What is political blackmail and what are some of the things that have been going on after the Nashville school shooting?
Welcome back to another T-Rex talk. This is Isaac Botkin and
We're gonna go over a number of different things in this episode
Obviously, we will be talking
About the school shooting that happened in Nashville last week, but the timing around that is kind of interesting
the aftermath has been very interesting and
Today is April Fool's Day, which is also kind of interesting because today was the scheduled day of trans vengeance
Which is actually canceled, but we'll be talking more about that as well
So as many of you know and have probably heard quite a bit about there was a school shooting last week
At Covenant Presbyterian Church, but the timing is a little bit interesting. I'm not suggesting anything conspiratorial
But let's just look at a few different events earlier this month or I guess earlier in March
Tennessee passed SB 1 which was a very interesting bill that banned
Transsurgeries the mutilation of children under a certain age
I don't know that Tennessee is the first state to pass this type of bill
But it is the first state to pass a bill that is very expressly focused on
Identity the official wording is that it's
Outlying the administering to a minor a medical procedure for the purpose of enabling a minor to identify with or live as a
purported identity
inconsistent with the minor's sex which is an extremely extreme bill in the eyes of the left
So immediately after Tennessee passed that bill. There was a furor in the media people were calling out Tennessee
They were
Pretty pretty hot under the collar. That was a few weeks ago
And the stories about Tennessee's bigotry continued and then just over a week ago
Tucker Carlson did a segment talking about some of the backlash. There was a very strong focus
People telling the trans community to arm up
To not only go out and fight for the rights but also to prepare for
Attacks from far-right wingers and genocide and things like that. I'm gonna have some direct quotes
Just so you know, I'm not exaggerating
But there was immediately tremendous mockery of Tucker Carlson for this daft alarmism
How could he possibly suggest that all of the trans community that was buying firearms would in fact plan on using them?
When all they were doing was saying that they were planning on using them. Technically, I don't know how many of those were actually trans folks
And how many of them were just media allies?
but last week there was a shooting at
Covenant Presbyterian Church and it was actually a member of the trans community who?
did the murdering 28 year old woman went into the church building which has a school attached and
attacked and killed
three children all aged nine and
three adults
Response time for the police officers was 14 minutes, which is actually very very short
But waiting 14 minutes is very very long
I also want to point out that police response once they were on scene was excellent moving very quickly
neutralizing the threat very quickly
But obviously the impact on that church community and the school and those families has been
Tremendous and the aftermath of the Nashville shooting
Pretty rough in a number of different ways not going to talk a lot more about the shooter
This is pretty close to home, but there's a lot of stuff that's been going on
Immediately afterwards and I mean same day day after lots of people calling
Tennessee congressman and senators leaving death threats on their phones
Ironically people saying we hate violence so much that we will kill you if you don't pass
Anti-gun bills if you don't start
confiscating people's firearms now interestingly most of these phone calls were obviously scripted and
For the first almost the entire day all of them had New York area codes, which is a little bit fishy
I'm not sure if that's because these were all actually New Yorkers or if that's just what the phone bank was set to
Before they remembered that they should switch it over to
Tennessee Nashville area codes and there were some very loud protests people physically showed up
There was a lot of shouting there was a lot of pushing it looked a little bit like something that had happened on
January 6th, but obviously on a much smaller scale because Tennessee's Capitol building is a lot smaller and most of the protesters that showed up tried very hard to keep
The conversation if you can call it that the the chance and the shouting and the conversation very much on
guns a lot of the initial reaction was on guns and the murders because
details surrounding the murderer is
Were not particularly
Politically convenient at that time when leftists show up at your Capitol building to demand gun action
It's a little bit inconvenient to say that a
Left-est shot a bunch of people at a Christian school and that's why Christians should disarm the rest of the Christians
Yeah, all the usual folks were there the community organizers and logisticians and social media folks Eva
marks and the usual suspects and a
Lot of new faces a lot of people were being bust in even even high school students were being bust in from other states
I'm not sure of all them but definitely Alabama and definitely Kentucky and
