Less than 24 hours after an apparent white supremacist murdered nine black churchgoers in cold blood during a prayer meeting in a historic black church in Charleston, South Carolina, one prominent MRA is trying to put the blame on feminism, because of a remark the killer reportedly made about rape.
One of the survivors of the church killings reported that, before he began shooting, the killer told those in the prayer group that “you rape our women and you’re taking over our country. And you have to go.”
Dylann Storm Roof, the accused killer, wore his racism on his sleeve, almost literally: a former classmate tells the press that Roof “made a lot of racist jokes”; his license plate featured the Confederate flag; his Facebook profile picture shows him in a jacket with patches representing the flags of Rhodesia and apartheid-era South Africa.
But Dean Esmay, the second-in-command at A Voice for Men, probably the most influential Men’s Rights site, thinks that Roof’s killing spree may be the result of too much feminism. Earlier today, he posted a link to an article on the shooting to the Men’s Rights subreddit with this headline:
To their credit, the Men’s Rights subreddit regulars voted his comment down; one told him “[n]ot everything is about us, man. This is distasteful.”
Two hours later, apparently undaunted by the criticism and oblivious to irony, Esmay returned to the Men’s Rights subreddit to make another accusation:
No one has declared the shooter to be an MRA. The little we know about Roof right now suggests that he was a garden-variety old-school racist. The paranoid notion of black men raping “our” white women is one of the oldest racist tropes out there; as Jessica Valenti noted on Twitter, Roof’s language is “the language of white supremacist patriarchy.”
The alleged threat to “our women” was used for generations as an excuse to lynch black men and terrorize the black community as a whole. In the case of Roof’s shootings, it’s an even more transparent ruse. As Rebecca Carroll notes in The Guardian, it’s hard to argue that these killings had anything to do with real fears or even paranoid fantasies about the rape of white women when most of the victims were not black men — the symbolic “rapists” in the equation — but black women:
There is something inconsistent with the Charleston shooter’s alleged evocation of the historical myth of black man as beast and rapist of white women, and the fact that he killed mostly black women. Did he only shoot black women because there were no more black men to kill? Because black women birth, care for and love black men? Or because he didn’t see black women as women at all …
The idea that white women’s bodies represent that which is inviolable while black women’s are disposable hasn’t changed enough since it was first articulated by white men; but again, aimed at black men on Wednesday night, it was predominately black women who suffered by their invocation.
We will find out more about Root’s twisted beliefs in days to come. But it is clear already that they had nothing whatsoever to do with feminism.
H/T — r/againstmensrights
EDIT: I’m making this a NO TROLL, no-derailing-with-idiotic-MRA-or-incel-talking-points thread.
So I read that Daily Mail story, and it’s Daily Mail so I take the listed facts with a spoonful of salt, but the story goes on and on and on about Roof’s stepmother. Apparently she and Roof’s dad had a somewhat rocky marriage featuring emotional abuse from the dad, and finally the dad beat her up and she left and filed for divorce. Roof stayed with his dad.
How long will it take before some MRA blames this on his stepmother in some way?
@Policy of Madness: That’s interesting; unfortunately, the sad truth is, a fair number of other infamous murderers also came from broken homes-Look at Joseph Franklin, for just one example.
@KL
The hell? Chicago is not “maybe the most segregated place in the country”, that’s a baseless and bizarre claim. There’s racism and police brutality, that’s sadly in everywhere.
*ditch the “in”
Had this become unexpectedly personal for me today. Was at a meeting and found out a friend of mine is a cousin of the pastor from the church. Have a hard enough time trying to say something online, much less in person to friend of mine. My response to him was: “I’m sorry, I can’t even, I don’t know what to say…”
My friend talked of the sadness he felt and the feeling of being unmoored by the shootings. He also talked about how much sadness he felt for the shooter, that he had thrown his life away as well. That last statement gives me hope that we can find a way out of the current state of our culture.
As an older straight white male, I’ve spent way too much time being ashamed of things my race and gender do. I trained myself over the last half of my life, as I became more aware, to not use racist and sexist language, and realized [have a nephew with Assbergers] that I needed to do the same with ableist language- and I will. But being as prejudice free as possible myself just isn’t enough. I have to do more, although I’m at a loss for what right now.
When I said that Roof was different earlier I wasn’t saying that because I considered him the other, but because I think he’s just like everybody else. Although I obviously didn’t make that clear earlier.
I think every human being is good. I think that only humans that have been abused hurt other people. Does that mean I think many millions of people over the world have been abused? Yes it does. I was abused as a child, if the abuse had continued and I had been in a racist environment when I was Roof’s age, I can see myself going down the same path he did. I’d like to think I could never have done that kind of horrible thing, but honestly can’t say that I wouldn’t have if life had broken me a little more.
Fortunately, my parents weren’t racist- my dad has never said anything disparaging about any group of people that I recall and the abuse stopped. I found recovery, therapy and a spirituality that gives my life meaning.I have a strong support network and friends that I can share with on a deep level. I was lucky to survive my childhood and come out as reasonably healthy as I am today.
Today, I can’t conceive of doing what Roof did- I just don’t have the anger and resentment and I care about other people too deeply. I’m really not sure I could kill in self defense, hurting other people hurts me too much. I was deeply ashamed of the post that got me labelled a troll when I re-read it and those were hurtful words, not actions.
However there was a time in my life when that was much more possible. I am grateful to so many people for the help I got to get out of that state. I believe that, if we could get to them in time, we could rescue people like Roof and prevent tragedies like Charleston from happening.
At some point, the good people of the country have to start working together to end this.
I signed the move on petition to remove the confederate flag from SC, it’s a symbolic act, but the flag itself is symbolic. It would be a start.
