Pickup artists, classy fellows that they are, are using Elliot Rodger’s killing rampage as a marketing ploy. In the comments to one of Rodger’s videos on YouTube, a company called Strategic Dating Coach offered their solution to prevent similar shootings in the future: send disturbed young men who can’t get dates to one of their coaching sessions!
While this response to Rodger’s mass killing is uniquely crass, the argument that “Game saves lives” is hardly new. To PUAs like Heartiste and Roosh Valizadeh it’s practically an article of faith.
In the wake of George Sodini’s murderous shooting spree in a Pennsylvania gym in 2009, Heartiste (then known as Roissy) wrote
If Sodini had learned game he would have been able to find another woman and gotten laid after his ex dumped him. He wouldn’t have spent the next 20 years steeped in bile and weighed down by his Sisyphian blue balls, dreaming of vengeance. Game could have saved the lives of the women Sodini killed.
The fact that Sodini had in fact imbibed in the alleged wisdom of pickup artistry, going so far as attending a pricey seminar from old-school pickup guru R. Don Steele, a self-proclaimed expert on dating young women, didn’t lead any in the pickup community to reconsider this position.
Nor has it this time. It is clear that Elliot Rodger was steeped in “red pill” thinking about women. And while he wasn’t himself a PUA, he was certainly aware of the basics of “Game.” Indeed, he subscribed to a number of PUA channels on YouTube and was a regular commenter on PUAhate, a sleazy forum devoted to criticizing “game,” not because it is manipulative and misogynistic but because it doesn’t work.
On the Roosh V forum earlier today, Roosh acknowledged that Rodger knew at least a little about “red pill” ideology – noting that Rodger referred to himself as an”alpha” – but still went ahead and argued that Game was the solution to massacres like this:
He is self-delusional and massively entitled, but exposing him to game may have saved lives.
In a followup comment, Roosh expressed his concerns for the real victims of this tragedy – Pickup artists:
I’m trying to think of ways our enemies will come after us because of this, but if anything, we’re the solution to this sort of murder rampage. This is the society that progressives wanted, where women are fully able to choose the top 10% of alpha males while shaming masculinity, leaving beta males with modest resources in the dust. Of course they will simply push a ban on guns, but this wholly neglects the cause. Seven people died because this guy couldn’t get laid … .
Other commenters were quick to agree. According to someone known as Moma,
Roosh has a very valid point. This will continue to replay over and over again. As human beings, our wiring is very basic yet primal. …
When have you last heard of a porn star shooting up a place? How many have emptied their balls in a hot lizard and then felt the urge to go and smoke 50 strangers?
According to Samseau, the problem wasn’t that Rodger hadn’t heard the Game Gospel; the problem was that he had rejected his salvation:
He knew about Game. If he had an account on PUAHATE then he knew about game. He was just a denialist. There was no helping this dude.
Roosh seconded this bit of wisdom, seeing it as clear evidence that “game denialism kills.”
Michelin, for his part, hoped that PUAs would be able to use the massacre as a publicity bonanza and a great “told you so” to all the haters.
One should write a mainstream article about this case. The argument that game could have saved lives can be an eye-opener and a smash in the face to haters of game.
Tuthmosis, the man best known for a Return of Kings post on the “5 Reasons to Date a Girl With An Eating Disorder,” reported his joy that PUAhate was getting bad press:
Seeing your enemies fall is a delicious treat you only get to taste a few times in your life. I’m savoring this delicacy with a cup of freshly brewed coffee. It’s a shame real people had to lose their lives, but I can’t help but think this will discredit a horrible website, PUAHate–and a way of thinking–that could have harmed even more men and innocent people. Beta losers will never go away, but this will wake up a few men and, more importantly, scare others.
Zelcorpion blamed “girls” and MGTOWers for giving Rodgers bad dating advice:
I bet a few girls told him that he only needs to be himself, be nice, be a gentleman, have a nice car, looks etc. – only to realize that it mattered shit. Instead of learning from the PUA-community he chose to listen to PUAhaters and some of the anti-female comments of the MGTOWs who themselves are often refusing to accept Game or even basic concepts like Alpha/Beta. I think that problem will become way worse, since hypergamy and promiscuity will only increase and most men will be left in the sexual wasteland.