Just a lot of shouting and a lot of chanting and a lot of political blackmail
Some of the chants were the usual think of our kids save our kids
But there was also a lot of very aggressive no action no peace
stuff and
This is really interesting to see as we've gotten more involved in local politics and
Done more and more stuff at the State House. We've gotten to know a lot of different people
And we've seen rallies we've organized lobby days
And we've seen things like this also back in the summer of 2020 a lot of folks got bust in to protest various things during that
mostly peaceful summer and
That is more like what we were seeing over the last few days
This isn't voters showing up to remind their representatives which values they hold this isn't people showing up
With recommendations or with concerns. This is people making death threats
Admittedly most of those over the phone. These are people chanting that there will be a lack of peace if they don't get their way
This is like good old fashioned mob stuff
And to be honest, I'm not really sure how the Tennessee legislature is going to handle it
I think that one of the major major factors that may
Change the way that it is looked at is the fact that so many of the folks who are showing up in these demonstrations are
High school students. I'm not sure if that makes it feel less like a mob and more like a collection of young future voters
Or if people believe that these are the people who are the most
probably impacted by
Gun legislation or a lack of gun confiscation, but I think that that is the thing that may change the tide if the Tennessee legislature
Caves and bows to the mob and
Compromises and passes some anti gun legislation even if it's a small compromise
I think it's going to be the high school students that that tip things over the edge
Which is kind of a shame because I honestly have no idea how many of the high school students
actually want to be there because the school teachers can organize walkouts and call classes and
Bus people to the Capitol building and then once they're there, they're really not allowed to leave the group
There are a lot of examples of organizations like March for our lives
Organizing memorials or vigils that turn into once you get off the bus a large anti gun rally
And so people are really easily tricked into participating in these things or if you're a high school student and you're given the option
Go to the Capitol building and yell at a bunch of boring old politicians or
math class
I mean it's pretty obvious, right?
but a lot of those students are genuinely fearful of
school shootings and they believe the things that they're being told I don't want to undermine that at all and in fact
We'll come back to that later, but you can tell the difference between a professional activist
And high school student pretty easily all the shouting and screaming was
Political blackmail it wasn't an ideological case. It wasn't a principled case. It was an entirely emotional case
We are very emotional about things and we're going to make you emotional about things too
There'll be death threats. There'll be blood on hands
There will be all of these things so that you the legislators have an emotional response to these things the same way that we do
Our emotions are bigger and louder and they demand a response and that response needs to be this legislation now
And I think a really important principle that most of us know but is maybe hard to remember in times like this if you are a
Sitting legislator of Tennessee is that you never bow to the mob you never actually pay blackmail
The temptation is always there to say pay a ransom and in real life
That kind of sort of work sometimes may be in the short term you pay the ransom you get your family member back
But you're also subsidizing the kidnap and ransom industry political ransom political blackmail
Political protection money it never actually works you never ever pay that or the dane gild is a great
Kipling poem about the dane gild back when the Danes were invading
England they would go of Viking and they would attack England and you could pay them to go away
But very temporarily and he wrote a really great poem which I was gonna read part of it
But I'm just gonna read the whole thing
It is always a temptation to an armed and agile nation to call upon a neighbor and to say we invaded you last night
We are quite prepared to fight unless you pay us cash to go away
And that is called asking for dane gild and the people who ask it explain
That you've only to pay him the dane gild and then you'll get rid of the dane
It is always a temptation for a rich and lazy nation to puff and look important and to say
Though we know we should defeat you we have not the time to meet you. We will therefore pay you cash to go away
And that is called paying the dane gild that we've proved it again and again
That once you have paid him the dane gild you will never get rid of the dane
It is wrong to put temptation in the path of any nation for fear. They should succumb and go astray
So when you are requested to pay up or be molested you'll find it better policy to say
We never pay anyone dane gild no matter how trifling the cost
For the end of that game is oppression and shame and the nation that pays it is lost
