Kane board member ‘cherry-picking’ facts about shootings
Kane County Board member David Young is very concerned about facts. So am I.
Young has spoken during the public comments portions of board meetings multiple times over the past few weeks about four tragic shootings in the past year in which a transgender person was identified as the alleged shooter. Young insists he’s only sharing the “facts.”
Young argues that Democrats aren’t condemning these shootings, and yet any Internet search provides several examples of elected Democrats condemning these shootings and not a single one celebrating them. That is a fact.
According to Gun Violence Archive Data, out of 4,147 mass shootings between 2018 and 2025, the attacker was a transgender person 0.17% of the time. That is a fact. And the victims involved in that 0.17% absolutely lost their lives in a tragic and inexcusable way.
But why can’t Young see the community’s anger about his failure to consider the other 99.83%?
Reading the names and ages of shooters and victims from four specific gun violence incidents as Young has done several times is indeed sharing factual information. Reporting that cherry picked information and then casting all transgender people as an “evil group” that needs to be denounced is absolutely not “fact,” as Young claims. At best, it’s clearly an illogical conclusion.
According to the Violence Project, in cases from 1966-2021, 98% of perpetrators of mass shootings are cisgender men. By Young’s logic, should we be denouncing cisgender men everywhere? After all, they’ve been responsible for the vast majority of mass shootings. Are cis men an “evil” group that needs to be taken down?
At worst, Young’s rhetoric is unfair, dangerous and just plain sad. Transgender people are not some sort of demonic monolith intent on killing, as he seems to suggest. They’re human beings and, right now, they’re a marginalized group that has been under increased verbal and physical attack, which isn’t helped by elected officials like Young publicly labeling them as “dangerous” and “evil.”
Every single incident of gun violence breaks my heart, terrifies me and enrages me, regardless of the shooter’s demographics.
But the fact is, demonizing an entire group based on the actions of a few has never solved the actual problem.
And if we really care about facts, here is the truest one: It’s not any single demographic. It’s the guns.
Alice Froemling, South Elgin
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