A mass shooting in Santa Barbara last night left seven dead, including the man suspected of being the killer. Local authorities say that this chilling video, titled Elliot Rodger’s retribution, “appears to be connected” to the shootings. It is a supremely disturbing real-life villain’s monologue in which a young man, evidently the killer, explains on the day before the massacre why he intends to kill: because women have rejected him.
As the person who sent this video to me this morning noted, it sounds almost like a parody of the misogynistic beliefs and rhetoric that I write about on this blog. His language and his melodramatic tone both echo the writings of many of those young men who consider themselves “incels.” His anger is the same anger we see from the rejected men who lash out with insults and threats on OkCupid when their often crude advances are turned down. He reminds me of every so-called “nice guy” who is inwardly seething with resentment born of sexual entitlement denied. He even, at one point, calls himself a “gentleman.” He also calls himself an “alpha.”
It is clear that his resentment at women was stoked by what I call the “new misogyny” and by steeping himself in at least one online community that reaffirmed his exaggerated, unwarranted sense of victimhood. So far we have evidence that he was a commenter at PUAhate, a site ostensibly designed to critique PUAs but which has degenerated into a haven for misogynistic “incels” and angry trolls. I suspect we will find that he was also a reader of, or a commenter at, some of the other sites I critique on this blog.
For those of you who cannot make it through the video — I found it very hard to watch — here is a transcript of what he said.
Hi, Elliot Rodger here.
Well… this is my last video. It all has to come to this.
Tomorrow is the day of retribution. The day in which I will have my revenge against humanity. Against all of you.
For the last 8 years of my life, ever since I’ve hit puberty, I’ve been forced to endure an existence of loneliness, rejection, and unfulfilled desires. All because girls have never been attracted to me.
Girls gave their affection, and sex, and love, to other men but never to me.
I’m 22 years old and I’m still a virgin. I’ve never even kissed a girl.
I’ve been through college for two and a half years, more than that actually, and I’m still a virgin.
It has been very torturous.
College is the time when everyone experiences those things such as sex, and fun, and pleasure. But in those years I’ve had to rot in loneliness.
It’s not fair. You girls have never been attracted to me.
I don’t know why you girls aren’t attracted to me, but I will punish you all for it.
It’s an injustice, a crime, because I don’t know what you don’t see in me. I’m the perfect guy, and yet you throw yourselves at all these obnoxious men, instead of me, the supreme gentlemen.
I will punish all of you for it. (laughs)
On the day of retribution I am going to enter the hottest sorority house of UCSB… and I will slaughter every single spoiled, stuck-up, blonde slut I see inside there.
All those girls that I’ve desired so much, they would’ve all rejected me and looked down upon me as an inferior man if I ever made a sexual advance towards them while they throw themselves at these obnoxious brutes.
I will take great pleasure in slaughtering all of you.
You will finally see that I am in truth the superior one. The true alpha male. (laughs)
Yes, after I’ve annihilated every single girl in the sorority house, I’ll take to the streets of Isla Vista, and slay every single person I see there.
All those popular kids who live such lives of hedonistic pleasure while I’ve had to rot in loneliness for all these years, they’ve all looked down upon me every time I try to go out and join them. They’ve all treated me like a mouse.
Well now, I will be a God compared to you. You will all be animals. You are animals, and I will slaughter you like animals. I will be a God, exacting my retribution, on all those who deserve it.
And you do deserve it, just for the crime of living a better life than me.
All you popular kids. You’ve never accepted me, and now you’ll all pay for it.
And girls, all I’ve ever wanted was to love you, and to be loved by you. I’ve wanted a girlfriend, I’ve wanted sex, I’ve wanted love, affection, adoration, but you think I’m unworthy of it.
That’s a crime that can never be forgiven.
If I can’t have you, girls, I will destroy you. (laughs)
You denied me a happy life, and in turn, I will deny all of you life. (laughs) It’s only fair.
I hate all of you, humanity is a disgusting, wretched, depraved species. If I had it in my power, I would stop at nothing, to reduce every single one of you to mountains of skulls and rivers of blood, and rightfully so.
You deserve to be annihilated. And I’ll give that to you.
You never showed me any mercy, and so I will show you none. (laughs)
You force me to suffer all my life, and now I’ll make you all suffer.
I’ve waited a long time for this.
I’ll give you exactly what you deserve.
I will have more on this as the story develops. My heart goes out to the loved ones of all the victims.
Misogyny kills.
EDITED TO ADD: Elliot Rodger seems to have been a commenter on PUAhate, the anti-PUA message board that is as misogynistic and generally awful as the PUAs it critiques. PUAhate has taken itself offline, so all evidence of this may end up scrubbed. I added a paragraph about this.
I will keep updating as I track down more information on this story. Please post anything you find in the comments as well.
EDIT 2: This will be a NO TROLLS thread. Anything gratuitously argumentative or less than respectful of the victims will be removed.
I think he had something to learn before that: that women are human beings, not fuckdolls.
That frog is straight chillin’. Life is good. He’s so content, wants for nothing. I love him.
Well I thinks it very clear that misogyny played a large role in this crime, I wonder what can first the misogyny or the MRA sites?
I think neither. I think the entitlement, the superiority, and the “I am the most persecuted rich white boy ever” attitude came first. The MRM just influenced the particular shape it took.
Which isn’t to say it’s blameless and he would’ve been a murderer no matter what. If he’d found himself an online community that expected empathy and ethical behavior from its members, that could have also influenced him. The MRM does deserve blame for being the absolute opposite of that. The violent entitlement may have been in him to begin with, but the MRM sure provided a spectacularly encouraging and uncritical incubator for it.
He was even planning on killing his kid brother, because he couldn’t stand the thought that the child would probably grow up to have sex and at least some degree of social success. How fucked is that? He also planned to kill his stepmom, though it sounds like that was mostly because (obviously) she would get in the way of murdering the little brother. I am like, how the fuck do you even get in that headspace? Sure the culture is chock full of misogyny, racism, rampant consumerism, etc, but the vast, vast majority of even the most entitled blowhards don’t go down that road. Totally sickening.
I am sure the manosphere is alternately pretending he wasn’t one of them and blaming women for not fucking this shitbag, (‘course, they’d also blame a woman FOR fucking him despite his obvious instability!) ’cause that is pretty much what they did with George Sodini.
@ceebarks: That is pretty much what most of the leaders of hate sites do when one of their own starts killing. Just look at what Don Black says whenever one of the members of his forum Stormfront goes on a rampage (which sadly happens very often).
@Pteryxx of Pharyngula – thanks for passing my message to Louis-who’s-not-my-Louis-but-has-the-best-cat-gravatar along. 🙂
@Cliff
you make a great point with
“the “I am the most persecuted rich white boy ever” attitude came first.” This just struck me as a major point I think many are over looking. People on here are all about not saying he’s crazy or insane because it ableist. well, i understand why not to do hat better now, it is worth noting that when your talking about a person whose starting view of the world is your above quote, it clearly someone not in touch with reality at all. also being disturbed is in no way an excuse for these actions.
kittehserf – Yeah, I’m a little uncomfortable with the idea that this guy needed to learn “social skills.” That almost comes close to (and I know Miri doesn’t mean it like this) buying into the idea that him getting dates would have changed things one bit.
I do wish, though, that someone could’ve got through to him how being a Sex Haver is not going to fix all his problems. Like, they don’t throw down a gold carpet everywhere you walk because you had sex with a blonde woman. If you feel lonely and persecuted before, afterwards you’re just going to feel like you’re lonely and persecuted and had sex.
I wish they’d gotten this through to him even if he did find a partner, because he’d probably have taken it out on her after they had sex and it didn’t fix his life.
And hell. All of this is deckchairs on the Titanic. What I really wish he’d been taught is that you don’t fucking shoot people. That’s sort of the starting point before I can work myself up to care about all his delicate little emotions.
I too am horrified by these murders. My thoughts go out to everyone affected.
@leftwingfox
That last thing you said, misogyny is deeply engrained in American culture. Not surr if someone on here said this next bit but I did read th e spearhead link and the discussion. All I can say about a site like that wherein that particular thread some of the guys agreed no one is entitled to sex and then contradicted themselves downthread by claiming womens sexual liberation has ruined society for all men and MISANDRY! is wow those dudes dont understand the purpose of govt or more importanlty how govt works. This is constantly reinforced prettty much evrrywhere I see an mra comment on a website. To wit, dudes on spearhead are actually positing that womens sex lib has resulted in irresponsible women having indiscriminate sex and poppin out babies for men to provide for via taxes rather than aim such hate at dudes who dont financially provide for their children, because duh that was THE reason for the creation of child support enforcement. That was a bit of a rant sorry but the cognitive dissonance with dudes who think this way boggles the mind. And they think theyre logical! *head. desk.”
Back to my point pre-rant, either someone on here or on the spearhead thread mentioned thatgun rights folks are monopolizing threads on mainstream sites fearing this will bring up the gun contr debate again. A lot on spearhead (surprise!) Are minimizing why this guy said he was going to do this by jumping on the “oh he has aspergers” train. Someone on that thread asked what will come of this in re the tie to mra/pua angle and someone responded by saying not much bc society will glom on to the gun and mental health issue and push aside the virulent misogynist aspect of his crime. Sadly I think that is what is most likely to happen BECAUSE sexism is so deeply engrained in our culture and thus women who want to keep his hatred of women in the forefront will be ignored or told to stfu and men who want to discuss same will be called manginas or white knights.
I think I need some of this brain bleach everyone keeps talking about. *sigh*
@BreakfastMan Good point. Don Black is a complete piece of garbage. I think the white nationalist leadership is generally very careful to cultivate a semi-civilized front… while letting the rank and file run wild with race war fantasies. They know precisely what they are doing. Nasty, nasty, nasty.
ken
i’m… soo confused. b/c “not being in touch w/ reality” or however you want to phrase his massive entitlement as, is from… his privilege… not any mental illness/neurodivergence…
i can’t tell what you were saying
@ken l
uhhhhhhhhhhhhh
fuck you.
I can’t even argue right now I have no energy.
but fuck you.
I was going to stay away but you are all so cool and I knew there’d be brain bleach (and it was lovely) and I had some wine AND some salted caramel ice cream and I thought I would be okay but … I’m not.
My friend’s daughter could well have been killed by this guy. She is a UCSB student, and blonde, and slim, and adorable (which is all he would have noticed)–and smart, and geeky, and kind, and now absolutely terrified that someone might shoot her while she’s just trying to go to college in Santa Barbara and living in Isla Vista. I just spent 30 minutes on the phone with her mother who has no idea how to comfort her, and neither do I.
How do you explain to a person who is compassionate and decent that other people might decide to kill them for terrible reasons? And the thing is, I know that even asking that question is an indication of my incredible privilege, since there are so many people in this world for whom it is simply a fact of life that they might be killed for terrible reasons.
I see there’s a new post but I think I’ll stay away from that one for now. Buster cat has draped herself over Hazel cat and fallen asleep, so I think I’ll just join the purring cuddle pile. More hugs on offer to anyone who needs them.
@Fade
Even if his entitlement is from his privilege, He is not in touch with reality. it is plain to anyone that his thinking is way fucked up. So the cause of this happening be it privilege or mental illness, still ends in the same place. in short it should not surprise or matter to anyone that he was a disturbed person. the fact that he hold those view means he is disturbed. the point i was making even if he was disturbed does not in anyway excuse him or the MRM in this event.
it is worth noting that when your talking about a person whose starting view of the world is your above quote, it clearly someone not in touch with reality at all.
Actually, he was quite in touch with reality. He knew exactly what was going on around him. He knew that if he shot people they would die. He knew damn well what he was doing.
As if it matters. Lots of people really aren’t in touch with reality and they still don’t shoot anyone.
The whole mental illness discussion is a red herring that lets people go “well, I guess some people are just secretly monsters among us” instead of confronting the fact that this wasn’t random, this was the outcome of a whole bunch of social influences and personal choices that could have been changed.
@racnad
Didn’t you read? No trolls here.
@cloudiah
All the wanted hugs to you, and good thoughts to your friend and her daughter. I have no idea what’d be good to say.
@Ken
“It is clear” Sure prove it asshole
Oh that’s the point you were trying to make? Cuz you failed.
So not holding Ken’s hand on this. He’s been called out on ableism here before.
@Idrais:
Okay, so it wasn’t just me, he really does sound like a comic-book super-villain. As to the possibility that the consciously chose to quote Anakin Skywalker, I don’t even know how to react to that.
And Cliff did a very good explanation on that.
SO go read that, like, at least twice, Ken.
racnad
racnad: Sad story people are using this to further their agendas different from my ableist agenda which is totally agenda free.
ps didn’t you see the no troll sign?
ken
yes, but if you try to say it’s b/c mental illness, mentally ill people will face even more stigma than they* already do. You’re like “why acknowledge it for what it is when we can pretend like mental illness is equally to blame?”
*i’m mentally ill but not w/ a mental illness that is stigmatized like this
After reading ceebark’s description of the manifesto, I found myself thinking– at the risk of muddying the waters further, I know– “geez, he reminds me of Christian Weston Chandler.”
But why Chandler would pour all his creepiness into his poorly-drawn Sonichu comics and this guy become a spree killer, I don’t know. Would the fact that, to the best of my knowledge, CWC never interacted with the PUA/MRA types be an issue?
racnad: Piss off. Do not start your bullshit in this thread.
cloudiah: Many hugs. I don’t even know what to say about your niece and what to tell her about this.
@racnad
See that “No trolls allowed” notice? Yeah. Time for you to fuck off.
I emailed David about racnad.
And I’m having more wine and snuggling more kitties.