Two Narcissistic, Nihilist Mass Killers In Their Own Words.
Posted by Ed Folsom, September 7, 2024.
The Covenant School Mass Murderer, Nashville, Tennessee 3/27/2023.
On Monday, March 27, 2023, 28-year-old Audrey Hale, who often referred to herself as Aiden Hale, murdered three 9-year-old kids and three adult school staff members at the Covington School, in Nashville, Tennessee, before being shot dead by police. Because Hale often referred to herself as “Aiden” and claimed to be a “boy” or a “male,” Hale has been referred to in many news accounts as a “transgender man.”
When Hale committed her murders, transgender activists had already been planning a so-called “Trans Day of Vengeance” to take place on Saturday, April 1, 2023. Those events were ultimately called off shortly before they were to take place. All of this caused some people to question whether Hale committed the murders as an act of vengeance on behalf of the “trans” movement. Those suspicions were only heightened when authorities refused to release the contents of multiple notebooks filled with Hale’s writings, one of which police initially referred to as her “manifesto.”
On Tuesday, September 3, 2024, the Tennessee Star newspaper made public the contents of 90 pages of Hale’s journal entries, ending the day Hale committed the murders (viewable here). There is nothing in those entries indicating that Hale committed the murders to further a transgender agenda. So, why did she do it?
The mass murders of innocent strangers, including mass school shootings, have become a cultural “thing” in this country. Why?
As Pew Research puts it, “Regardless of the definition [of ‘mass shooting’] being used, fatalities in mass shooting incidents in the U.S. account for a small fraction of all gun murders that occur nationwide each year.” As Pew also tells us, the current rate of gun homicides is lower than it has been in the past. But mass shootings get all the attention. They create the impression that gun homicide rates have never been so bad.
Who would want to draw the attention that comes from committing mass murder? Mass shooters, that’s who. Audrey Hale wanted that kind of attention.
Hale was a thoroughly miserable person, entirely disappointed with herself. She described herself this way: “I pay no rent or bills…still live w/parents, might as well throw me in a retard home.” Still, she had a high opinion of her intelligence and creative abilities, at one point writing, “My brain makes me smart + brilliant imaginatively/creatively, but at all the while makes me suffer every day. Why did God make me this way?” She also wrote, “Cursed to be looked down upon. It be better to be average + have friends the most brilliant people suffer the most and are the most isolated from everything they love.”
Hale apparently didn’t choose the Covenant School as her target out of any atheistic hatred of religion. She repeatedly expresses her belief in God and asked God for forgiveness.
As delusional as she was, she was not insane in the legal sense. She clearly had the capacity to appreciate the wrongfulness of her conduct, writing “I’m sorry innocent lives will be taken” and “Forgive me God, this act will be inglorious.”
Her sexual frustrations were a central part of her writings. Hale referring to herself as “a f*gg*t with no lover” and “a virgin f*g… no sex in real life no love in life resort to cartoon porn or let my stuffed animals f**k.” She imagined, “My penis exists in my head” and “I swear to God Im [sic] a male.” But she lamented that she actually only had a “puny vagina,” which did not allow her to fulfill her desire to sodomize “a beautiful young brown girl” with her imaginary penis.
Hale’s delusions apparently extended to the belief that her death would mark both the death of Audrey and the birth of her alter-ego, Aiden, writing, “The year Aiden was born (3/27/23).” The date, 3/27/23, is the date Hale carried out her murderous and suicidal plan. When she signed-off the last of her journal entries that day, she did not sign off as “Aiden” but as “Audrey,” writing, “Remember me for, the good things…[drawing of heart] Audrey.”
Hale portrayed her plan to kill her victims as part of nature, writing, “Human nature to kill” “Humans kill humans and themselves” “Animals kill animals” “Bugs kill bugs” “destruction; reconstruction repeat Live, Death, Repeat NATURE.” Next to that, Hale drew the symbol for infinity.
Hale was well aware that her plans would bring her infamy. In one passage, she wrote the following about going to a live performance by her “beautiful brown girl:”
“She made history that night even if she was nervous and her back felt clammy. Only natural to sweat with having a first live show, and she’s still beautiful. She knows who she is, and all the rest of the world in time will too. She’s famous to me; a star to many. Little does she know how we will soon share the same fate. She will live a legend and I will die a shooter – hopefully to become infamous (I will make history too). No one will forget neither of us. She will be the blessing, and I will be horror to inflict pain.”
Maybe that’s the bottom line on why Audrey Hale chose to go out shooting little kids to death in a school. She made history. She became famous — something she had no hope of achieving any other way. Audrey Hale, the disaffected loser who hated her failings and hated that she had no penis with which to sodomize a beautiful brown girl, gained significance on March 27, 2023. She was well aware of the fame that Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold gained from their mass killing spree at Columbine, Colorado, High School, in 1999, and she chose to emulate them. At one point in her journal, Hale wrote: “April of ’99 – the year Columbine was born. The year Aiden was born (3/27/23).” At another point, she wrote: “I want my massacre to end in a way that Eric and Dylan would be proud of.”