That principle was true in the days of the Vikings
It was true in Kipling's day when Britain was trying to appease the Nazis
And it's true today. You don't negotiate with terrorists. You never bow to the mob and you never ever pay the dane gild
And it's very important that mobs
Learn that tantrums don't work if you teach mobs that tantrums do work
then all you're gonna have is mobs and tantrums for the rest of your life and
especially
This group of people because it's largely our kids our Tennessee high school kids
That are being told that tantrums work. I think it is incumbent upon our
Tennessee legislators to make sure that our Tennessee kids
Learn that that is not actually true another really interesting thing that always happens
after these events is that
Teachers unions and various other lobbying groups stand up and they talked very loudly about our kids our kids
Teachers are claiming your kids
As their kids or even claiming the kids of this this private Christian school as their kids
Talking about our kids were killed last week. It was it was not
Members of the public school. It was not
subjects of the Tennessee teachers union it was children in a private school and you know just last week the week before
There was a lot of furor and fuss over a bill
HB 1214 that creates a bunch of new
categories of public school so that they can pretend that they have school choice
They were not calling private schools our schools back then those were schools that needed more
Supervision needed to be brought back into the fold under the supervision of the public schools. They were outsiders then
But then last week those kids became our kids our kids were killed said
representatives of various teachers unions and
I want you to think about this fact if you live in Tennessee or Alabama or Kentucky
Your kids are being used in this fight
Teachers are using your tax money to bust your kids to Nashville to demand that your rep
Pass laws that confiscate your guns. I want you to think about that fact when the teachers unions say those are their kids
Those are your kids. You should be pulling your kids out of their schools as quickly as you can
Those are probably the biggest takeaways for me as we're watching some of this unfold number one
You never give in to the mob and our legislators need to be encouraged to never give in to the mob
That's true everywhere even though the mob seems to be
the hottest breathing down the necks of Tennessee legislators right now if you live in Tennessee
I would recommend that you write a letter to your
Republican
Representatives, I don't know that it's actually worth getting in touch with the Democratic reps
but write to your Republican reps and senators and let them know that you still want strong second amendment protections and that you don't want them to
Bow before the mob
You don't want them to give in to this tantrum. You don't want them to give in to these demands
You don't want them to pay the black mailers
Maybe you don't need to put in language quite that strong
and then the second thing that you need to do is get your kids out of those schools and
Engage in some proper school choice
I think a lot of schools and teachers unions and various administrators around the country are kind of on edge at the moment because there has been a very large
Very successful very sweeping school choice movement ever since
2020 they're very much on edge. They're very much trying to keep what is there
They're very much trying to maintain their relevance
And so in some ways I feel like this issue is as much a school issue as it is a gun issue
this is them flexing their muscles and trotting out your kids as
Janissaries in this particular gun debate and I will point out that it's very rapidly becoming more than just a second amendment gun
Rights red flag law debate people are bringing the trans stuff back into it now
They they did tastefully wait a few hours a few people waited days
But even just a couple of days after the shooting there were many people chanting in the Tennessee Capitol building about trans rights and
Saying that there were seven victims. There were many people
Holding up seven fingers because they are arguing that there were seven victims in that school shooting not just six
Which I actually
Partially there were not seven murder victims. There were six murder victims
That were killed by one murderer
The murderer was not a victim in the school shooting at all
But I think that she was a victim in other ways that I'll get to in a minute
I mentioned the different elements in and around the trans community had been pretty
vociferous in their complaints about Tennessee's laws and
They've actually been pretty spicy
Commenting on this particular school shooting so the trans resistance network is one of the most extreme groups
And they said that the murderer that I've just referred to had no other effective way to be seen
Than to you know murder children and that life for transgender people is very difficult and made more difficult in the preceding months
by a virtual avalanche of anti trans legislation and
public callouts by right-wing personalities and political figures for nothing less than the
Genocidal eradication of trans people from society, which is a pretty extreme claim
