Police in Lafayette, Louisiana are evidently struggling to understand why the outspokenly misogynistic, racist and anti-Semitic John Russell “Rusty” Houser murdered two women and wounded 9 other moviegoers at a showing of “Trainwreck,” a film written by and starring Amy Schumer, a feminist comedian with a Jewish father, known for joking frankly about sex.
[For more, see my latest post on Houser: “Did right-wing attacks on “Trainwreck” inspire John Russell Houser’s shooting rampage?”]
Col. Michael D. Edmonson, superintendent of the Louisiana State Police, wondered aloud about Houser’s motives at a press conference:
Why did he come here? Why did he do that? … We may not find a motive.
It seems to me that Houser’s likely motive is staring them in the face.
Because it turns out that Houser was pretty well-known, at least to regular viewers of one local TV talk show in Columbus, GA, as an angry right-wing fanatic who hated women. As one former host of the show recalled,
He was anti-abortion. … Rusty had an issue with feminine rights. He was opposed to women having a say in anything.
Houser evidently appeared on the live show dozens of times as a “gadfly” whose appearances “would generate calls.”
When Houser’s career as a loudmouthed crank on local TV apparently came to an end years ago, he moved to another medium, leaving a long trail of hateful comments on assorted websites, many of them openly praising Hitler and talking ominously about the future of what he saw as a deeply “immoral” culture.”
In the comments on a news article about an 60-year-old man who’d been murdered, Houser wrote
I am sincerely sorry for the loss of this fellow in the deer processing business. Most people over 50 in certain businesses are just as their parents were,rock solid morally.
I am also sorry for what is to come for the other very few moral souls left in the entire US.
I am not sorry for the 90% immoral population which will be meeting the same fate.
Filth is rampant.That none have stood against it causes me to take rest in the worse than MAD MAX near future which approaches.
In Trainwreck, Amy Schumer plays a New York journalist “riding the cock carousel” — as the odious men I regularly write about on this website like to put it — who eventually falls in love.
It seems highly unlikely that Houser was someone “who just happened to be in this theater,” as the police superintendent put it.
It seems highly likely that a woman-hating neo-Nazi ended up in a theater showing Trainwreck on purpose.
When a religious fanatic blows themselves up at a cafe frequented by members of a rival religious sect, we have no trouble calling this terrorism.
When an outspoken white racist murders nine black churchgoers in Charleston, SC, well, some people (including virtually all of the Republican presidential hopefuls) have trouble calling it terrorism. But most people can see it for what it is.
When misogynists murder women, almost no one calls it terrorism.
Elliot Rodger, who left behind an assortment of misogynistic videos and a book-length diatribe, was a terrorist.
“Rusty” Houser — who left behind no manifesto but who was well-known for his odiously anti-woman and neo-Nazi views — was almost certainly a terrorist as well.
NOTE: According to court filings, Houser had “a history of mental health issues, i.e., manic depression and/or bi-polar disorder.” (Which are actually the same thing.) While this could certainly have had an effect on his state of mind, it says nothing about his motives. Bipolar disorder does not cause people to become misogynistic neo-Nazis who murder women.
EDIT: Added the note above, made tweaks to wording.
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Please read the newly revised COMMENTS POLICY before commenting.
@Bina:
BRB, gotta go rosin up my trollwhacker…
As always, you crack me up, The Queen of Sheba. Can’t wait to see what’s coming. Will get myself a cuppa tea while waiting.
@ Robjec
When I said get out of the way, I was referring to you saying that we’re wasting our time criticizing the media. The media has let you down so many times, etc. and you asked for someone to explain to you why you should bother with it. That is you actually trying to get in the way of other people pursuing something they consider to be worthwhile. To which I responded by saying it’s fine if you don’t consider it worth your while but you need to get out of the way of those who feel differently. I won’t walk that back because it’s exactly what I meant and I still mean it. If that makes you feel unwelcome, well…I don’t want anyone to feel welcome to hinder others’ efforts just because they have different priorities. That’s a feature, not a bug.
I won’t apologize for being angry that someone who knows nothing about anyone here made some breathtakingly presumptuous comments about how those people ought to spend their time. I realize you apologized for that and I appreciate it. That doesn’t mean I now have to also be sorry for having a completely reasonable reaction to what you said. Your continued lectures about my tone, as if you’re telling a toddler they can’t have a cookie unless they ask nicely, are doing nothing but reinforcing my initial impression of you.
