Elliot Rodger

@ossobuco,

I listened to Chu last night on NPR's "Tell Me More" during which he, essentially recited the comments made in this article.

Arthur Chu is, apparently, the self-appointed voice of American Nerds. His qualifications for the position seem to consist of his being a Jeopardy savant, and, I suppose, his physical appearance.

The article, to me, is essentially a projection of Chu's "former" misogyny and rape fantasies on the members of "Ned Nation." He repeatedly qualifies his assertions with admissions that not all "nerds" are misogynists or entertain rape fantasies, but then goes on to assume that all "nerds" require his sage advice to "grow up."

In his interview last night he revealed that he is recently married. Apparently this has led to his reformed way of thinking about women, and like a lot of reformed sinners he feels the need to announce his transformation, from atop a lofty position, by preaching to those still sinning.

The support for his generalizations about a presumably large group of American men are entirely anecdotal and one gets the impression that he is actually the main character is some of these anecdotes.

I'm happy for him that he, apparently, followed his own advice and found love with a women who shared his "nerdy" interests, and that it has helped him change his view of women, but his article would have been more interesting and more honest if it was limited to his own reformation and offered as an example of a better way rather than as a scold for those who haven't been as fortunate as himself.

More generally, it is amusing that the Rogers crime has led to an intense interest in what "nerds" are thinking. Not because "nerds" don't deserve consideration as human beings, but because for so long they were regarded as precisely the opposite. The host of "Tell Me More," Michelle Martin, remarked more than once that this was a discussion of some importance because of the ascendency of "nerds" in American culture. The irony is striking.

Later in the show, the topic was addressed during the "Barbershop" segment during which men of color discuss (with Ms. Martin) the events of the week. I was pleased to hear that the discussion wasn't simply an opportunity for each man to announce their bonafides as "feminists" (although at one time or another each did), but that there was a recognition, by at least half the panel, the Rogers crime is an issue of mental health, and other issues, while worthy of discussion in their own right, were beside the point.

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@Finn dAbuzz,

It is not relevant, rodger not only was not a nerd but he did not like nerds. The problem is that Rodger was not anything, he did not fit anywhere, he never became part of us.

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@nononono,

Quote:

Again, you're using mainstream feminist propaganda...

I cited articles from the Southern Poverty Law Center regarding misogyny and hate that can be found on Web sites in the "manosphere".

I have yet to see you condemn any thinking of that type. In fact, you give every indication that you support it.

You use the terms "feminist" and "feminism" so loosely, they are really synonymous with female and woman, and your rants about "feminists" are nothing more than a rather transparent excuse to attack and malign all women.

Quote:

I will never accept that hatred of men is OK.

Neither is hatred of women "OK".

But you refuse to see, or acknowledge, or condemn the hatred of women, which is misogyny.

In a thread about a young man, whose murderous rage was fueled by misogynist thinking, and a sense of male entitlement, a good deal of which was reinforced by his excursions into the "manosphere", you've repeatedly tried to shift the focus of discussion to the victimization of men in a society you see as "female dominated"--as though you were nodding in agreement with that killer's lethal perceptions of girls and women.

Quote:

You are a M I S A N D R I S T to the utmost!

I'm not misandrist at all--not in my thinking, nor in my behavior toward men.

Quote:

Definition of MISANDRY
: a hatred of men
— mis·an·drist noun or adjective

No female in this thread, including me, has made negative comments about men as a group, let alone voiced hatred toward men as a group, or complained of being victimized by men as a group, or blamed men as a group for all of society's ills.

You've done nothing but whine about how men are victimized and kicked around by women.

Quote:

Men are ENTITLED to an EQUAL voice in society.

Men have always had an equal voice in our society. My grandmother had to fight to even get the right to vote in this society.

Quote:

Men are NOT disposable, nor are they meant to be supplicants to an unjust media, unjust judicial system,...

That "unjust media"--the movie industry, the TV industry, the print news media, is controlled by men. The "unjust judicial system"--and, in fact, all three branches of government--are dominated by men. Until fairly recently, there were no women on the Supreme Court.

In terms of violence directed against them, women pay a heavy price for misogyny--which is one reason such hostility, and denigration of females is intolerable--it all too often translates into violence toward women. And that's a global problem, in terms of the basic human rights of females, which is why it shouldn't be consigned to being a "woman's issue", or something only "feminists" should be concerned about.

Quote:

Men are NOT disposable...

Nor are they being disposed of.

But women are.

Perhaps your head was too buried in the "manosphere" to hear the news about the over 200 girls kidnapped from their school in Nigeria, because their abductors didn't feel girls should have an education, and they threatened to sell the girls into slavery.

