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| Adam Michael Nettina |
So much attention seems to be focused on Donald Trump's indictment that other more pertinent issues are being shoved to the back. And in several cases, that's a mistake.
Ever since that awful Nashville shooting last month, the far right have been attacking the trans community. The shooter was a person with emotional problems who was said to identify as a trans man. While ignoring the many other times in which mass shootings were perpetrated by cis white males, people like Tucker Carlson, Rep Marjorie Taylor-Greene, Laura Ingraham and others on that noxious side of the political spectrum have exploited this specific tragedy to blame trans people and the LGBTQ community in general.
This is the type of mindset they are inviting. From The Washington Blade:
A Maryland man has been charged with making threats against the Human Rights Campaign. The Justice Department in a press release notes Adam Michael Nettina, 34, of West Friendship, Md., on March 28 left a threatening voicemail that referred to the massacre at the Covenant School in Nashville that took place the day before. The press release notes the shooter who killed six people inside the school “was publicly identified as being transgender."The Justice Department alleges that Nettina in his message made numerous threats. “You guys going to shoot up our schools now? Is that how it’s going to be? You just gonna to kill little kids. You’re just going to slaughter fucking little kids,” said Nettina, according to the indictment. “Let me tell you something, we’re waiting, we’re waiting. And if you want a war, we’ll have a war. And we’ll fucking slaughter you back. We’ll cut your throats. We’ll put a bullet in your head. We’re not going to give a fuck. You started this bullshit. You’re going to kill us? We’re going to kill you ten times more in full.”Nettina appeared before U.S. Magistrate Judge Matthew J. Maddox in U.S. District Court in Baltimore on Monday. He faces up to five years in prison if convicted on the charge of interstate communications with a treat to injure.
HRC spokesperson Elizabeth Bibi put the threat in context of other attacks on LGBTQ+ Americans. “The LGBTQ+ community is under attack in statehouses across the country and on social media platforms,” she told The Advocate via email. “This violent, hateful rhetoric leads to stigma, and stigma leads to physical violence. As we see radical politicians sow hate and fear with anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric, we have seen the physical threats to our community multiply — from armed men at Pride parades, to threats of violence against local drag shows at libraries, to bomb threats at children’s hospitals, to the continued rise in fatal violence against members of our community, especially Black transgender women.“Late last month, HRC received two threatening voicemails. These threats were referred to law enforcement, who have since confirmed that they have made an arrest. We are grateful to law enforcement for acting so quickly to keep our community safe, and we condemn any and all violent words or deeds. We will continue our work to call out those who spread violence, fear, and disinformation.”