Dude, it’s not YOUR body. Why are you trying to police what other people (i.e. WOMEN) do with theirs?
And no, you don’t get away with that “might aswell” (sic) argument, either. Abortion is not murder; murder requires malice aforethought. NOBODY aborts pregnancies just out of malice. There are as many reasons for abortions are there are abortions, and yet, strangely, not one of them has anything to do with wanting to harm a fetus just for some sadistic power kick. You do not have the right to pass judgment on something that doesn’t concern you, IdiotSan. You may not like it, but you have no right to condemn it. Not your body, not your choice, not your problem. Capisce?
BTW, you know who aborts the most “babies”? MOTHER NATURE. Something like 2/3 of fertilized eggs don’t even survive long enough to implant, let alone for the woman to know she was pregnant. And that’s not even counting miscarriages of implanted zygotes, either. Those, too, are as common as dirt. Yet I don’t see any of you “abortion is murder!!!1111elebentyeleben!” morons calling for miscarriage to be classified as manslaughter. So why call abortion “murder” then? Could it be because you are an ignorant know-nothing jackass looking for reasons to blame and despise women who don’t do what they’re told? Hmmmm?
And anyway: Why are you harping on abortion here? A man killed several grown women, and it wasn’t in self-defence, because none of them even so much as looked at him cross-eyed. Don’t women’s lives count to you? What is your fucking problem, IdiotSan?
Here, let me help you figure your problem out: You sure do have a strangely selective idea of murder.
Aunt Edna: It’s coming. It landed in moderation because I quoted the troll verbatim. When will I ever learn?
I think it’s a side issue to be arguing about who is and isn’t a ‘terrorist’. All that word means nowadays is someone who the speaker intends to have killed, and whose death the speaker doesn’t expect to be called to account for.
I love how “ethical” has turned into “doesn’t openly challenge my viewpoints” in these circles.
Which is sad, because actual journalistics ethics are a thing.
@Elliotsan.
And I am sure you don’t give two shits about that “child” after it’s born. . .
The reason abortion is a feminine right is that the woman alone bears the physiological risk of trauma and death. What right does a zygote have to the use someone else’s body without their consent? Yeah I know that is harsh, but you haven’t really thought this through much.
Yes, being pregnant is a consequence of having unprotected sex, birth control failing, and also being raped. A woman has no obligation to continue a pregnancy at all. If she chooses to then I would agree she does have an obligation to take care of herself so she eventually has a health child.
I usually leave later term abortions up to doctors and their patients who might have to have one. Again, a zygote (the stage of development when most abortions are performed) is not the same as a child who has been born already. Move along troll you are being tiresome now.
What is it about the topic of mass murder that so reliably brings the trolls out?
Bruno,
Men are murdered by often. But almost always by other man. It’s almost like we have a toxic masculinity problem! So why are you so angry at feminists? We aren’t the ones encouraging men to kill each other.
Elliotsan,
You felt the need to do your forced birther trolling here…why? You seem more upset by women getting abortions than you with the murder of actual human beings who were born and lived on this planet for decades. Gee. I wonder why.
@Aunt Edna:
I’m still after all this time terribly unclear on the why of specifically women “sleeping around” causing the downfall of society.
I’m going to guess it’s because it’s (colloquially known as) bollocks.
By which I mean I wish people would stop making shit up to suit their world view, and then ignoring any evidence or testimony to the contrary.
Georgina Hale:
It’s actually pretty important to get people to identify these crimes for what they are; namely acts of terror. If we did, then we would be ignoring the very reasons that this person committed his crimes in the first place.
Houser committed a massacre because he wanted to make them pay for watching a film by a feminist Jew, and to prevent others from watching the same film for fear of getting shot by neo-Nazis like him. If we were to stop that sentence at “Houser committed a massacre” then we’re not acknowledging that our society has a problem with male-on-female violence that sometimes comes out in ways like these.
I agree with you that the word ‘terrorist’ has changed in meaning lately (it’s halfway there to becoming a slur for Arabs, or anyone remotely similar) but we can’t just say that it’s entirely beside the point that we call terrorists out where we see them, especially if no one else is willing to.
@lith:
I’m still after all this time terribly unclear on the why of specifically women “sleeping around” causing the downfall of society.
= women’s sexuality is no longer under men’s control = fall of patriarchy = Menz Tears (TM).
