We saw another mass shooting Wednesday targeting another parochial grade school, this one during Mass at Annunciation Catholic Church in Minneapolis.
The shooter was Robin Westman, 23, a transgender who’d changed his name from Robert after he announced he was transitioning to a female. The details suggest that we’re treating the subject of trans youth wrong.
Westman left behind what appeared to be a manifesto, addressed to "my family and friends," according to KSTP 5 Eyewitness News. It said, in part, that "I’m a sad person, haunted by these thoughts that do not go away. I know this is wrong, but I can’t seem to stop myself."
Large sections of the manifesto were described as being "encrypted in a homespun code of Russian Cyrillic script and English words," and were especially revealing.
"I only keep [the long hair] because it is pretty much my last shred of being trans," the shooter wrote. "I am tired of being trans, I wish I never brain-washed myself."
Former FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe listed what he called "remarkable similarities" between Wednesday's shooting in Minneapolis and the 2023 Covenant School shooting by Aiden Hale in Nashville. They include:
- Both shooters were in their 20s
- Both targeted religious schools that they’d attended
- Both brought three legally-purchased weapons
- Both drove to and left their vehicle at the attack site
- Both posted manifestos
- both wanted to kill young children
- Both were students of other mass shooters
But McCabe ignored the most obvious and relevant similarity — they were both transgender.
He came close, though, by suggesting that the mass shooters are "mentally disturbed, and alienated, and filled with grievances."
In addition to the Minneapolis and Nashville shootings, there have been at least three other recent such tragedies, committed by those who identified as either transgender or non-binary. They include:
- Anderson Lee Aldrich, in 2022: The perpetrator of the shooting at an LGBTQ nightclub in Colorado Springs killed five people and wounded 19 others. Aldrich identified as non-binary and pleaded guilty and was sentenced to multiple life sentences.
- Alec McKinney, in 2019: McKinney, a transgender male, along with a fellow student, fatally shot one person and injured several others at a STEM school in Highlands Ranch, Colorado. McKinney was sentenced to life in prison.
- Snochia Moseley, in 2018: Moseley, who had recently begun to identify as a transgender male, shot and killed three people at a Rite Aid facility in Aberdeen, Maryland. Like Wednesday’s shooter, Moseley died from a self-inflicted gunshot wound.
Perhaps we should medically treat people who claim to be transgender differently. Instead of humoring them and their delusion, we should correct it.
This should especially apply to young people.
We used to call this condition — this confusion over one’s sexual identity — gender dysphoria, and treated it as a mental disorder.
It would seem pretty obvious that nothing good can come from pumping drugs and hormones like puberty blockers into a young person, who is already confused and suffers from mental illness.
In addition, today's accepted treatment calls for medical professionals to prescribe them with a lifetime of estrogen (for males claiming to be female), or testosterone (for females claiming to be male). And they call that “gender affirming” care.
If they want to offer true "gender affirming" care, they should prescribe the hormone that corresponds to their biological sex. Better yet, don’t prescribe anything.
And the drugs are a prelude to body parts typically being chopped off.
Periodic sessions with a caring, empathetic psychologist or psychiatrist would be far less invasive than drugs and surgery. And it would have one additional benefit.
All five shooters listed above — Robin Westman, Aiden Hale, Anderson Lee Aldrich, Alec McKinney, and Snochia Moseley — purchased their firearms legally from a licensed dealer.
People being treated for a mental disorder are generally prohibited from buying weapons.
Although the phrase "first, do no harm" is not contained in the original Hippocratic Oath, that principle is a core concept in the writings of Hippocrates, and is a good rule for medical professionals to follow.
Rather than humoring their patients' delusions, they should help them accept their true sexual identity. We need to stop celebrating transgenderism and start treating it.
Michael Dorstewitz is a retired lawyer and is a frequent contributor to Newsmax. He's also a former U.S. Merchant Marine officer and a Second Amendment supporter. Read Michael Dorstewitz's Reports — More Here.
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