But it took a relative newcomer to the forum by the handle of thedavidgt to raise the obvious logical objection to the Game-for-everybody solution to incel rage:
If every sexless beta in the world took it upon himself to learn game, approach girls, lift, dress well etc, would it not simply feed women’s egos and entitlement? So instead of occasionally getting awkwardly hit on by skinny fat, poor-dressed chumps, the average 7 would then be approached several times a day by extremely high value men. We’ll have a society of men working to improve themselves for women who will get lazier and lazier while at the same time demanding more and more.
In fact, the “Game saves lives” mantra is dead wrong, but not for this reason. First of all, there is no clear evidence that “game,” per se, works, except insofar as it encourages men to pursue large numbers of women and numb them to the pain of rejection. It’s possible that a few of the conversational ploys invented by various PUAs may work better than having no conversational ploys at all. But there are no magic cheat codes to “getting with women.”
There is one more disturbing way in which “game” may increase “success” with women for unscrupulous men: many of the standard techniques of “game”– invading a woman’s personal space, touching her repeatedly, trying to “isolate” her from her friends – may serve as “tests” to find women who are less likely to resist violations of their boundaries. In this way, “game” may serve as a quite effective enabler of date rape. Indeed Roosh himself has admitted to raping a date too drunk to consent.
So how much of a solution is training a guy who is already filled with a toxic mixture of entitlement and self-loathing (yes, these strange bedfellows do often go together) in some techniques that might help him to tamp down his insecurities enough to manipulate some willing or not-so-willing women into bed?
You might have simply turned a mass killer into a serial rapist, or possibly a serial killer. Ted Bundy was quite the charmer. Somehow this didn’t make him a decent human being.
Even if “game” were the beneficient form of “self-improvement” that some of its proponents like to claim it is, teaching Rodger how to be a better dater would not make him a better person. Would having a girlfriend solve all his problems? Hardly. Relationships require patience and compromise and mutual respect, and Rodger seems to have had none of these qualities. Instead of directing his narcissistic rage at “girls” at large, he would likely have ended up abusing a string of girlfriends.
The problem wasn’t Rodger’s lack of “Game.” It was his lack of humanity.
My question is, why is it so important to saurabh to convince us/hirself that this man’s thought processes were somehow different from those of most other angry misogynists? Is it magical thinking, ie do you think that if it’s true that Roger was psychotic then that will mean that you/women will be safe as long as you avoid people who don’t seem psychotic to you? Is it that you recognize aspects of your own messed up thinking in his and you’re trying to disassociate yourself from the connection between them and these murders? Or the same, but for a friend or loved one rather than yourself? Because whatever your reasons are, sorry to break it to you, but all of the shit you’re pulling out as proof that this one guy was different from most of the others can be found in lots and lots and lots of the writing of men involved in the manosphere (and in abusers who don’t identify as MRA or PUA).
. I’m saying that the cause of this guy’s misogyny is his delusion, NOT his ideology.
Based on what?
I’d argue the object of this guy’s delusions is based on the overarching misogynist structures in society, and that when he needed a target for his frustrations he chose the one his society has been telling him is the cause of his “manly” misery. Those uppity women who don’t know their place and have usurped men from theirs.
No, I don’t think the MRM are the primary cause, but I’d be willing to say they were the proximate one.
Aebars, wow, thanks for the fat-shaming and uncensored slurs.
Suarabh, just no.
Wow, this post is really bringing the fail out of the woodwork.
There’s this thing people do in the wake of a mass shooting or politically-motivated attack (US examples: George Tiller and Gabrielle Giffords), where they just decide that the attacker must have been mentally ill. It has a kind of logic to it, because to the average person the idea of such a thing is so foreign that they can’t imagine a rational person doing it. And it helps us feel safer, knowing that only “crazy people” are dangerous and not apparently neurotypical people. It’s a lot like the “monsters commit rape” belief: when the alternative is confronting the fact that the ordinary people you pass on the street every day might actually be rapists or killers, no wonder people prefer the illusion of safety afforded by the “he was crazy” line.
Unfortunately, assuming mental illness in high-profile shooters (again like the assumption of inherent monstrousness in rapists) prevents us from seeing – and thus, challenging – the social structures which are actually fueling these crimes. Writing people off as crazy may allow us to comfort ourselves, but we owe it to each other to open our eyes to reality and start doing the hard work so this doesn’t keep happening.
@saurabh
I’d also like to point out that even if it’s true that he was on anti-psychotics, that actually doesn’t prove shit. A) The fact that he was on anti-psychotics means that the chances are lower that he would have experienced a psychotic break as opposed to if he had an undiagnosed psychosis. B) People with psychoses don’t actually live in a land of a 24/7 psychotic break, they are perfectly capable, like neurotypical murderous wastes of human life, of being lucid murderer. People are not solely defined by their diagnoses.