Last November three pages of Hale’s writings were leaked by Steve Crowder, viewable here. One of the three pages leaked by Crowder is also from the journal that was recently made public by the Tennessee Star, but two other pages appear to be from a different journal. On one of those other two pages, dated 2/3/23, Hale wrote:
“kill those kids!!!” “those crackers going to private fancy schools with those fancy khakis + sports backpacks w/ their daddies mustangs + convertibles” “f**k you little sh*ts” “I wish to shoot you weakass dicks w/ your mop yellow hair” “wanna kill all you little crackers!!!” “Bunch of little f*gg*ts w/ your white privlages [sic]” “f**k you f*gg*ts.”
These bits, deriding her intended victims as privileged white “crackers” and “f*gg*ts,” provide the only indications in Hale’s released writings why she chose to target kids at the Covenant School, in particular.
The Old National Bank Mass Murderer, Louisville, Kentucky, April 10, 2023.
Reading Audrey Hale’s newly released journal entries got me thinking about another mass shooting that happened shortly after Hale’s. That one took place at the Old National Bank, in Louisville, Kentucky, on April 10, 2023, when Connor Sturgeon, age 25, shot and killed five bank employees and wounded other people, including a police officer, before being shot dead. Sturgeon also left writings behind. Those writings were released to the public in a report issued by the Louisville Metro PD in November of 2023. And guess what – Sturgeon also considered himself a failure and was trying to find a way to make himself matter. He decided to shoot a bunch of people to death to make the point that it’s the NRA’s fault; that it was just too easy for him to buy the gun that he used to murder his victims.
Sturgeon wrote that he felt, “Worthless, meaningless” with “nothing to live for.” He also wrote, “need to make an impact – affect change somehow,” followed by the words: “collapse – inflation – no kids – climate disaster – gun access – lack of mental health care – politicians w/ no interest in helping people.” On the other hand, he felt he had a “blessed life” with “parents/family – good grades – perfect girlfriend – good career.”
In another place, Sturgeon wrote: “Other Thoughts – I am just tired of fighting – I was never going to reach anywhere near my full potential – I couldn’t even handle a BS office at a bank – I don’t think I am a terrorist, or a monster – I may be a psycho – I am definitely very sick.”
In reference to purchasing the gun, magazines and ammunition to carry out his plan, he wrote:
“It is legitimately unfathomable how easy this all was. I always knew I was A) cunning B) mean as absolute shit and C) a WAY better liar than anyone gave me credit for (the secret is leading with, “Yeah I’ve always been a bad liar”) (never cheated on a girl though), but good heavens I just lied to everyone so easily and none caught on. This is intentional. There is nothing anyone could have done. I’ll say it again, there is nothing anyone could have done. It only would have delayed the inevitable. I know how sick I am, and with this, this sickness wins, but on MY TERMS.
“But let us not forget the most important player here. The one who made this all possible. Lets [sic] give it up for the NRA!! (raucous applause). I couldn’t have done this without all of your lobbying dollars! You really brought this whole thing together. This is the world you are building. One without any regard for the value of Human Life.”
Sturgeon live-streamed his killings on Instagram, apparently to drive home his point and to ensure that he would “make an impact – affect change somehow.”
In this, we have a mass murderer, playing off trendy cultural vibes to blame his killings on the NRA while condemning the NRA for having no “regard for the value of human life.” And he did it all to make his life meaningful and to effect positive change.
Why did Sturgeon pick the bank as the place to gratify his impulse for homicidal infamy? For one thing, he worked there. For another, he wrote in a note to his parents:
“This country and its politicians have decided that money is more valuable than lives. Let’s see if that changes once the fat cats start feeling the pain. They won’t listen to words or peaceful protests, so let’s see if they listen to bullets. Hopefully the lives lost tomorrow can save some in the future. Please do what you can to help others, and to stop the sale of WMD’s to psychopaths like me.”
O.K., then. So noble.
Among the alienated, disappointed, narcissistic, nihilist class, the mass murder of innocent people has become a cultural “thing.” And as long as it’s done for a good cause, like attacking white privilege, fat cats, climate change, inflation, and/or the NRA’s disregard of human life, what could be the problem, right?
It’s not the guns, unless you suppose that narcissistic, homicidal maniacs won’t be able to find other means to gratify their impulses. The worst school massacre on U.S. soil occurred in Bath, Michigan, in 1927, when 38 kids and 5 adults were killed with bombs. The problem is sick little homicidal narcissists nursing personal grievances, willing to commit mass murder to gratify their homicidal impulses. And we sure do have an abundance of them these days. The solution is far more complicated than simplistically adding another layer of gun regulations to the multiple layers already in effect.
P.S. Both Hale and Sturgeon were receiving mental health care when they committed their mass murders — Hale for what she called autism, and Sturgeon for what his parents called depression.
Related Post:
