It’s still not clear if the Umpqua Community College shooter, now identified as 26-year-old Chris Harper Mercer, posted his plans on 4chan’s /r9k/ board the day before the shooting, or if the post, warning of an impeding shooting at a school in the northwest, was just a bizarre and highly improbable coincidence.
What is clear is that a lot of 4channers, particularly the “robots” of /r9k/, are offering the now-dead killer their sympathy and support. Indeed, in one thread on the board today, 4channers are blaming the shootings on women being sluts. Sluts, that is, who won’t sleep with them.
The thread starts with a post attacking “sexual liberalism” for allegedly leaving most men celibate while women have casual sex only with a small minority of the most attractive men.
Yep. As one critical anon put it, the OP’s “grand plan” seems to be “to force women in relationships with men they neither like nor are attracted to.”
Another anon thought the problem could be addressed, at least partially, on a voluntary basis:
Not all anons were quite so, er, optimistic:
Others, meanwhile, pinned their hopes on the inevitable arrival of sexbots:
Still others had even more radical “solutions.”
If at this point you feel your faith in humanity slipping away, you will be perhaps be slightly reassured by the fact that a good number of those posting in the thread thought the OP and those who agreed with him were a bunch of self-absorbed, self-pitying assholes.
One anon got this point across with admirable succinctness.
“Robot,” in this context, refers to the denizens of /r9k/, not the “companion robots” that others in the thread think will ultimately make women obsolete.
We must respectfully disagree. One does not express respect by disregarding site commenting policy and insulting a significant portion of the users. In the same regard one is not being personally attacked when asked not to behave in such a manner.
One is not expressing respect when they deliberately misrepresent the criticisms leveled against them. One is not expressing respect when they petulantly post a repeated image nor when they pretend to be woefully unaware of common terms regarding misogyny. And one is most certainly not expressing respect when they poutingly declare they ‘might have been wrong, but not really.’
In short, your brief posting history here has been a case study in how not to express respect. Were we to hazard a guess we suspect that it has, in fact, been carefully (and perhaps unwittingly) crafted to reinforce a preconceived notion. It is an exercise in bad faith and, as such, puts a halt to intellectual integrity before it ever gets started.
Good day.
“Feminist rhetoric,” “Destigmatising misogyny” – yeah, I take it back, dude’s a stock-standard brogressive. He’s just better at hiding it than the last few.
To argue that misogyny is a mental illness is to argue that most of mankind throughout history has been mentally ill. It’s a ridiculous notion on its face. Recognizing the absurdity of this hypothesis and treating it with contempt is not treating it as “heresy,” a superbly loaded term that only you have used.
If you really want to draw an analogy to creationism, try when creationists talk about intelligent design and how scientists are opposed to this empty “theory” out of a religious zeal. To be intellectually rigorous is not to give credence to every single possible thing that comes your way.
To argue that misogyny is a mental illness is to argue that it isn’t actually an issue that “normal” people have to face. It says that society doesn’t have a sexism problem that needs to be addressed, and that no culture-wide revolutions need happen. After all, it’s just a few “mentally ill” people.
Fuck off with that “you just want to feel superior” bullshit. What’s your goal here, to figure out how we approach things here or nurture your own feelings of superiority by casting us as irrational?
Argue in good faith or leave.
Felix,
You have yet to present one shred of evidence that misogyny is a mental illness. I have a psychology degree and at no point in my studies have I ever seen any suggestion that it was. You can’t just pull a fact out of your ass, expect us to take it seriously and then declare that we can’t handle the truth when we express skepticism. And BTW, you’re not saying anything we haven’t heard, so you can take a seat if you think you’re dropping some original truth bombs.
As to your assertion that you were being respectful, you may want to actually listen to what we’re saying and rethink that claim. I suggest you look at the comments policy posted in the header and then Google something like “how to be an ally” before you try and engage in a conversation in a feminist space again.
I don’t know if I’ll ever understand why these types always seem to go “I’ve been nothing but unfailingly polite to you (while dismissing your life experiences, stigmatizing your conditions, and supporting people who seek to violate your rights)! I never said the word ‘fuck’! I didn’t call anyone a slur, even if I was severely tempted! You’re all just meany mean meaners! ” when told that what they’re doing isn’t cool.
Hah.
Ahahahahahahahaha.
Hahaha.
