Hours After LGBTQ+ Mass Shooting In Colorado, Libs Of TikTok Targets Colorado LGBTQ+ Events

This is stochastic terrorism and this is the inevitable end result of allowing it to fester in online spaces that we have warned about.

Many people are awakening to terrible news this morning… multiple dead and dozens injured at a LGBTQ+ bar in Colorado Springs, Colorado. Club Q, the bar and the site of the shooting, has been known for its drag events. This morning on Transgender Day of Remembrance, they were planning an all ages drag show - now the blood of my queer siblings stain its floors. Yet only hours later, Libs of TikTok, an online account responsible for dozens of violent threats across the United States against LGBQT+ people, saw this and seemingly said “yes. this. more.”

If you aren’t aware of Libs of TikTok, it is a hate account on Twitter with over 1.5 million followers. It regularly posts clips of transgender people with inflammatory blurbs. Her followers often then respond with death threats, many times actually showing up to the events and committing violent acts. Just days ago, bomb threats were sent to one of her most popular targets: Boston Children’s Hospital, where they specifically were targeting the gender clinic meant for transgender youth.

Libs of TikTok has been banned multiple times and likely was soon to be permanently banned before Elon Musk bought twitter. Chaya Raichik, the woman who runs Libs of TikTok, has a history of stoking violence against LGBQT+ organizations and drag events:

• Earlier this year, she targeted a town in Kiel, Wisconsin because officials were investigating the abuse of a young transgender student. The town was beset by bomb threats. People in her replies actively called for such threats. See:

  

• During Pride, she tweeted against a pride event in Idaho saying it was run by the Satanic Temple. People in the replies called for violence. Hours later, a group of Patriot Front terrorists were arrested and pulled out of a U-haul by local authorities. See:

  

• In June, she tweeted that a drag queen story hour was going on in a San Lorenzo library in California. In her comments, people posted violent threats that were allowed to stay up on the platform alongside pictures of guns. A day later, militants showed up with shirts saying “kill your local pedophile.”

  

This morning, hours after the tragic deaths at Club Q, Libs of TikTok has targeted a transgender legislator as well as an organization that hosts all ages drag events. This is a cold and calculated campaign of terror that they are waging on the LGBTQ+ community. She knows exactly what she is doing and this cannot continue.

We don’t know the motive of the shooter in Club Q in Colorado. But we do know the motives of Chaya Raichik by her actions. We know that she is aware that she calls targets and people answer. We know that she pays attention to these events, and has decided that this morning, she wants to stoke more. We know that she regularly targets transgender people and family friendly transgender events and that her followers regularly post violence. We know that she is part of a system of violence against our communities made up of other people who have likewise called for violence, like Matt Walsh, Christopher Rufo, and Tucker Carlson.

We have been screaming, begging people to listen that this would be the end result - that allowing these people to continue doing what they do would lead to this. Now, only days after protections for LGBTQ+ people are dropped on one of the largest social media platforms on the internet, queer blood has been spilled and the biggest hate account has decided, “more.”