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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
 Posted - 05/28/2014 : 17:55:54
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If an avowed white supremacist kills a black man, we have no problem attributing the murder to racism.
If a homosexual is brutally beaten by someone who has made anti-LGBT comments in the past, we have little issue with pointing out that the crime was probably motivated by fear of the gay.
But good grief! A hater of women leaves behind a 137-page manifesto and several videos about how much he hates women and how he intends to punish a sorority house full of them, and what happens? We see a tremendous amount of mass-media and individual denial that misogyny had anything to do with the guy's killing spree.
There's a whole lot of people out there seeming to be trying to out-deny each other, and lay the blame on the most ridiculous things. Just bizarre.
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13476 Posts |
Posted - 05/28/2014 : 18:43:40 [Permalink]
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Yes, he was a misogynist. But there's more to it than that, I think. And remember, he hated men too for being able to have relationships with women. He hated couples too. And most of the people he killed were men.
Here's what I think is the best analysis of this person and the kind of crime he committed. It came by way of Michelle:
How We All Miss the Point on School Shootings
Perhaps the only criticism I have with the article is while he might have been a psychopath, he was most certainly narcissistic. As were all those other shooters. I'm talking about the personality disorder that also includes a lack of empathy. I suppose a narcissist can be legitimately called a psychopath. But it's important to understand the attention getting aspect of these crimes, which would be indicative of narcissism.
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ThorGoLucky
Snuggle Wolf
USA
1487 Posts |
Posted - 05/28/2014 : 19:16:21 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Dave W.
If an avowed white supremacist kills a black man, we have no problem attributing the murder to racism.
If a homosexual is brutally beaten by someone who has made anti-LGBT comments in the past, we have little issue with pointing out that the crime was probably motivated by fear of the gay.
But good grief! A hater of women leaves behind a 137-page manifesto and several videos about how much he hates women and how he intends to punish a sorority house full of them, and what happens? We see a tremendous amount of mass-media and individual denial that misogyny had anything to do with the guy's killing spree.
There's a whole lot of people out there seeming to be trying to out-deny each other, and lay the blame on the most ridiculous things. Just bizarre.
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Agreed. That's basically what David Futrelle wrote in his blog. Greta compiled some good comments at http://freethoughtblogs.com/greta/2014/05/26/misogynist-killer/
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ThorGoLucky
Snuggle Wolf
USA
1487 Posts |
Posted - 05/28/2014 : 20:03:15 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Kil
Yes, he was a misogynist. But there's more to it than that, I think. And remember, he hated men too for being able to have relationships with women. He hated couples too. And most of the people he killed were men.
Here's what I think is the best analysis of this person and the kind of crime he committed. It came by way of Michelle:
How We All Miss the Point on School Shootings
Perhaps the only criticism I have with the article is while he might have been a psychopath, he was most certainly narcissistic. As were all those other shooters. I'm talking about the personality disorder that also includes a lack of empathy. I suppose a narcissist can be legitimately called a psychopath. But it's important to understand the attention getting aspect of these crimes, which would be indicative of narcissism.
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Thanks, Kil. I agree. |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
Posted - 05/29/2014 : 08:24:10 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Kil
Yes, he was a misogynist. But there's more to it than that, I think. |
Of course there is, and I hope I didn't read like I was saying otherwise.
Manson's piece lists a bunch of things that people are having conversations about, including misogyny, the ubiquity of guns, mental health and male privilege, and I say: it's clearly all of the above.
However, one of them sticks out far above the others in terms of informing us about Rodgers' motivation. I don't think we have much of a need to second-guess his own stated purposes. If we turn the focus to his narcissism, and away from his misogyny, does it help anything? Do we get a better handle on how to reduce the incidence of mass murder in the future?
The numbers will probably go down (and drop for other, less sensational forms of violence) if we get our society to recognize that casual sexism is bad and enables the outright misogynists. Just like how the number of cops who'll turn a blind eye to a lynching has dropped over the last six or seven decades as we've worked to ensure that out-and-proud racism is only found on the fringe, so to should sexism get marginalized and recognized as being abnormal and/or dangerous.