LBT, is this the article you were thinking of?
http://logicalliving.blog.com/files/2011/04/Suicide-Ten.pdf
I’m sorry, I should have put a trigger warning before the article.
I kinda wish Dvarghundspossen were here, since she knows more about psychosis than I do. (For me, it’s been more a few discreet episodes due to bad medication reactions or just complete nervous breakdown.) But I dunno, when we were psychotic, we could not pass for normal like barely at all. At best, we were staggering aimlessly around town like an intoxicated zombie. At worst, we were sobbing and babbling incoherent nonsense. We DEFINITELY could not pass for normal, and although we weren’t dangerous, people definitely kept their distance from us because they weren’t sure how to respond to our behavior.
We DEFINITELY couldn’t come up with a coherent explanation of what the hell was going on; our brain just couldn’t string things together cogently and we kept losing track of our own thoughts. (Which was why we were so incoherent… we couldn’t just say, “I feel so dizzy that when I fall into the bed it feels like falling into an abyss,” we’d end up blathering, “THE BED IS TRYING TO EAT ME.”) Our emotional affect was all over the place, hysterical tears or just a dreamy Stepford Wives zombie expression.
In other words, even if we HAD felt the urge to be violent, I doubt we would’ve been able to keep it going because. Uh. We could barely manage to walk down the street without getting confused, no way could we manage a violent revenge plan and make videos about it. The one time we attempted any sort of planned behavior was to write down what we were feeling, and it dissolves into unpunctuated uncapitalized illegible scribble about how much we liked our dog!
So yeah, dude’s behavior? NOTHING like the psychosis I’m used to.
RE: hippodameia8527
Sorry, no, that’s not it. I remember it being from some pretty well-regarded British organization… definitely a government institution of some kind. It had a much larger sample size too, and tables that pegged various murderers with their rationale, job, ages, that sort of thing. It was less interested in small case studies than overarching tendencies.
RE: Shadow
I’d also like to point out that even if it’s true that he was on anti-psychotics, that actually doesn’t prove shit.
Furthermore, different meds get used for different things, under different labels. Some anti-psychotics are also used as anti-seizure medication. I was perscribed a benzo for post-surgical dizziness. I was perscribed an anti-depressant with the double feature of fighting off my eating disorder, since it promoted weight gain and appetite enhancement. Soooo yeah, it’s not always as simple as, “you’re psychotic, so I will give you this anti-psychotic med.” Plus sometimes the meds don’t work.
Oh, and whoever referred to the shooter as “ethnic” – you fail, too.
OP:
I don’t believe for one second that he’s actually sorry about women dying. I don’t even believe he meant to refer to them as “real people”.
Bodycrimes:
YES THIS. This is exactly what we tried to tell GGG, back before we realized he couldn’t be argued with. The lack of sex was not his problem, as is demonstrated by the fact that he is currently having sex but still threatening to kill people when his next dry spell hits.
Surabh,
I mean, they whine about 10% of the men getting all of the sex, and claim that PUA lets you pass as alpha long enough to get your beta self laid, so I’d argue that this anger is in fact the basis of their entire ideology.
Bluecat, I’m so sorry about your friend. What a tragedy.
Cassandra, which one is the blog herpes? Mr Al?
Michelle,
Well said, and thank you.
Buttercup,
Based on previous manosphere responses to this sort of thing, I’m gonna go with “yes”. And then I’m gonna go vomit.
OK, but you have to give them a hard “no”.
@ emilygoddess
Yep. Don’t say the name though – he’s like Candyman and will show up if you mention him.
I used to argue with the Red Pill types that wandered into Blue Pill that game doesn’t save lives, it corrupts and destroys. It makes vulnerable men into cruel, callous, and sometimes predatory self-proclaimed “alphas.” It enforces toxic masculinity, where men can’t be themselves for fear of being called “gay” or “beta.” It teaches them that aggression is an acceptable way of solving problems and that a man’s sole purpose in life is to get laid.
To me, that isn’t therapy; it’s the opposite. The Red Pill types and their ilk create men who are capable of committing the crimes that Rodger did. These are the same people who write pick-up manuals that advocate using Ted Bundy as model for approaching women. They only want absolute and total control of everything and everyone and seeks to crush the souls of both women and men.
/End Rant
Side note: By “vulnerable” I mean men, who feel that their social lives are unfulfilling or lonely. I’m not talking about mental illness.
