Mentally Unwell Man Shoots Up Canadian College; Mounties and Media Insist He’s Feminine

In one of Canada’s worst mass shootings to date, 18-year-old Jesse Strang on Tuesday killed eight people and injured more than 25 others before turning his gun on himself. Yet anyone getting his news from the mainstream Canadian media would think the killer was a woman with a different last name.

Why?

Because Strang identified as transgender, and in Canada, no respectable media outlet would dare call his self-selected identity into question — let alone give aid and comfort to “transphobes.” They would, however, use the tragedy to call for stricter gun laws.

They Always Get Their Woman

Strang, who began “transitioning” to female six years ago, first killed his mother and his 11-year-old stepbrother at home, then went to Tumbler Ridge Secondary School and murdered a teacher and five students, after which he committed suicide.

This would be a shocker anywhere, but in a British Columbia town of 2,400, it was devastating.

The Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP) responded to the shooting, issuing an active-shooter alert describing the suspect as “female in a dress” and charging into the school to stop the killing. Afterward, by which time they had to have known Strang was a man, the Mounties didn’t correct the record; instead, they referred to him as a “gunperson.”

European Conservative columnist Jonathon Van Maren wrote:

The term has never before been used in an official capacity, and it instantly made headlines in The Sun, The New York Post, Sky News, GB News, and elsewhere. When asked, an RCMP spokesperson stated, “We identify the suspect as they chose to be identified in public and in social media.”

When the RCMP finally identified the shooter — nearly 24 hours after the incident — they referred to him as “Jesse Van Rootselaar” and continued to obfuscate about his sex.

The Canadian press dutifully reported the official findings. “The CBC, the Toronto Star, the Vancouver Sun, CTV, Global News, the Globe and Mail, the Winnipeg Free Press, the Ottawa Citizen, the Montreal Gazette, and others all referred to the shooter as female” and as “Jesse Van Rootselaar,” Van Maren noted on LifeSiteNews.

Relative Truth

The truth, however, was waiting to be found. It just took journalists who didn’t subscribe to the woke religion to uncover it.

Juno News, for example, contacted the shooter’s father and maternal uncle, both of whom confirmed that his last name was Strang. His father, Justin Van Rootselaar, who was estranged from Strang’s mother, said in a statement, “[He] had a passport and the name on it is not Van Rootselaar.”

Van Rootselaar obviously sent the same statement to the CBC, But, rather than simply report it, the government broadcaster felt the need to “correct” him and to assert its own pro-trans bona fides:

In his statement, Justin VanRootselaar refers to his child as Jesse Strang and uses he/him pronouns to describe her. According to police, Jesse Van Rootselaar was assigned male at birth and began transitioning to female about six years ago.

The cops’ admission that Strang was born — and therefore always — male only came about “in response to reporters’ questions,” penned The Spectator’s Jane Stannus.

The Telegraph reported Friday that a witness claims Strang may have gone to the school with the intention of finishing off the rest of his family. The paper further wrote:

Police confirmed there was a “history of police attendance at the family residence,” some relating to mental health and others relating to firearms incidents.

He [Strang] was apprehended and taken for a health assessment more than once, but the last contact he had with police was last year. His gun license had expired in 2024 and he had no registered guns.

Mental Gymnastics

By referring to the shooter as Jesse Van Rootselaar, the authorities and their friends in the media may have hoped to forestall further investigation into his background. Stannus pointed out that his real last name “connected him and his mother to pro-trans social media posts,” including ones “in which he mentioned spending time in mental hospital, taking antidepressants, trying out psychedelic drugs, and awaiting hormone therapy.”

The New York Post’s Bethany Mandel observed:

The public is lied to in an attempt to force us to avert our eyes.

Yet when journalists knowingly discard biological reality and gloss over the link to mental health, they don’t just mislead readers; they actively interfere with our ability to understand reality, and therefore, assess danger. 

For years, the public has been told that identifying as the opposite sex is simply another harmless expression of one’s self-identity.

Questioning it is dangerous, cruel — “bigotry.” Exploring whether transgender identity may signal deeper psychological distress is forbidden….

That dogma has consequences, as another community has learned the hard way.

In this regard, things are much worse in Canada than in the United States. There, by law, everyone must “affirm” a “trans” kid’s chosen gender. Trying to help the child overcome his gender confusion — even at the youngster’s request — is strictly prohibited. Good luck dealing with the kid’s probable other mental conditions under such a regime, even if those conditions could lead to murder.

As Stannus put it:

It just doesn’t seem right. Nine people, including 12- and 13-year-old children, have died. Many others are injured. Families are living through shock, loss and anguish. And instead of finding answers, the authorities are busy making sure transgender ideology isn’t tarnished by association. Are they sure they’ve got their priorities straight?