No lie, WWTH. I think maybe mass murder threads should be no troll zones as well.
Whenever I hear someone say they’re a “equaltarian” or for “equal rights” they actually don’t care about anyone they’re just one of those “I can’t stand anything that’s not about me! I want to be included!” people and just want to silence everyone else.
Yes men do get murdered more but women and girls are being murdered because they p***ed off a man for not obeying him or something and then get blamed for his actions and/or people try to sweep it under the carpet with “we may never know why he did it.”
Misogyny gets people murdered, raped, abused, causes victim blaming, etc.
Misandry seems to be nothing more than men and boys whining about everything not being about them and instead of creating something that is about them themselves they want everyone else to work for them and make everything about them but when that doesn’t work they complain about that too. Make men and boys in the positive spotlight at all times (but who cares if women and girls get absolutely nothing) or its Misandry. That’s all it is.
@lith:
A bit more seriously (not that I wasn’t serious above), this taps into man’s primal fears which have been enshrined in the foundations of patriarchy for centuries: that of being rejected by his woman for a better lover, as well as being cuckolded and “duped” into raising another man’s offspring.
When you read manurespherian blogs, you can see it quite clearly, especially the second one. The first one not so much because all spherians are Natural Born Alphas (TM) for whom sexually satisfying women is second nature, something so obvious that’s not even worth mentioning (although they like to mention it, a lot, just in case).
Their cries about the awfulness of Hypergamyyy! come from a place of deep insecurity and fear that they personally do not measure up as men.
“Houser’s stay at the motel since early July was apparently uneventful — aside from the 59-year-old’s penchant for wearing a bright-yellow Speedo bathing suit while at the pool.”
http://news.yahoo.com/lafayette-theater-gunman-spent-final-days-drinking-beer-at-a-motel-pool-224651877.html
And there goes dinner……*HURGH!*
A bit of a frivolous thing to say. Besides, as Frank Zappa would note, that’s not what made him ugly.
@AuntEdna,
So, basically, their ramblings about hypergamy are the product of rage at having been at one point dumped and/or rejected by a woman who went on to date and/or marry another man, whom they believe was higher in status than them in some way. And as we’ve seen before, this can literally be any other way. He can be better-looking or richer or smarter or more “alpha” (which can mean literally anything) or taller or have a better face based on the laws of physiognomy.
Not frivolous….he sounds like he made people uncomfortable, likely women at the pool. Not frankly reportable as a violation of anything…but when “the hair stands upon the back of your neck creepy” is happening it is sometimes a warning something ain’t right.
@alaisvex
Or higher video game scores
Oh no, for the love of pete, bi polar disorder does not turn you into a monster from hell like this one. Do they have to try and excuse this oh so poor baby by saying he has a mental illness? Damn it, I’m bipolar and i do not kill people. It’s no excuse. Bipolar does not turn people into maniacal killers.
I’d never heard of “Philosophy of Rape” until reading about it in the comments today. What a horrible premise for a discussion group, it’s the kind of thing that makes you die a little on the inside. Out of curiosity I went to go look at it, and while I usually don’t go in for censorship I was happy to see that it was one of the banned subreddits. I’m sure it will pop up in another guise elsewhere (maybe voat?) but at least it’s gone from Reddit (for now anyway).
I appreciate your footnote re:bi-polar disorder David, I know plenty of people on that spectrum and I very much doubt that any one of them is one trigger away from a mass murder. It always worries me when the news fixates on mental health as a proxy for the other issues that they won’t touch with a ten foot pole. I would rate hate radio, misogyny and embittered white male privilege as much more likely causes for this violent outburst before even considering the perpetrator’s mental health. Of course good luck expecting any discussion of those topics on the news — we wouldn’t want to alienate white men who aren’t already watching FOX.
No, but hating women does. I’m trying to find out the sex of the wounded. It’s the same problem I had trying to find out about Elliott Rodger’s victims — the sex of the wounded. Complete media blackout.
Someday it will show up behind a foolproof academic firewall/paywall. The wounded and their sex.
I want very very much to know the sex of the people wounded by Houser and Elliottt Rodger. This info is being suppressed — it’s nowhere on the Net.
If anyone knows anything, please let me know, thank you very much.
Since the story broke, I have also been waiting to hear the gender of the other victims. Women were methodically targeted by this man and the press is covering this fact up. The red herring is “gun control”, but the elephant in the room regarding the media is that it’s open season on women. Literally.