I just need all of these scumbags to crawl into a hole and leave the world alone. Blue pill, red pill – we would all be happier and safer without them.
Oh look. Another special snowflake who says offensive things, whines that we’re so mean to hir and immediately fails to stick to the flounce.
You clearly don’t understand the “not guilty by reason of insanity” defense. Google the M’Naughton rule. The insanity defense only works if the defendant did not know the difference between right and wrong (legally speaking), didn’t plan the crime in advance and didn’t cover it up. Rodger’s knew murder is illegal and considered wrong in our society. He planned out his crime in advance. He didn’t just snap. If he had survived and been arrested, an insanity plea would be a no go.
Narcissistic personality disorder is an axis II diagnosis. Mental illnesses are on axis I. NPD isn’t an illness, it’s considered an indelible part of someone’s personality. People with NPD are not delusional or psychotic unless they also happen to have a psychotic disorder. So I’m not sure what point you’re trying to make by copy pasting the DSM criteria. Again, you are speaking authoritatively on something you aren’t terribly knowledgeable about.
That being said, until Rodger’s doctors come out and say (disclaimer: I haven’t read the news today so if his doctors made a statement already, I wouldn’t know) he was diagnosed with NPD, I’m not diagnosing him with and neither should you.
I guess you aren’t familiar with the way abusers and rapists speak. “Look what you made me do” is a common refrain.
I thought you said you read this blog regularly? The manosphere is rife with misogynistic rage. That’s why this blog exists in the first place.
RE: WWTH
saurabh is getting so much wrong, I’m boggled that she seems to be surprised nobody is taking her seriously. She really doesn’t seem to understand the damn insanity defense at all.
@emilygoddess, By “real people” I suspect they’re referring to the men who were killed. The women were apparently “hot lizards” (WTF?).
Normally I can at least kind of figure out what the dudebros are getting at with the demeaning terms for women, but “hot lizard” has me stumped. Does he mean sexy women who have really dry skin? Should we ship them some hand cream?
@NonServiam:
What’s wrong with Blue Pill? It’s a subreddit dedicated to calling out and mocking the horrible people on r/TheRedPill. I’d like to think I’m not a scumbag. 🙁
RE: cassandrakitty
You missed it being uncovered: dude calls women lizards, because he used to shoot lizards as a kid. And then he compared his dick to a bazooka that he blasts women with.
Yuuuuuup.
saurabh
wow i didn’t know purchasing lottery tickets meant you were mentally ill..
because he is a rich entitled white boy. FFS! people can hold lots of perspectives that are not “rational”. See: misogyny, racism, homophobia… My stepmom honestly believes that girls cry to manipulate people and not b/c we are sad, should i armchair diagnose her?!
Stop blaming mentally ill people, especially people w/ stigmatized mental illnesses (like diagnoses that include psychosis) JUST BECAUSE YOU CAN”T UNDERSTAND THAT MISOGYNY, HATRED OF WOMEN, MAY CAUSE VIOLENCE AGAINST WOMEN.
ffs
how about you cite your ableism. any evidence other than just reading this guys thing?
Ableism – discrimination against disabled people. Some of whom are neurodivergent, are *actually* diagnosed with something labelled as “psychosis” and manage not to go on violent murder sprees like you’re acting are the cause of mental illness. FFS
Right like the MRAs who think that by implying women are selfish but as long as you say it’s not all women it’s suddenly not sexist? You’re doing the same thing but for people w/ mental illness.
@MIchelle
exactly. it’s easier to say “mentally ill” than it is to realize that this is the result of the patriarchy and men feeling entitled to women’s bodies.
anyway, i’m gonna post now b/c i don’t really have much more to say to the weird troll…. gah i’m just gonna keep getting angrier at more blaming mental illness so..
Ugh, I saw this on abc news this morning and it was disgusting. They scrubbed how this attack was aimed primarily at women and then went on spewing about “mental illness”. Has this kid even been diagnosed with anything or is this all just bs armchair diagnosises?
There is something to be said about the treatment of serious mental illnesses being transferred to the criminal justice system in the US. Twenty percent of inmates in prison have a serious mental illness and thirty to sixty percent have substance abuse disorders. Forty percent of people with a serious mental disorder have had contact with our criminal justice system.*
But mostly, I agree that his mental illness, if any, is irrelevant. If he turns out NOT to be mentally ill then he is a good example of how filling a man with anget and hate can lead to violence. If he IS mentally ill then he’s a good example of how filling a man with anger and hate can lead to violence.