How about the pregnant woman who was stoned to death in broad daylight in Pakistan this week, and whose husband admitted he had killed his first wife to be with her, and whose sister had also been murdered by her family.

Quote:

The husband of the pregnant woman who was beaten to death in broad daylight has admitted he murdered his first wife to be with her.

Farzana Parveen, 25, was attacked with bricks by 20 family members because she 'illegally' married the man she loved.

The honour killing, on the steps of Lahore court, sparked global outrage as police reportedly looked on doing nothing.

Today, the victim's husband confessed he killed his first wife so they could marry - and revealed that Farzana's older sister was also murdered by her family in an honour killing.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2642528/Farzana-Parveen-Pakistani-woman-stoned-death-marrying-man-loved-pictured.html#ixzz33JrXr89m

So, when a privileged young man in this country writes down his thoughts about wanting to put all women in concentration camps and starve them, and he talks about how he wants to kill all women, and picks out a particular sorority house in his area as a target, and then goes on a murderous rampage, and we then find he was a frequent online visitor to the "manosphere", of course the national conversation will include discussions about misogyny, conversations you found "unfair" because of the way you felt they reflected on men. You can't stop whining long enough to take a look at the kind of misogynist thinking, supported and perpetuated by many of those "manosphere" sites, that contributes to actual violence, of all sorts, against women.

1 Reply

@Miller,

hawkeye10 wrote:

And we still have A2K for the moment, I will miss it when it is gone (TWO THUMBS UP TO ROBERT)

nononono wrote:

He's shutting this down eh? That's too bad. Some posts and people here seem to be quite informative.

Miller wrote:

I will miss it too, when it's gone. Could the exit be approaching?

I don't know if there is a shutdown approaching, but there have been predictions that the planned revamping of the ignore switch to turn it into an offensive weapon will make the site useless as a forum for intelligent discussion.

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@hawkeye10,

hawkeye10 wrote:

The problem is that Rodger was not anything, he did not fit anywhere, he never became part of us.

Elliot Rodger was autistic and that means that Rodger was something.

Looking at his appearance, I'm surprised that no one thought that Rodger may have been gay. Could it be that Rodger actually hated females, because he wasn't one?

Likewise, females may not have liked Rodger, simply because of his effeminate appearance.

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@ossobuco,

That's a great article, osso. I particularly hope that some of the men here will read it, because it's a take from a different perspective.

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@firefly,

Quote:

So, when a privileged young man in this country writes down his thoughts about wanting to put all women in concentration camps and starve them, and he talks about how he wants to kill all women, and picks out a particular sorority house in his area as a target, and then goes on a murderous rampage, and we then find he was a frequent online visitor to the "manosphere", of course the national conversation will include discussions about misogyny, conversations you found "unfair" because of the way you felt they reflected on men. You can't stop whining long enough to take a look at the kind of misogynist thinking, supported and perpetuated by many of those "manosphere" sites, that contributes to actual violence, of all sorts, against women.

What the heck is the "manosphere?"

What does the fact that Elliot Rogers was "privileged" have to do with anything? Would his act have been somehow less heinous if he were not "privileged?" Are only the "privileged" misogynists?

[/quote]

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@Finn dAbuzz,

Quote:

What the heck is the "manosphere?"

http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/intelligence-report/browse-all-issues/2012/spring/misogyny-the-sites

1 Reply

Powerful writing from a WOMAN. A reminder of just how inappropriate the hashtag #YesAllWomen was, being used during a holiday that memorialized men's sacrifice.

This past Memorial Day weekend, while Americans with at least a shred of civic integrity were respecting the ultimate sacrifice of our servicemen, “Twitter activist” feminists were piggybacking on the tragedy at UC Santa Barbara. The juxtaposition would be laughable if it were not so grotesque. “Microaggressions” pale in comparison to “lethal aggressions.” Lena Dunham, dutifully, took a moment to buoy the charge with her shout-out to her “brave web friends” using the #YesAllWomen hashtag. On a sacred holiday honoring our fallen, feminists took to the airways to smear men and masculinity.

The bald absurdity of politicizing a tragedy like the UC Santa Barbara murders to promote grievance culture on Memorial Day weekend is enough to make one wonder, “How can anyone believe and promulgate the hatefulness of modern feminism?” The worldview polarizes people into brutes and victims and their respective sympathizers. If the feminists are to be believed, women are to live in fear of men, whose capacity for violence has been profoundly perverted by feminist demagogues from serving to protect to serving to victimize. Nevermind that over 8,000 men died defending the people of the United States in Iraq and Afghanistan.