I would love to hear next steps available to help end this. There has to be a way.
@Berdache: This was a really good post, IMHO. Bravo! =)
One of Milo’s Five examples is Charles Whitman, who committed his mass shooting in 1966. Apparently Feminism is playing the long game with their war on boys.
Milo sounds like a Scientologist, in part because one of the links in the article sends readers to the the anti-Psychology Scientology front group CCHR (Citizens Commission on Human Rights).
The link:
http://www.cchrint.org/2012/07/20/the-aurora-colorado-tragedy-another-senseless-shooting-another-psychotropic-drug/
CCHR
Scientology’s War on Psychiatry
http://www.salon.com/2005/07/01/sci_psy/
Speaking as one who is antihistamined to the gills for a rash that I suspect may be a parasitic skin infection, I have just this to say to you, Milo Yeah-NOPE-oulos:
http://cdn.someecards.com/someecards/usercards/1339426725154_9146065.png
And right now, the only thing I want to kill is whatever is causing this infernal fucking itch.
@KL: “Chicago is maybe the most segregated place in the country, or at least bad enough, and white cops torture and kill black people there. Racism is not a southern problem.”
That’s true; just as there are some really nice and decent people in the South who aren’t racist at all, there are at least few people in the North and West who *are* racist…..it’s not limited to any one state, region, country, or even ethnic group, and this is also regardless of one’s position in society in said place; racism is a *human* flaw. Has been pretty much forever. =(
@alternatesteve90
The comment about Chicago was goofy and wring, and racism isn’t a some amorphous human flaw. The shooting has undeniable historical context of terrorist violence against black activist churches.
No shit. Are you a child? Do you see social forces or just individuals acting out of personality quirks? There are people still alive who lived under legal American apartheid and we’re all dealing with the after effects.
…think maybe you mean Aspergers…
You’d have to have an incredibly broad definition of abuse, or maybe an incredibly narrow definition of hurt, to believe that.
I would hope that this horrible, cowardly terrorist attack at least pushes law enforcement to more closely monitor white supremacist and far right websites online. These groups have a history of killing not only unarmed civilians but law enforcement officers, and there’s been so much concern over groups like ISIS using social media and websites to radicalize and recruit young men, but these far right websites are radicalizing and recruiting young men too, and their adherents have killed far more Americans than ISIS has.
@ spindrift
Yes, meant Aspergers, sorry. Meant to look up the proper spelling and just forgot.
I do believe that only abused people hurt other people. Will grant that there are occasional exceptions to the rule, but they don’t change the overall pattern.
You believe wrong. There is no evidence at all to support you assertion. Now you are inadvertently demonizing the abused. Just stop.
alternatesteve90,
Alot of murderers eat peanut butter and wear shoes too. Correlation does not equal causation.
There is so much effort to erase the whiteness and maleness of these spree killers and the culture of privilege and oppression that teaches white men that they are supreme and have the right to stay on top through violence.
If you are a white man doing this, take a minute to examine your desire to make these murders about something other than racism and misogyny.
Pandapool,
Thank you.
Thank you for saying this Lea. I was really biting my tongue on berdache’s comments because I just couldn’t articulate how much that hurt me, being someone who was abused in just about every way possible by members of my family.
And berdache, you can handwave this all you want and try to add “Well, not ALL abused people, just all these murderers must have been abused!” doesn’t help.
You’re still demonizing victims. You’re still trying to say that abused people are capable of “snapping” and going on murder rampages, and that fosters a fear in people who haven’t had that terrible experience of being abused of those who are suffering or did suffer.
You’re helping to create a stigma against those who not only have been abused, but could be suffering from mental illness because of it.
Stop it.
@Lea
I really am sorry. It’s hard not see the South as just a lot of racist ass white people, waving the confederate flag everywhere while wearing Klan robes, but I know there’s a lot more to it than that. A lotta lotta more. Admittedly, most of my middle school/high school years were all about learning of voodoo, vodou, hoodoo and French. It’s very interesting how Haitian, West African, French and Spanish religions all mushed together in Louisiana. (Plus Cajun and Creole cooking, which I already mentioned.)
And, well, you know, voodoo. It’s voodoo. It’s inherently awesome. (Which is why the Shadow Man is one of the best Disney villains, along with being a snazzy dresser.)
Pandapool: I was under the impression that voodoo/vodou/hoodoo is a closed religion.
That being said, while it does seem awesome to us outsiders, it should be respected that those who do participate don’t want us involved. 🙂
@Paradoxical
I was more interested in the history and practices because, well, they’re interesting, not because I wanted to participate. Also, I’ve been an atheist since before I knew the word for it, so kinda never wanted to practice it. It’s like how I looked up stuff on pagan religions or Greek mythology and stuff, but I never wanted to celebrate the Green Man or Zeus. I’m purely interested in religions do to their historical impact; voodoo has shaped a lot of Louisiana’s history and culture.
there are many killers – Tim McVeigh, the Columbine killers, Ted Bundy – who were (probably) not abused. Abuse DOES damage the mind and as a survivor I think we should be real about that, but abuse is no excuse either, nor is it the only or even primary reason.
uhm, Chicago has a strong history of institutionalized racism. Ignorance of a fact doesnt make those facts nonexistant. Read just about any study or history on the subject or just visit the city. The South isnt the only place where oppression occurs.
…like, say, an analysis of census data: http://chicago.cbslocal.com/2015/05/04/chicago-is-the-most-segregated-city-in-america-analysis/
Seriously, how DARE you people minimize the brutal segregation Chicago has suffered from for generations that has literally KILLED black people when you clearly are speaking based on assumption?! On THIS thread.
Also, best villain song ever.