The Facebook poll created by shop Tactical Shit was deleted this weekend, but images of it were captured by the Riverfront Times. The images show 15 percent of respondents voting that the murder of 50 innocent people was "f**king great."
"How do you 'feel' about the NZ Shooting?" the poll question read, according to the screenshot. "This poll is because in our posts and news stories, our s**theads seem pretty divided."
"We are in no way are indicating our opinion. Just want yours," the post added.
The shooting attack on two mosques stunned Christchurch, New Zealand, Friday, leaving 50 dead and dozens injured. New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern called the attack a terrorist act and said it was the country's "darkest day."
Australian right-wing extremist Brenton Tarrant confessed to the attack and was charged with murder soon after the massacre. On Saturday, a New Zealand court ordered that he remain in custody until his next court appearance April 5.
According to Riverfront Times, Tactical Shit's Facebook page also shared a "distracted boyfriend" meme following the shooting.
In the meme, the boyfriend is "literally the whole "f**king world" and the girlfriend being ignored is labeled as "daily acts of terror committed by a religion preaching violence." The boyfriend is distracted by another woman labeled as "one guy shooting Muslims in revenge." Riverfront Times took a screenshot of this meme before it was deleted over the weekend.
Riverfront Times also reported that the Tactical Shit Facebook page was replete with posts related to the mass shooting Saturday, with its followers posting photoshopped images from the shooter's livestream in comments. However, it appears as though these posts have since been deleted.
On Monday, company owner TJ Kirgin released a statement on Tactical Shit's Facebook page, writing, "At Tactical Shit, we are a comedic media company first. We are like a Tactical South Park. Nothing is off limits, we make fun of everything and everyone. We (us and our fans) are mostly Military and Law Enforcement past and present. We use dark humor to deal with tragedy on a regular basis."
"We broke the story about the tragic terrorist attack in New Zealand moments after it happened on our News Blog at TacticalShit.com. The following morning, we posted this message only to be shouted down by followers that did not agree. We then removed this post and read the comments section of the aforementioned news article. We were shocked by the volume of arguments taking place in the comment section amongst our readers. Some said ‘it was a tragedy' others said ‘it's fucking great' calling the shooter an ‘Australian hero' and posting memes," the statement continues.
"We are NOT anti Islam. We are just not fans of most religions. We in no way condone or support terrorism for any cause against any race, creed or religion," the statement adds.
A podcast segment between Kirgin and store employees Alex Milberg and Kris Dickson was uploaded on YouTube Friday. The segment is titled "Radical Gamer Trolls World in Real Life First Person Shooter."
At one point in the video, Kirgin says, "We don't like Muslim extremists at all. We're not fans of Islam in any shape or form. Still, killing of innocent civilians is probably not cool."
In addition, throughout the podcast, the hosts discuss Tarrant's manifesto in detail, agreeing with his notion that high Muslim birthrates "dominate most of America and pretty much all of Europe." Islam is referred to as a "religion of violence" throughout the podcast.