While Lena Dunham’s Twitter activists likely do not know the difference between Iraq and Afghanistan, they may grudgingly admit that they benefit from the male tradition of military service. Traditionally the protectors of house and home, men’s capacity and willingness to do violence has been demonized and misrepresented by focus on a criminal few for political gains by women whose misconceptions of masculinity are pathological. Violation and abuse are egregious, but internalizing these terrible experiences as a blueprint for one’s worldview is unhealthy, not to mention, results in an inaccurate view of reality.

In line with forcing “reality” to reflect worldview, feminist dogma expunges or justifies women’s own capacity for violence, and relieves women of their responsibility for their own behavior in a way that can only be described as infantilizing and patronizing. Women are helpless products of ecological forces and men are the architects of a system that marginalizes them. The best thing that men can do is neuter themselves; become “allies,” acknowledging their barbaric complicity in this paradigm of oppression by resigning themselves to contrite self-loathing (note: feminists aren’t attracted to these men, though they recognize they are who they should be with “politically”).

This Marxist fever dream—- sex warfare peddled under the banner of “equality”—- is riddled with fallacies and tragically popular. For example, if “every woman’s son is her potential betrayer and also the inevitable rapist or exploiter of another woman,” as feminist intellectual grandmother Andrea Dworkin wrote, how does one explain that the vast majority of those who volunteer their lives in defense of American families are men? Are male midwives misogynists in disguise? Furthermore, if feminism is about women’s liberation, why do feminists feel imperial claims to the real estate of my person in describing “women’s experience?” Answer: feminism has become an authoritarian movement. It seeks to control and punish on a basis of emotional legitimacy, blind acceptance of dogma and using repressive smear tactics against its dissenters.

Twitter feminist activists claim to have “their experience” impugned with the refreshingly sane refutation, “Not all men are like that.” They would be well served to consider the truth of the objection to their vile generalizations about men, rather than to interpret a call to reason as a personal denial of their subjective experiences. Personal validation is not the work of the public sphere, belying the slogan, “Make the personal political.” Modern Western feminism is a disease that has metastasized in the American body politic using victimhood as a recruitment tool. With this strain of feminism, nothing is sacred. Tragedy serves as a springboard for self-reference, on a holiday honoring dead heroes.

It’s ugly, ugly politics.

https://medium.com/@SouthernKeeks/what-the-mob-doesnt-tell-you-about-masculinity-206dccab8ce1

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@nononono,

Quote:

a holiday that memorialized men's sacrifice

Are you now pretending that no women have died while in the service of our country?

It has never been my impression that Memorial Day was devoted to only honoring men.

1 Reply

@Finn dAbuzz,

I dunno. I liked some nerds before that was a word. But I wasn't them, so I can't say.

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@hawkeye10,

Quote:

A few years before the end Rodger actually did break down and ask for help, at the dinner where he told His parents and the people they were having dinner with that he wanted to die.

THeir response, spend three hours talking him up. That is it.

"That he wanted to commit suicide" is what he stated. There is more concern in my eyes, a child telling me that than, "I want to die".

I wrote that before to you Hawkeye, in a post, re he previously wanted to commit suicide and it was at that point the parents should have seen, it was more than a problem with social skills.

In your other post you are talking about sexual abuse. So are you saying you too think, that there could be a possibility that this actually did occur and he supressed it or "never spoke of it" same way as when asked about sex, he stated " I have no drive" when in fact he had a massive drive.

Also, let's even take that above. So a kid says I have no drive. As a parent aren't you supposed to have a bit on an inkling of how your kids mind works? Wouldn't you discuss the said subject anyway? Why would you go, "oh ok, he has no drive", walk away and never discuss it.

Re sexual abuse. " I got lost, I met some strangers, eventually they got me back to class". "EVENTUALLY" why not " I got lost, I managed to find some strangers and told them what school I went to and that I was lost . They helped me get back to class"....

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@hawkeye10,

It was her parents ignoring, and she didn't go out and murder people.

Meanwhile, I saw this on Twitter:

Adelaide Kane @AdelaideKane · May 26
Not ALL men harass women. But ALL women have, at some point, been harassed by men. Food for thought. #YesAllWomen

I see this hashtag criticized for "capitalizing" on the murders, but I think since women were actively targeted - this response is healthy and effective. I love it. As long as the statements are even-handed - like the one above.

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@Lash,

Cockteasing is often torment, and many/most men have been subjected to it. Contrary to what the feminists claim if the genders are going to throw down their victim cred it is not all clear that the women would win.

