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Nashville school shooter Audrey Hale's parents 'couldn't accept' his trans identity

Audrey Hale's parents were in denial about his trans identity and refused to let him use his preferred pronouns

NASHVILLE, TENNESSEE: The parents of Audrey Hale, the 28-year-old former transgender student accused of fatally shooting three students and three adult staff members at The Covenant School in Nashville, Tennessee, on March 27, 2023, couldn’t accept their child's trans identity. Hale's strict Christian parents, Norma, 61, who is a church coordinator, and Ronald, 64, struggled to accepet Hale’s gender identity and sexuality. They refused to let Hale, who was born as a female and adopted the name Aidan while using he/him as pronouns, wear men’s clothes at home. Hale would wait to go out of the house to change clothes.

The parents of Audrey Hale, the 28-year-old former transgender student accused of fatally shooting three students and three adult staff members at The Covenant School​ in Nashville, Tennessee, on March 27, 2023, could not accept their child's trans identity. Hale's strict Christian parents, Norma, 61, who is a church coordinator, and Ronald, 64, had difficulty accepting Hale's gender identity and sexuality. They refused to let Hale, who was born a female, take the name Aidan, use the pronouns he/him, and wear men's clothing at home. Hale had to wait until he could go out of the house to change clothes.

A source told DailyMail, "You only see what you want to see. Their religion does not allow them to accept homosexuality. She was Audrey at home but when she left the house she changed clothes. They did know about it, they just didn't accept it." One of the neighbors described Hale, who was under a doctor’s care for an “emotional disorder," as a "skater, tomboy type." "She introduced herself about a year and a half ago as Audrey. I treated her like a female and she didn't correct me. She seemed artistic, quiet, and well-mannered," said the unidentified neighbor.

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'We are terrified for the LGBTQ community'

The motive behind massacre of six people, Evelyn Dieckhaus, 9, Hallie Scruggs, 9, William Kinney, 9, Katherine Koonce, 60, Cynthia Peak, 61, and Mike Hill, 61, remains unknown but the officials are looking into whether Hale’s identity as a trans person was a reason for this deadly attack. And this ​has now caused fear among the trans community. As per Yahoo!, within 10 minutes of police declaring the suspect was transgender, the hashtag #TransTerrorism started trending on Twitter. While a cover of the Rupert Murdoch-owned New York Post read, “Transgender killer targets Christian school.”

Kim Spoon, a trans activist based in Knoxville, Tennessee, said, "We are terrified for the LGBTQ community here." Denise Sadler, a drag performer who is transgender, said, “You don’t know if [the shooter’s gender identity] is going to trigger a community of people who already hated us to come and try to shoot us to prove a point. At the end of the day, there’s a lot of hurt going on, there’s a lot of anger going on, there’s a lot of confusion going on.” While Aislinn Bailey, the acting president of Tri-Cities Transgender, a trans-led support and advocacy group based in Johnson City, Tennessee, expressed, "I knew that as soon as anyone mentioned that, it was immediately going to become the center focus instead of what should be the focus, and that’s gun violence in this country."

'Life for transgender people is very difficult'

The Trans Resistance Network (TRN) released a statement in response to school shooting that said, "We extend our deepest sympathies and heartfelt prayers to those families dealing with the loss of loved ones. There is nothing we can offer that will comfort the hurt, or ease the sorrow. We mourn with you.” The statement went on to say that “life for transgender people is very difficult, and made more difficult in the preceding months by a virtual avalanche of anti-trans legislation, and public callouts by Right Wing personalities and political figures for nothing less than the genocidal eradication of trans people from society."