viral, will resonate, will rile people up. I'm never
going to do that, And if you don't agree with me,
that's always okay. I'm always open to hearing about it
from you guys. But all I can do is tell
you the truth is I see it, and on this one,
I think they are totally wrong and I just can't
(20:49):
get on board with this narrative that's emerging. But what
do you guys think? Let me know in the comments,
Make sure subscribed if you aren't yet, and do hit
that like button while you are at it. Now. One
final piece of this I want to talk talk about
is the truly bizarre take that Candace Owens put out
after this shooting. You probably know of Candace. She is
a super popular right wing YouTuber and influencer, very controversial
(21:14):
over the years. She loves herself a good conspiracy theory,
and I think she's finally taken that too far. I mean, honestly, frankly,
she took it too far a while ago in my view,
But after this, you should change how you look at
her after this. Here is how she responded to this
shooting at the Catholic School in Minneapolis. She tweeted on
August twenty seven, the day of the shooting. The government
(21:37):
is behind this period, Oh evidence, nothing to back up
that claim. That extraordinary claim, just asserting it blindly to
millions of people. She continued, Each shooting is more traumatizing
than the last because the goal is to scare us
into compliance. It is the tried and true strategy of
(21:58):
nine to eleven and the Manson murders, both CIA operations
do not ever agree to hand over your Second Amendment rights.
That tweet has more than one and a half million
views from Candice Owens, and I don't even want to
get into the nine to eleven conspiracies of it all,
them Anson murders. I don't know anything about that one,
but there is zero evidence at all that this terrible
(22:21):
shooting in Minneapolis of this Catholic school was orchestrated by
the CIA or by the government. She just made that up,
asserted it as fact to millions of people. That is
so grotesque, That is so irresponsible of a way to
use your platform. That is so insulting to the victims
(22:42):
and their families that you are using the tragedy they
are still reeling from to go viral for conspiracy clickbait.
It is genuinely disgraceful. And I just think that if
you are a person with a public platform, you have
a responsibility to only assert things you know to be
(23:03):
true or have some reason to believe are true, not
to just wildly spout off and pop off and say
random shit and potentially mislead millions of people in the process.
But frankly, Candace Owans does a lot of that these days,
and I think it's to her eternal shame. Honestly, if
this is just obviously one story, it's just one post.
(23:25):
Though I imagine she'll double down on this on her
podcast the next time she drops an episode. But this
is the kind of thing that if somebody like this
makes a claim like this that is just so baseless
and is never able to prove it or back it up,
you can't just keep continuing to trust them, right if
they would lie to you once, or if they would
be so reckless once, you've got to stop trusting them
(23:47):
because that means they would do it again, and they
probably have done it many times. So it's up to you, guys.
But millions of people still tune into Candace, and I
think they should not. I think that is a serious
stake because a person this detached from reality and a
person this willing to throw around grave and seismic allegations
(24:09):
with no evidence in not even bothering to try to
pretend to present some that is not a person you
can trust as a source for information or perspectives. That's
my opinion At least, but you guys, let me know
what you think in the comments and guys, that'll be
it for today's episode of the Brad Versus Everyone podcast.
Thank you all so much for tuning in. Please do
(24:29):
make sure subscribed if you aren't yet, do it that
like button while you are at it, and we will
talk again real soon
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