Emotional belittling....pretty damn sure almost all men have been subjected to that at the mouth of women.

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@FOUND SOUL,

Quote:

Last July, shortly before his 22nd birthday, Rodger went to a house party in Isla Vista in what he wrote was a last-ditch effort to “give women and humanity one more chance to accept me and give me a chance to have a pleasurable youth.” If he returned home that night “a lonely virgin,” he wrote, he would plan his “Day of Retribution.”

Quote:

At the party, he drank heavily and felt out of place. As he stood outside the house with other undergraduates, he wrote, a “dark, hate-fueled rage overcame my entire being, and I tried to push as many of them as I could from the 10-foot ledge. My main target was the girls. I wanted to punish them for talking to the obnoxious boys instead of me.”

Other party guests kicked and punched Rodger, and he ended up in the hospital, where on July 21, 2013, he had his first encounter with sheriff’s deputies. Rodger wrote in his manifesto that he lied to the police, alleging that other men pushed him off the ledge. The other men told police that Rodger was the aggressor. Without any evidence, the case was dismissed.

Rodger crossed paths with the Santa Barbara County Sheriff’s Office again Jan. 15, when he accused his roommate of stealing three candles, valued at $22. Rodger tried to make a citizen’s arrest.

Quote:

The SPLC also points to Rodger's misogynistic postings from PuaHate. In several Rodger referred to himself as an incel (involuntary celibate) and called for the destruction of feminism:

One day incels will realize their true strength and numbers, and will overthrow this oppressive feminist system.

Start envisioning a world where WOMEN FEAR YOU.
http://jezebel.com/elliot-rodgers-final-videos-racist-postings-leaked-1581163115

Quote:

Elliot Rodger’s best friend, Philip Bloeser tried to offer him dating advice.
Elliot Rodger‘s best friend, and childhood friend, Philip Bloeser has told that he had offered Rodger dating advice but at the time he had refused to heed his suggestions.

Told Philip Bloeser in an exclusive with the UK’s dailymail: ‘I can’t believe I was friends with a psychopathic, mass murderer.’

Prior to setting off on his retribution video, Elliot Rodger had written in his manifesto that Bloesser was his first real school friend.
Philip Bloeser, a childhood friend of Elliot Rodger has told that Rodger had confessed to him that he wanted to hold down women and rape them.

Philip Bloeser in turn would be one of 30 individuals who would receive Elliot Rodger’s manifesto in an email chain prior moments prior to Elliot Rodger setting out on his rampage.

The manifesto itself delineated how Rodger intended to kill his housemates, then slaughter women at a sorority house before then proceeding to open fire on the streets of Isla Vista.

Told the Philip Bloeser’s mother, Cathleen Bloeser: ‘We could see that he was turning,’

‘He’d changed emotionally, and he’d become very despondent and he wanted to get back at people.’

The mother would tell how within the last year Elliot Rodger’s mental health had markedly deteriorated, despite being under psychiatric care, whilst all the while refusing to take his medication.
She said Rodger, who had spoken to her son Philip and another one of his friends about wanting to sexually assault women, had invited her son over to stay at his home over the weekend.

But he and another childhood friend did not stay at the apartment. On Saturday, Rodger’s two roommates and another male friend were found there stabbed to death.

At present it is not sure whether Elliot Rodger had intended to murder Philip Bloeser along with the roommates.

Nevertheless the mother told: ‘I have a feeling that they would have been right there as a part of it and shot as well,’

Quote:

To date it is not understood why Elliot Rodger had sent out his manifesto to a collection of up to 30 individuals, including his mother and therapists. Some have wondered if he may have sought someone to stop him at the last moment whilst others are more inclined to believe that Rodger was only parlaying into his narcissistic need for attention and validation

On killing his brother Jazz

Quote:

Wrote Rodger: ‘It will be a hard thing to do, because I had really bonded with my little brother in the last year, and he respected and looked up to me,’

‘But I would have to do it. If I can’t live a pleasurable life, then neither will he! I will not let him put my legacy to shame.’

Adding of his step-mom, Soumaya Akaaboune: ‘In order to kill him I would have to kill Soumaya too, but that will be easy. All I would need to do is think about all of the hurtful things she had said to me in that past as I plunge my knife into her neck.’

As it would turn out, neither were targeted in the massacre, though it’s not clear whether this was due to a lucky accident or if Rodger changed his mind at the last minute.

Elliot Rodger comes to explain how he decided to murder his brother around October last year when he had an argument with Soumaya while visiting their house.