He’s found us out! We don’t believe in equality for women at all. We’re just terrified that hatred of women will become acceptable. How bigoted we are! Now that the truth is known, doubtless the world will shun us as hateful reactionaries intent on preventing people from making a more tolerant world.
David, thank you for letting this one through. This is hilarious. This line is going straight into my list of Great Things MRAs Have Said.
EJ,
I read that as him saying we want misogyny to exist because we just want to be able to play the victim card. A bit of projection because it’s MRAs who desperately want misandry to be real so they can get what they perceive as victim privilege.
Nah, you didn’t attack us personally! You only dehumanized us and threw us under the bus to “other” a guy who walked into a school and shot people and expected us to just nod along!
You also ignored the comments policy, insisted that I lacked reading comprehension because I “misunderstood” you (and so did everyone else in the comments section, apparently), accused us of bullying you, and threw a temper tantrum when we suggested that you were wrong about misogyny possibly being a mental illness, and explained why you were wrong to challenge that claim.
Nope. Nothing wrong here! [/sarcasm]
Don’t let the door hit you on the way out.
“Willfully misinterpreted” = “You trusted your gut and experience as a woman on the internet, and you didn’t buy the excuse of someone you don’t know personally and have no idea of their true intentions, so you’re misinterpreting me and you’re meanies!”
And we didn’t “step over” any feminist rhetoric. Feminism is all about calling out potentially creepy behavior. Which that was.
Perhaps, in the future, instead of just insisting that you were in the right, you could step back, look at what people have to say about why it’s creepy behavior, and fucking learn from it to be a better feminist ally. Though, I sincerely doubt you’re going to do that, because you’re apparently too busy huffing your own farts.
Call me again and drop this shtick about how bigoted we are when we start threatening to beat and rape men, threaten to take away their rights, and obsess over their sexuality and shame them for it. Kthxbai.
Calling you out for being creepy and ableist isn’t “bigotry”, in fact, I daresay it’s the fucking opposite.
I’m going to agree with Newt, this is a claim of “intolerance of intolerance”.
You fucking were, and people here explained why you were wrong, you willfully obtuse shitnugget.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH.
Oh, that’s a good one! We sat down and explained why you were wrong, and yet, you’re still saying “Oh, but what if I’m right?! Why are you denying the truth?!”
Look dude, I have mental illness, and I manage to not be sexist just fucking fine.
I was sexist in the past, but I’ve learned from that and moved forward. You can’t “unlearn” a mental illness, bruh.
And not a shred of self-awareness was had that day.
Wow.
I have no words for this level of projection. This is like THX levels. Complete with that annoying noise they play that I hate so much.
Misogyny is has been well destigmatized in society. It’s just been in recent decades that it’s becoming slowly unacceptable. That’s shows much you know about feminism, history and how much you’re actually aware of your environment.
Also, you’re a douchebag.
http://images.huffingtonpost.com/2014-04-09-Douchebags.gif
@ Paradoxy
You like all this sort of stuff
http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/oct/05/racist-racism-racially-white-ethnic-minorities
After the felix debacle, I kinda missed this post by Virtually out of touch.
Yes, I think this is very accurate, well for me at least. When I was younger I did feel this massive desire (and sadness) over not being in a relationship. I quite literally felt incomplete. It took a long time for me to relinquish toxic masculinity and realize that no, I didn’t ‘need’ a girlfriend, I was just desperate for someone to connect with emotionally. Then suddenly I had a total wizard of oz moment when I realized that I already had what I was looking for: A group of friends who genuinely cared about me.
I think you’re absolutely right, a lot of men (and boys) feel that the only way that are permitted to express their emotions is through their relationship with their wives/girlfriends. This explains why so many women have zero problems being single while so many men agonize over it.
Another thing about toxic masculinity (related to how it makes single men feel like shit) and one of the worst aspects: The easiest to climb up the masculinity ladder is by pushing others down. Men are encouraged to basically ‘rat out’ other men who aren’t acting sufficiently manly or who dare commit the crime of showing feelings. This gives them bonus manly points and ensures that all men keep those girly emotions deeeeeeeeep down inside.
Moocow – I experienced the other side of the coin, feeling that having a BF was ‘proof’ that I was not a complete failure. I was never told this directly, but it was like being thin enough – it was everywhere in many different ways, a lot from the media, some from other girls and older women like my mother. It made my teen years pretty miserable, as I was with a man who treated me like shit and I did not have the strength to leave him until I was on the way to another relationship.