(By the way, I don't see how Manson's "these people need help" conclusion doesn't fall under the mental-health conversation, but whatever.) |
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13476 Posts |
Posted - 05/29/2014 : 10:37:15 [Permalink]
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Dave:
However, one of them sticks out far above the others in terms of informing us about Rodgers' motivation. |
If he was a killer who wanted to be famous for killing, his main motivation was to kill. It's not that misogyny should be left out of the conversation. But he probably would have found another reason to kill had he not been a misogynist. I think that was the point of the article. There is a similarity of MO running through these school shootings, no matter what the killers stated as the reason, that should possibly be brought into focus.
Dave:
If we turn the focus to his narcissism, and away from his misogyny, does it help anything? |
Gosh I wish I had the answer to that. But I'm thinking that the narcissism really does loom larger than any stated reason the killer gives for a rampage. Again, take away the misogyny, and you still probably have a killer.
I'm in no way suggesting that we shouldn't continue to fight against misogyny. And even point to this extreme act of hatred against women (and people in general) as a problem. But this killing, and the others, seem to be more about spreading terror and fear for fame than anything else.
Unlike the author of the article I linked to, I do think it's a mental health issue. But not the failing of a mental health system unless you count it as the failing of profiling a killer. They throw down the signs and then they do it. So we somehow need to recognize the signs. |
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13476 Posts |
Posted - 05/29/2014 : 12:39:57 [Permalink]
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| Remember that the killing was indiscriminate, unlike the white supremacist killing a black man or a homosexual beaten and killed by a homophobe. Again, that's the MO of these kinds of killings. They differ in that way from the typical hate crime. All of these school killings, like those of political and religious terrorists, target anyone in the path of the killer. |
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
Posted - 05/30/2014 : 07:54:13 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Kil
If he was a killer who wanted to be famous for killing, his main motivation was to kill. It's not that misogyny should be left out of the conversation. But he probably would have found another reason to kill had he not been a misogynist. |
Well, did he want to be famous, or did he want to be famous for murder? Had he figured out another path to fame, would he have even thought of killing anyone?
I'm having trouble wrapping my head around the idea that his misogyny was less than central to the massacre because he spent years obsessed with women and what they should (but weren't) doing for him. Why go through all that effort when a single snubbing has been good enough rationale for other people to kill?
In other words, if his main motivation was simply to get famous for killing people, then he spent years creating the false impression that his main motivation was his hatred for women.| Remember that the killing was indiscriminate... |
Only after nobody answered the door at the sorority house. It's obvious he didn't have a plan-B. |
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13476 Posts |
Posted - 05/30/2014 : 09:16:11 [Permalink]
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Dave:
Only after nobody answered the door at the sorority house. It's obvious he didn't have a plan-B. |
The first three victims were his roommates. All male.
But look. All of these killers came up with a motive of one sort or another. They all obsessed on something. So what should be the main focus? The similarities of these killings or the stated motive for each one?
And again, I'm not trying to play down his misogyny. I'm just saying that if you want to stop this kind of killing, if it can be done, you have to look closely at the similarities of these kinds of killings and consider the possibility that the stated motive is only a part of the MO, and not even the most important part. I'm not throwing his misogyny under the bus to say that. It was after all his excuse for his act. But I'm trying to look at the bigger picture. The profile of a killer. |
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ThorGoLucky
Snuggle Wolf
USA
1487 Posts |
Posted - 05/30/2014 : 10:13:01 [Permalink]
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"Some people are just no damn good."
--Eric "Brouhaha" Smith
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
Posted - 05/30/2014 : 13:20:15 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Kil
Dave:
Only after nobody answered the door at the sorority house. It's obvious he didn't have a plan-B. |
The first three victims were his roommates. All male. |
Yes, but they weren't indiscriminate killings. Rodger had been having issues with his roommates for some time. Racism was probably also involved, since he considered "pure" Asians "ugly." And it's not impossible that if they had healthy relationships with women, Rodger would have considered them to be "stealing" girls he was entitled to. With those guys alive, he would have had to sneak three guns and 41 clips of ammo out of the apartment, or they probably would have raised the alarm before Rodgers got into his car. I'm certain that offing his roomies was a necessary step-one for Rodgers' "Day of Retribution," as vengeance on people who were beneath him and to help ensure his own success.But look. All of these killers came up with a motive of one sort or another. They all obsessed on something. So what should be the main focus? The similarities of these killings or the stated motive for each one?