‘She began to boast that my brother was recently signed by an agent to act in T.V. commercials,’ he wrote.

‘She said that by the time he is my age, he will be a successful actor. I talked about how he was already so socially savvy for his age, and how I’ve always envied him for it. She told me he will never have any problems with girls, and will lose his virginity while he’s young.

‘I had to sit there and listen to the b**** tell me that my little brother will grow up enjoying the life I’ve always craved for, but missed out on.

‘It is very unfair how some boys are able to live such pleasurable lives while I never had any taste of it, and now it has been confirmed to me that my little brother will become one of them. He will become a popular kid who gets all the girls. Girls will love him. He will become one of my enemies.

Adds the youth: ‘That was the day that I decided I would have to kill him on the Day of Retribution. I will not allow the boy to surpass me at everything, to live the life I’ve always wanted. It’s not fair that he has the chance to have a pleasurable life while I’ve been denied it.’

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@hawkeye10,

I'm sure that is no universal thing or even particularly common. You are belligerently set in your ways and don't know what you are talking about. Yes, I know you swing and all that, but I doubt that gives you magisterium for pronouncements about women in general.

1 Reply

@ossobuco,

ossobuco wrote:

I'm sure that is no universal thing or even particularly common. You are belligerently set in your ways and don't know what you are talking about. Yes, I know you swing and all that, but I doubt that gives you magisterium for pronouncements about women in general.

right, it is 50 years of watching and listening which does.

1 Reply

@FOUND SOUL,

Quote:

In your other post you are talking about sexual abuse. So are you saying you too think, that there could be a possibility that this actually did occur and he supressed it or "never spoke of it" same way as when asked about sex, he stated " I have no drive" when in fact he had a massive drive

Yes, lots in common re damage and response to damage, but I dont see any clues that he was sexually abused, repressed or otherwise. That no one at home or school noticed his anguish makes me angry. But that still leaves the $1000000 question, why did he shut down and then explode rather than reach out for help? From reading his account it sounds like he decided that the human race is so barbaric that he did not want to be part of us, that deciding that humans are nasty creatures made him stuck between wanting to be part of us and not wanting to be part of us. Meanwhile the pain level kept going up, so the only option was death.

Is the deciding to go out in a pool of blood a legacy of the movies? Maybe.

1 Reply

@hawkeye10,

hawkeye10 wrote:

So I have read a fair chunk of the 140 pages.

U know, of course, that it is NOT FAIR
if u have read more than someone ELSE has read.
It is a crime; (don t ask me which statute it has violated).

hawkeye10 wrote:

Two things:

By 15 he had already mostly given up,
but he was deeply appreciative of anyone who broke through to him,
even if it was just for one short interaction.

Yes. I 'd have enjoyed arguing with him.
I 'd have liked to be social with him; he severely craved that.

hawkeye10 wrote:

The time from 15 forwards has the feel of what I have seen with a lot of female childhood sexual abuse victims....he knows how broken he is, and he has developed some coping mechanisms to get him by after a fashion, in Rodgers case WOW mostly.

He was a slave of fear.
By now, his psychiatrists and his mental health counsellors,
his social skills advisors, have had enuf time to read his manifesto.
I 'd wager that thay recognize that their work with him was not their finest hour.
If thay have conferred with one another,
that wud be a most interesting conversation.

Note that BEFORE his decision to avenge himself,
Elliot was never interested in any personal weapons; no knives nor guns.
His knives & guns were only for offensive purposes, not for defense.

David

1 Reply

@OmSigDAVID,

Quote:

He was a slave of fear.

most certainly not, this was a combination of knowing that he did not have the skills to be successful, and also an opinion that humans suck.

Early in life he sounds almost female, in that he is not going to attempt something unless he is pretty sure that he will be successful. Plus as someone pointed out his looks were feminine. Then at the end he acts out in exaggerated movie version masculinity almost like maybe it was compensation for not feeling what he thought masculine was. One the other hand his lack of emotion and his approach to problem solving seem very masculine.

We are never going to know what was going on with him at this level though, he is gone and it looks like a near certainty that no one ever knew him well enough to know about these sorts of things about one Elliot Rodgers. We have his 140 pages and his video, but they were left for other reasons than for us to plumb the depths of this guy. We are not going to get someone coming forwards saying " ya, elliot and I had a heart to heart one night and he told me blah,blah, blah..."

Elliot Rodgers was for all intents and purposes a ghost, till he decided to kill". And he would have likely stayed a ghost had he not killed. He was a nobody, and he could not deal with that.

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