@Ellesar
That’s true, I forgot that there are many pressures for women to be in relationships (and get validation from the mere fact of being in a relationship) due to toxic gender roles. Thanks for pointing that out.
I’ve heard similar stories like yours from my friends. It’s also completely fucked up that the popular narrative that gets extracted from that situation (and proudly shouted by much of the Mano-sphere) is ‘all women are attracted to assholes’. Glad to hear you’ve managed to escape that, hope you’re in a good place now :).
It seems like, to me at least, that women dating/marrying men is seen as an obligation, a duty. You’re supposed to have a boyfriend/husband, because otherwise you are failing your job as a woman and depriving some poor man of a partner.
While dudes are more expected to have a girlfriend/wife as proof of how manly and worthy of respect he is, that he was able to ‘win’ a woman to take care of him.
Someone said having a wider social network has a lot to do with it, but with that comes greater exposure to disappointment – friends and family can let you down after all, close relationships often end abruptly – so women perhaps grow more emotionally resilient and better able to accept being single, while some guys with limited social contact barely grow at all…
As far as I’m aware (or maybe just assuming), most of the people committing gun violence have obtained their guns illegally, no?
No. I haven’t done tons of research, but I know that the Sandy Hook shooter’s mom obtained guns legally, and permitted him to use them (I think they went out target shooting together).
OK but if the gun is not registered in my name and I use it, then its illegally obtained, no?
No, buying a gun for someone, or allowing them to use your gun, generally isn’t illegal, just as loaning someone your car generally isn’t illegal, even though it’s registered to you. I believe that there are some situations where it’s illegal, mostly when someone is a felon, but I don’t think any of these types of shooters have been felons. Even then, I’m not sure that the loaner has any liability, I think it’s just the borrower (who should know whether they’re allowed to possess a gun).
Well, here’s the latest example of toxic masculinity: It’s a shooting between two children in Tennessee.
That’s horrible. And instead of changing the gun laws so parents are required to keep guns locked away from children, instead of doing something about a bully before he shoots someone, they’re looking at trying this kid as an adult. What a fantastic criminal justice system we have!
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the average age Americans lose their virginities (defined here as vaginal sexual intercourse) is 17.1 for both men and women. The CDC also reports that virgins make up 12.3 percent of females and 14.3 percent of males aged 20 to 24.
–mass scale virginity (80/20%) is a silly myth
So apparently now a few angry teens speaking anonymously on an anonymous imageboard dictate that the entirity of 4chan has decreed “women caused this shooting”? Yet more sensationalist nonsense. Everytime something like this happens it’s always straight onto the Misogyny bus where we once again blame male culture and this magic phenomenon known as “toxic masculinity”, shouting over any tragedy that our patriarchal, woman hating society caused this and we should pay more attention to women’s issues.
Instead of having a conversation about male mental health issues, the poor quality of mental health services in America, the negative perceptions of mental health problems across the Western world and the issue of widely available firearms, you posted an ‘article’ where you plucked some anonymous user’s opinions off a website and said “omg look how mean these people are!!!1!!”. pathetic.
Jack
So women being attacked and dying because of men not getting what they want (male entitlement) is not a womens’ issue and not misogyny? And way to go with the ableism, a-hole.
Congratulations, you threw some buzzwords at me and insulted me. Thank you for the discussion.
The problem is American media and the glorification of serial killers. In no other country does this happen, even in ones with guns, and even in ones with REAL misogyny, because the killers simply don’t get the media coverage they do in the USA. As soon as somebody shoots up a school their face is plastered all over the TV screen and they are immortalized, getting everything they wanted when they set out do what they do. When you have nothing to lose and want your life to end, the prospect of fame and quasi-immortality is driving these people to kill others, rather than just themselves. Ostracized, lonely people kill for fame, not because of an undercurrent of misogyny. They didn’t exclusively kill women. They killed everyone, because they hate people in general and they want to be famous. And the American media gives them that fame.
“even in ones with REAL misogyny”
Do you really think you can be taken seriously with that kind of sentence ?
Do you think anyone can take you seriously when instead of ever debating issues, you fire off insults and buzzwords whenever a contrary opinion arises?
Killer blatantly states that not having girlfriends is one of his motives. People think it’s silly to talk about misogyny and toxic misogyny.
Seems logical!
Question for you Jack, given that women are just as likely, if not more than men to have mental health issues, why is it that women don’t go on shooting sprees when life doesn’t hand them a harem of hot men? How do you explain the gender disparity?