And again, I'm not trying to play down his misogyny. I'm just saying that if you want to stop this kind of killing, if it can be done, you have to look closely at the similarities of these kinds of killings and consider the possibility that the stated motive is only a part of the MO, and not even the most important part. I'm not throwing his misogyny under the bus to say that. It was after all his excuse for his act. But I'm trying to look at the bigger picture. The profile of a killer. |
Since Rodger was obsessed with the wrongs women did to him every day, I'd say his misogyny would have to be a pretty big chunk of that profile.
Now, maybe it did nothing more than feed a rage that would have been burning in him no matter what, and if he hadn't been obsessed with women he would have been obsessed with and raged against something else. It's speculative, but possible.
Perhaps you'll remember marf's regular attempts to lay the blame for apparently religiously motivated atrocities on anything but religion. My response to her was that if we got rid of religion, it wouldn't be able to cloud the stage and confuse our analyses of such situations. Sure, it may just be one rationalization that we could eliminate, but there aren't an infinite number of them, and any clarity helps.
If we lived in a world where casual sexism was uncommon and outright misogyny was as rare as out KKK members, people would have been much more concerned about Elliot Rodgers' behavior long before he bought his first gun. |
- Dave W. (Private Msg, EMail)
Evidently, I rock!
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Kil
Evil Skeptic
USA
13476 Posts |
Posted - 05/30/2014 : 15:44:50 [Permalink]
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Well... I dunno. I wish I did. But to my way of thinking, his mental state, and all the preparation and hints he dropped about what he was planning looms larger than any stated reason for the killing spree. I pretty much do believe that if it weren't for women rejecting him, it would have been for his inability to make and keep friends, or something else. I'm thinking that this is a small subset of violent crime that is mostly the result of narcissism and psychopathy.
And god knows, I don't agree that all religiously motivated atrocities are anything but religion anymore than I believe that crimes against females are anything but misogyny. That's not been the case that I've been trying to make. (I know you know that.) I'm just suggesting that there is a small subset of criminal behavior that does seem to have a pattern to it, no matter what the stated motive is, because there always is one, and that most people miss the seriousness of the signals that are freely given by the perpetrators of this kind of crime. |
Uncertainty may make you uncomfortable. Certainty makes you ridiculous.
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Dave W.
Info Junkie
USA
26020 Posts |
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Dr. Mabuse
Septic Fiend
Sweden
9687 Posts |
Posted - 06/02/2014 : 13:09:25 [Permalink]
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Here's another take on this:
In Living Color
http://kazez.blogspot.se/2014/06/the-misogyny-debate.html
I'm reluctant to accept Walsh's diagnosis because misogyny comes into the picture very late in Rodger's manifesto, when all the antecedents of his rampage have already been festering for 10 years. The antecedents are hatred, resentment, misery, loneliness, a sense of unfairness, rage (what you might call being "emotionally disturbed" as opposed to "mentally ill"--we don't know yet about the latter). Until late in his short life, his hatred doesn't take a specifically misogynistic form.
The excerpts from the manifesto looks to me like a lot of pain from a bullied boy who's not accepted by his peers.
But if you read this manifesto, what seems much more overwhelming is the overall pattern of hate, envy, loneliness, resentment, sadness, hopelessness, craving for status, humiliation, despair, etc. So it is baffling to me that we've settled on misogyny as key to understanding why this happened.
I have no vested interest in this matter, other than I recognise some of the emotions expressed in the excerpts as similar (though not as powerful) to what I experienced myself as a bullied child in school. Somewhere I found the strength to move on, where he didn't. |
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ThorGoLucky
Snuggle Wolf
USA
1487 Posts |
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Astounding denial
