On the Tuesday night edition of his Fox “News” program Tucker Carlson Tonight, host Tucker Carlson launched an unhinged and frankly un-Christian diatribe to open the show baselessly asserting that the trans rights movement is “targeting Christians” one day after a trans male shooter killed 6 people at The Covenant School in Nashville, Tennessee. The Covenant School is a Christian school affiliated with Covenant Presbyterian Church, which belongs to the conservative PCA denomination.
Carlson doubled down on his segment featured on last Thursday’s program attacking trans people for buying guns to open his rant.
With the realization that the shooter is a trans person, the anti-trans right-wing ghouls areusing the shooting to launch grotesque attacks on trans people. Carlson dipped right into that attack and then some with his disgustingly hate-filled rant baselessly insinuating that the trans community was preparing for a “violent conflict” against “traditional” (conservative) Christianity. This rant will serve to get more trans people hurt and/or killed thanks to his vile anti-trans diatribe to open his show on Tuesday.
In fact, if such a scenario were to arise, it would be the anti-trans conservative Christians that instigate such a war against trans people.
Tucker Carlson seized on a mass shooting in Tennessee to spread vile and dangerous anti-transgender hate on Tuesday, joining a chorus of other prominent right-wingers.
Steering well clear of the gun control issue, the Fox News host sought instead to peg Monday’s violence as evidence of a war between Christians and transgender people. The 28-year-old shooter, whom authorities identified as trans, killed six people at a private Christian school they used to attend before the assailant was shot dead by police.
“Why are some trans people so angry, and why do they seem to be mad, specifically, at traditional Christians? We can’t think of any trans person who’s ever been murdered by a pastor,” Carlson said.
Alejandra Caraballo debunks Carlson’s “We can’t think of any trans person who’s ever been murdered by a pastor” lie:
William Vaillancourt at The Daily Beast:
He went on to make the stunning argument that the transgender acceptance movement was preparing for violent conflict with “traditional Christianity.”
The transgender movement “is the mirror image of Christianity, and therefore its natural enemy,” Carlson said.
“In Christianity, the price of admission is admitting [that] you’re not God,” he continued, explaining that Christians acknowledge that they “have no real power over anything.” The transgender movement, Carlson said, “takes the opposite view.”
“‘We can change the identity we were born with’: Christians can never agree with this statement because these are powers they believe God alone possesses. That … failure to acknowledge a trans person’s dominion over nature incites and enrages some in the trans community—people who believe they’re God can’t stand to be reminded that they are not.”
From there, Carlson depicted an existential struggle between the two sides that will likely turn violent in the coming years.
“Christianity and transgender orthodoxy are wholly incompatible theologies. They can never be reconciled. They are on a collision course with each other. One side is likely to draw blood before the other side,” he said. “That’s what we concluded last week. Yesterday morning, tragically, our fears were confirmed.”
Matthew Sheffield explained on Twitter that Carlson’s hate-filled anti-trans rant could end up causing more killings of trans people:
John Casey wrote an op-ed piece in LGBTQ+ outlet The Advocate explaining that the Covenant School shooting is fueling further anti-trans hatred on top of what is already happening:
There is absolutely no defending what the shooter did Monday. If the shooter was upset about being the target of the state’s recent anti-LGBTQ+ legislation signed by Gov. Bill Lee, there are other, more humane, and saner ways to voice displeasure.
The real tragedy here is that more children were lost, while more anti-gun legislation gathers dust. And there was also the excruciating misfortune of the shooter possibly being transgender. Even if the shooter's manifesto is an ode to MAGA and Donald Trump, the possibility that the shooter is transgender is only pouring gasoline on the burning fire of the extreme right’s hate of transgender people.
The Nashville shooter will be featured in campaign ads spread across the red states, the South, and in MAGA pockets around the country. These incendiary ads will claim transgender people are not only pedophiles who groom and stalk children, but they kill them too.
Those ads, and the language accompanying them, will be grotesque. They will be uncompromisingly dangerous. And they will do nothing. Absolutely nothing in protecting children, while further demonizing transgender people, who are arguably the most marginalized community in the U.S.
For several decades, political and theological debates related to LGBTQ+ issues have centered around same-sex relationships for lesbian, gay and bisexual people. While an exploration of that topic is important, the volume of faith resources dedicated to it have often excluded reflection on the unique considerations related to gender identity. Mistakenly, some Christians have suggested that taking the Bible seriously requires people of faith to stand in opposition to the existence, health and humanity of transgender people. Consequently, gender-expansive people of all demographics and Christian traditions have been made to feel that they must choose between their faith and living a whole, healthy and authentic life. Whether you are a ministry leader, the family member of a transgender person or a trans person of faith yourself, this page seeks to serve as a brief overview of the Bible’s precedent for affirming the full inclusion of transgender, non-binary and other gender-expansive people in the full life of Christian community.
Earth to Tucker Carlson: your assertion that “Christianity and transgender orthodoxy are wholly incompatible theologies” is wildly un-Christian and transphobic, and such a statement implies that someone cannot be trans or trans-affirming and be a Christian. This is basically an extension of their conflation of LGBTQ+ and Christianity to be “incompatible”.
The Reformation Project addresses the biblical case for LGBTQ+ inclusion well, including debunking the false assertion that Sodom and Gomorrah was about “homosexuality”.
I hate to break it you, Mr. Carlson, but yes, someone can be trans or trans-affirming and be a Christian.
From the 03.28.2023 edition of FNC’s Tucker Carlson Tonight: