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.
Ken,
“Not in touch with reality” is a phrase people often use to describe schizophrenics or multis. That’s why it’s ableist and armchair diagnosing to say that.
Rancid,
If you’re going to post, do it in the other thread you were posting in. This thread is supposed to be troll free.
@cloudiah
I guess the only (potential) way to comfort your friend’s daughter is to assure her that her mother (along with any other loved ones concerned about her) is there for her no matter what. Other than that, I have nothing.
Frisky red panda brain bleach
Thanks, Ally, that’s a good idea. I’ll try that. Like, we can’t pretend the world can’t be a terrible place; all we can say is that we’ll support you while you’re navigating it.
And hi Cliff, hope all is well with you, you must be almost done with your nursing program which is fantastic.
RE: Ken’s ableism
I’m just going to copypasta from over on my Tumblr here, because I don’t want to have to write out the same fucking principles all over again:
Let’s face it, do you even know how much damage you do by always pinning shit like this on the marginalized? If a shooter’s not a person of color (in which case, there’s no sympathizing whatsoever, and they’re othered in racialized terms), then they’re always a “tragic” “victim” of “mental illness…” Which does all but nothing to increase help for those who actually ARE mentally ill (the vast majority of whom are no more inclined to violence than the neurotypical person), and so very much to increase the stigma against the mentally ill, and to make it more difficult for them to access care, or to even simply exist in a society that you make afraid of them.
We need to stop immediately othering awful people for their awful crimes with whatever is the easiest, most obvious way to dehumanize them. We need to take a long, hard look at what their behaviors say about the culture that shaped them – about what their behaviors say about US.
Because this wasn’t about some compulsion. This was about wanting to instill fear in and exact revenge against a very specific population. And we have a word for that, and it’s not “mental illness.”
(It is a thing we call “terrorism.”)
(Also, I echo Marie’s sentiments; I have no patience for this shit right now.)
I don’t want to get into the mental illness argument. Just, fuck, mental illness doesn’t lead you to do shit like this. Nothing happens in a fucking vacuum. I have Aspergers too, and I didn’t grow up to be an entitled little shit.
Fucking hell. I don’t even know why I’m trying to explain this. It feels so pointless.
@dustedeste
if you don’t mind (i can see why you would mind tho b/c mras and trolls frequent here :/) could you link me to your post on tumblr? it’s the thing i would like to reblog especially since i’ve been seeing way too much ableism around this and other people can say what’s wrong with it much better than i can
@dustedeste
good post.
Exactly. And maybe on top of that, her daughter can try to take a break from school (assuming she is currently attending a quarter)? Maybe a week off, if possible. I’d be shocked if her teachers were so strict as to stop her from taking a break for the sake of resting her mind and trying to cope with this tragedy.
Hi Cloudiah! I actually just graduated a couple weeks ago and applied for my boards yesterday! …Well, I applied for authorization to apply for a test date for my boards, and then I have to actually apply, and then I get assigned a date, and then I have to wait for that date to take them, and then I have to wait for results, and then I have to wait for a registration number… bureaucracies have a way of not exactly valuing your time.
But I’m within two months or so of being an Actual Nurse, so that’s very exciting!
Ken L, let’s not have a debate about mental illness in this thread.
racnad, you’re not allowed in this thread. I’m putting you on moderation.
Oh, and welcome back, cliff! conGRADulations.
One of the things we’ve stressed to our older son is that any solution to a problem that involves killing ANYone is a bad solution. He, like me, has experienced suicidal depression, so we are more concerned with his harming himself; however, homicide is also off the table.
After my mom had her stroke, most of* her nurses were amazing (seriously), and Cliff you will join the ranks of amazing nurses once you hurdle all the bureaucratic barriers. Best o’ luck!
Thanks, David
*There was one nurse who didn’t want to give her pain/anxiety meds and I had to have a very stern talk with him and with her doctors to make sure that never ever happened again. But that was like one nurse out of 40+ in a 2 month hospital stay.
Cliff – WHOOT! Congrats! 😀
@Fade:
I think you already found it but it’s here.
And I’m already being followed by a bunch of gross porn blogs because I pinned that pair of panties for my friend’s bachelorette party, so… -shrug- Worst comes to worst, I just make a new one, I guess.
Anyways, g’night, probably I’ll catch y’all Monday.
Bluh, pinned = blogged; mixing up my awful social media platforms, shame on me.
I talked to my friend again and her daughter had just said to her, “But I have kind of bad skin so maybe he wouldn’t have shot me” and I am once again heartbroken.
@dustedeste
wait are you kyrosion? my brain is exploding…
Well, I’m currently reading his manifesto. I’m about halfway done.
Some highlights:
He saved his baby brother from drowning. He uses that to fuel his own ego by saying something along the lines of “Everything that happens to him is all because of me.”
He had a friend who had similar beliefs to him. That friend decides to actually improve himself, which causes him to be more social and be successful with women. He views that as said guy insulting him and becomes really hostile. The other guy seems really patient for a while, but finally fed up with his shit, says that “no girl would want to fuck him” to him (obviously, he didn’t describe it like that, but it’s pretty obvious that’s what happened)
Oh yeah, and at age 18, he did this
His mother pretty much GAVE him jobs during college. But he quit them because he viewed them as far too low-end for himself. They were average teenager jobs, such as a custodian for an airport. He literally stated that his intellect is far too great for them like he’s the fucking Riddler.
Cloudiah – Oh geez. All my support and Internet Hugs to your friend and her daughter.
His friend was also a virgin, but had a more normal attitude about it. He says that this means that he’s “weak.” Because, in his words, “to be angry at the injustices one faces is a sign of strength.”
Robert,
Hugs for you and your son if you want them.
Leaving a bunch of hugs in the big barrel for anyone. My cats are doing the same–they even like belly rubs, so anyone who is deprived of feline belly rubs should check in with Hazel and Buster.