But I want you to remember that because the word genocide comes up quite a bit
And I don't have the exact timing of this but today April 1st April Fool's Day was supposed to be the trans day of vengeance
Technically it was supposed to start yesterday with a whole bunch of school and college walkouts, which
teachers helpfully organized
The event organizers were supposed to wear a mask and quote fight back against the far right attacks
They were supposed to be doing stuff in Washington DC. They were supposed to be doing stuff outside of the Supreme Court building
I mean hopefully outside not inside like the Tennessee Statehouse antifa was heavily involved in passing out the brochures and things like that
Technically however the the official trans day of vengeance was canceled
apparently not
Because nobody was going to show up or because they realized that it was in rather poor taste given that they were
really attaching a huge amount of their rhetoric to a
trans activist who murdered a bunch of people and not because you know
April 1st April Fool's Day is kind of a weird time to do this
Apparently it was shut down because they received a credible threat that a lot of far right groups had planned violence against them
I think the whole thing kind of bears watching but one of the things that that is the other takeaway here is
Why is it that it appears that a whole bunch of different groups are operating like really well together?
so trans activists and allies and
Teachers unions and antifa a whole bunch of folks from the anti-gun crowd that have nothing in common with folks in any other respect
All team up really quickly and at the drop of a hat turn into a pretty large mob
And I don't think that this speaks to or proves the existence of a vast left-wing
Conspiracy I think this just really shows that these groups do have something very clearly in common which is
To destroy some elements of the existing system to destroy the guard rails to destroy the limitations to destroy the status quo
There's a whole bunch of things that they do have in common and so
once they see an opportunity once they see the mob coalescing once there is a
common talking point they do get together and
This kind of destructive nature doesn't really require a lot of coordination
if you're trying to create division and distraction and chaos because you want to destroy then
This kind of inconsistency between these different groups is actually a feature not a bug
It makes your tantrums more effective if there isn't a consistent thing that you can argue with and that's part of the reason that there appears to be
Oftentimes a lot less unity on the right. There's an expectation maybe that
Whenever there's an issue that is somewhat related to freedom
Every freedom-related person should come out of the woodwork and just immediately turn into a very orderly and consistent and organized
mob on the other side and
It just takes a huge amount more work if you're trying to build or you're trying to restore
You just need a lot more coordination and a lot more principle in order to do that with any kind of consistency
You can't really expect this kind of constructive effort to just happen all by itself like a
George Soros funded flash mob of useful idiots. There's a lot more foundational work to do the destructive mob doesn't need that much structure and
Now they have the added advantage of being able to use your kids
They're free or at least as free as anything that's taxpayer funded ever is and a lot of these
Organizers and agitators can throw your kids into the fray really quickly and easily as cannon fodder
It doesn't really require them to put any skin in the game. I'll give you a couple of examples of this
One of them is Madonna couple of days after the school shooting
Madonna came out and announced a
Nashville concert that will be a trans benefit concert
You'll notice that she didn't announce a Presbyterian benefit concert and actually now that I say that I and probably the entire
PCA is very grateful that she didn't do that and I bet Madonna gets way more out of
This particular concert than the trans community
She gets to virtue signal and kind of use this community the way that she's used other
Quote-unquote marginalized communities in the past
If you've looked at her different causes and ways that she has marketed herself
You can see that she's always pushed the envelope just outside of what is currently mainstream
Whatever is the currently edgy cool mainstream thing. That's where she is. She didn't push for trans rights back in the early days
She didn't even push for homosexual rights back in her early days. She pushed for more
Fornication than was completely acceptable
But was still attractive and then she moved on to the other things as they went and she used those different
communities far more than I'll bet they benefited from her and
There are an awful lot of different agitators and organizers and rabble rousers that do exactly the same thing
In Madonna's case, I think that she just wants the fame and the fortune
But there's other people who want political power and they are very quick and easy with the cannon fodder and the foot soldiers
They're following them into this battle only to be collateral damage. I want to go back to this idea