*This is NOT to say that mentally ill people are violent. Most people in jail in the US are there for non-violent reasons. MOST mentally ill people are NOT violent, a few are. The complaint that we should do more to help the FEW that are, before they hurt people, is valid, if a bit premature in this case.
And BTW, I’m mentally ill myself. I used to “see” rotting corpses in the back seat of my car as I was driving. I’m surprised I never got in an accident. I also struggle with urges to hurt people but I haven’t hurt or killed anyone yet and NEVER will. Mental illnesses are not a monolith.
@ LBT
Well, generally if someone points a weapon at me I try to get away, so he’s just given women a perfect excuse to avoid him and his “bazooka”. On another note, dudes who seem to see their cocks as some sort of Super Soaker toy, but with added humiliation and degradation powers? Not very attractive.
@weirdwoodtreehugger
I know. It’s horrible. 🙁
@saurabh
Oh shit I forgot this wasn’t the no troll thread.
fuck you, saurabh. He wasn’t mentally disturbed, he was an entitled misogynist, just like the people who do game.
It’s not psychosis. It’s just more of his entitlement.
You don’t wish to excuse his misogyny, yet you are. Put your money where your mouth is.
Also, Roosh isn’t a mass-murderer, he’s just a self admitted rapist. Let me give the man a fucking cookie.
@weirdwoodtreehugger
Oh, zie’s done it before?
@saurabh
Yeah, I know thinking I’d win the lottery is the #1 sign you’re mentally ill. I mean, lets face it, which neurodivergent mammother hasn’t experienced that.
that’s because of his massive entitlement, shithead, not ‘delusions.’
Neither are most misogynists. You keep saying he does X therefore is mentally ill. How about you put in some citations, instead of just assfax.
Oh the definition of psychosis do you have a citation cuz your smells like shit.
STOP TALKING OUT OF YOUR ASS, YOU ABLEIST SHITHEAD. infact, just fuck off. I came here to get away from people like you.
Nope. FUck you.
May I suggest re-reading what you said and fucking off forever.
You are so full of shit go throw yourself into a pit of legos and never come out.
Good. Fuck off and don’t come back.
Might I suggest keep not commenting. FFS.
EVERY TIME THERE IS A CRIME LIKE THIS FUCKHEADS LIKE YOU BLAME MENTAL ILLNESS. EVERY TIME YOU EXCUSE ALL OF THE MISOGYNY, ENTITLEMENT, ANYTHING SO THAT IT’S NOT A PROBLEM THAT MOST MASS MURDERERS ARE WHITE MALES. SO YOU HAVE TO BLAME MENTAL ILLNESSES.
I AM SO TIRED OF YOU FUCKS. ITS NOT THE MENTALLY ILL KILLING EVERYONE, ITS THE ENTITLED WHITE MEN. AND FUCK YOU, IT DOES AFFECT US.
WHEN TALKING ABOUT GUN CONTROL AND PEOPLE SAY THEY SHOULD JUST CREATE A ‘LOONY DATABASE’ TO KEEP THE CRAZY PEOPLE FORM GETTING THE GUNS.
BUT IT’S NOT US KILLING EVERYONE.
ITS THE FUCKING WHITE MEN.
/posting now, even though I’m not caught up. FUck saurabh.
I see the rush to “but zie was mentally ill” after events like this as the “monster dissociation” that people always pull out for situations that make them uncomfortable. “This person who could be me or someone I know did this terrible thing because zie was a monster. I’m not a monster and nobody I know is a monster so it couldn’t possibly happen to me.” It’s a way of creating some kind of distance and avoiding having to actually, you know, confront reality and your [generic] role in it.
This ONLY happens when we have a white straight male committing terrorism, of course. Anyone who is black or brown skinned (or even just a white immigrant) is just a criminal and a terrorist. But when that guy flew into the IRS building, when the guy shot up the Holocaust museum, the guy who shot all those women at their gym, the guy who shot the women in a beauty parlor, the kid who just stabbed his classmate to death for not wanting to go to prom with him because she already had a boyfriend which he knew about, and on and on and fucking on, when they do these things, they’re “monsters” because the majority of white people don’t want to recognize that no, THESE ARE NOT EXCEPTIONAL CASES. This is everyday hatred of women, and it is getting women killed every fucking day.
Even the guy who killed those people at the Sikh temple, he was a “lone actor” doing something that “everybody normal knows was wrong.”
The lengths we will go to to avoid acknowledging how common and casual hatred and violence are in American society are terrifying.