That the murderer the shooter of this particular school this 28 year old woman
Was actually a victim because in many ways I believe that she was I think that when we look back in the future on
This particular trans movement
We're gonna look at it the way that we now think about the age of
Phrenology and lobotomies this weird
neuroscience that had an incredibly devastating effect on a whole bunch of different families because a
bunch of basically circus performers
Wanted to get fame and fortune by performing lobotomies in public and telling everybody that this is the way forward
This is the future of medical science. This is how we fix people and make them happier
And they had absolutely no consideration for their patients
Or subjects or exhibits or the families of the people that they were manipulating or maybe we'll think about it like the eugenics movement
Which was far less flashy, but it was deeply destructive and all of the purveyors of that particular
Ideology were very power hungry and they had no consideration for the people that they erased or sterilized because they were mere
Stepping stones grist for the mill and their pursuit of dominance
And when I look at the trans community
I see a lot of people who are being treated in that way when I think of the trans people that I knew 15 20 years ago
Before it was cool before it was celebrated by the media before they were Madonna's special friends
They weren't a collective group a marginalized group a political block
They were individuals who had
struggles
Difficulties they had confusion about certain things they desperately needed people to help them to work certain things out
But I want you to think about the fact that now there's an entire class of
agitators and
influencers and people who stand to gain from the growth of a marginalized trans community
They get to virtue signal and raise their social credit score by pitching a glorious trans lifestyle to confused young people
They can tell them that the way that they find
Satisfaction and fulfillment and a purpose and an identity is by doing the exact opposite of what their body is telling them to do
And then when that person joins that community and begins to undergo that kind of change
They find themselves fighting against their very own
Biology they find themselves fighting against God's reality and what they were actually created to be which is incredibly exhausting
And it doesn't actually give them the fulfillment and the perfection that they were sold
It doesn't solve all of their problems and depending on when they started and what they did
It is completely and utterly irreversible
And then they get told that the only reason that they aren't happy and fulfilled and perfect and
satisfied with their identity is because of
people on the other side who are attacking them and trying to
Genocide them the ideology hasn't failed the chemicals haven't failed the really barbaric
Surgeries haven't failed the only failure to fully realize yourself in this new identity is other people who want to eradicate you from existence
This is the world that a number of people live in because
They are following the advice and the influence of people who are the ideological grandchildren of
The phrenologists and the eugenicists. It is heartbreaking and it is tragic
And it's the reason why it was really really good for us to pass that
SB1 bill earlier this year to stop the mutilation and chemical alteration of children
That's why the influencers and the agitators are so annoyed by bills like SB1
And that's why they're so quick to try to keep the trans community away from Christians who will
Actually not genocide them
But love them by sharing with them the gospel and explaining to them how they can actually find peace and fulfillment
How they can actually find something that is the opposite of confusion and chaos
Something that will take their army of cannon fodder and reduce it
Not too many people are talking about this
But that is the real reason that the trans community is at war with Christianity
Because Christianity is the only thing that can solve the difficulties the pain and the questions that human beings have
So homework assignment
Tell your legislators not to bow to the mob not to give into the demands not to pay the production money and
To get your kids out of the public school system
and
pray for your enemies and
Especially pray for the people who are being manipulated and harmed by your enemies for their own benefit
And remember it is Christ or chaos even though the other side is saying the opposite
I is not too surprising it's April Fool's Day
Everything's kind of opposites these days the Christian community that actually loves their enemies and has the answer
That trans people are looking for are the ones who want to genocide them the people who want to equip
Teachers and families so that they can protect their children are the ones who are being accused of endangering them
Banning body armor now. That's the way that you protect people from bullets wanting a much smaller and less powerful government is
Fascism
Judging people on anything other than the color of their skin is racism and putting your blind faith in things that haven't been tested yet is
science
you
You
.