By David Futrelle
We’ve reached the point in Roosh V’s redemption arc in which we have to hear him complain about all the sex he had back in the day. Roosh, you may recall, used to be a professional “pickup artist” who made his living teaching his extraordinarily problematic, er, techniques; now he’s a newly minted religious fanatic of the Orthodox Christian variety who is trying, in his own terrible way, to make amends for his sinful former life. Trouble is, he’s feeling remorse for the wrong things.
In a recent post on his blog, Roosh declares that he wishes he’d remained a virgin instead of wasting nearly two decades of his life relentlessly pursuing women, sometimes literally. Now he’s given up on sex, including the self-serve variety.
Upon receiving the grace of God, I ceased all sexual activity. I don’t look at porn, or even sexy lingerie images. I don’t masturbate and definitely don’t fornicate. If sexual thoughts attack my mind, I pray to Jesus Christ to take them away, and He does.
His new abstinence applies even during his dreams. When some comely dream lady hits on him during his slumbers, he says, he stays pure (mostly), “usually say[ing] no to the flesh that is offered me.”
How very impressive.
The primary villain in Roosh’s story is lust — a powerful inner force that, he thinks, can transform male virgins and sex-havers alike into angry, bitter misogynists who hate women as much as they desire them. As he puts it:
If you are a virgin in lust, and fail to gain physical pleasure, you will experience tremendous anguish. You will be angry at all the men who are getting laid, and you will also be angry at all the women for not choosing you for sex. You will masturbate to experience the pleasure of the orgasm, and then experience an immediate emotional hangover of having had to masturbate. This is an unbearable state that most men “solve” through prostitution, yet since a prostitute is not what any man truly wants, the pain and anguish intensify.
Actually, only a small minority of men ever turn to sex workers to alleviate their lusts — with only about 1.5 percent of American men visiting a sex worker in any given year.
Even for the sexually active man, the accomplished player, the pain of his lust is transmutated into other forms, such as the simultaneous addiction and hatred of “sluts.”
Most sexually active men don’t turn into raging misogynists. Some of them rather enjoy the sex and have actual warm feelings towards even their casual partners.
Roosh concludes his attack on non-marital sex with a theatrical lament:;
I truly wish I were a virgin. I wish I didn’t learn game and become good at it. I wish I didn’t sleep with all those women, and I’ve prayed to God to not only forgive me for those encounters but to help me forget them. The intimacy I’ve had in the past does not at all serve me in the present. It doesn’t make me feel happier or more masculine. Instead, I feel regret and shame. I can’t stress how the sex I had in my life was in no way an addition. Instead, it was a subtraction, one that occupied most of my free time and intellect while taking my eyes off God.
I feel precisely zero sympathy for poor Roosh and his overwrought laments. Because in his attempt to frame himself as a sort of victim of the sex he willingly engaged in he has somehow overlooked the real victims — the women he pressured and manipulated into bed.
I’m not being facetious here. If you have read any of Roosh’s “fielf reports” in his assorted books and booklets you will notice at once that none of them are descriptions of hot sex and enthusiastic consent. Roosh instead details the assorted tricks he used to navigate often quite drunk women into bed. He treated their “nos” as little more than temporary hurdles to push past. In the case of one woman, Roosh wrote,
It took four hours of foreplay and at least thirty repetitions of “No, Roosh, no” until she allowed my penis to enter her vagina. No means no—until it means yes.
In another case, he reported, his, er, partner was so drunk that
[i]n America, having sex with her would have been rape, since she couldn’t legally give her consent. It didn’t help matters that I was relatively sober, but I can’t say I cared or even hesitated.
In one case when a woman revoked her consent part way through, “I had to use some muscle to prevent her from escaping.”
While not all of Roosh’s “field reports” are direct (if sometimes unintentional) confessions of rape, they all seem to involve trickery, manipulation and in some cases intimidation — and his writings about these, er, conquests never involve even the tiniest smidgen of remorse. (For more details, see here.)
If Roosh wants absolution for his sins, he needs to reckon with what he did to all these women — and do penance for it, preferably by turning himself over to the authorities. A thoroughgoing apology would be a good first step, if only the first step. Somehow I doubt we’ll ever get one.
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Roosh is projecting so hard here. When misogynists talk about what “all other men” think, they’re telling on themselves.
One could maybe give a little benefit of the doubt and think that this is has way to manifesting guilt and remorse for what he did, but then one would remember that he’s Roosh and doesn’t feel guilt and is still an awful person. He does not feel remorse at all.
I can’t tell if Roosh pivoted because he thought he’d get more money as a grifter, or if he did so because he’s having a midlife crisis, or both.
I think he might feel remorse for himself, but he certainly don’t feel any remorse for the women he raped. For me, he missed what was problematic ; and as usual for fanatics, he didn’t read the command of his religion all that well.
I remember a lot of jokes about french collaborators confessing or having remorse about their behavior, only to say that they should have betrayed for more money. I feel that the “remorses” of Roosh are entirely based on him feeling he didn’t get enough from it.
Note how pointedly absent are the agenda of women in his post. That’s the most damning part for me.
My hope is that his dramatics somehow convince some would-be players to leave women alone.
Not everyone has that problem, Roosh.
Well, if Roosh believes that lust is the root of all evil, and he has to fight it off still, let me suggest that he castrate himself.
That would do the trick, and then he could shut up and perhaps turn his thoughts to all the women he wronged. Or, advocate for a society in which all boys are castrated at birth, that would eliminate the problem altogether and lead to the utopia Roosh is looking for.
Good luck to you with your procedure, Roosh, let’s see how that turns out.
@Tyko
It does seem like Roosh’s current state could be a cautionary tale to aspiring PUAs: if you follow that path, you could end up like Roosh in your 40s; unhappy, creepy, and alone. My guess is Roosh probably realized that now that he’s older it will be harder and harder to convince women to sleep with him as he becomes that creepy old man, so he is trying to shift his life to a different misogynistic tack.
@LindsayIrene
He could be experiencing post-orgasmic illness syndrome. Or it could be psychosomatic from religious guilt.
@Garnetstar
Well, there was the Orthodox sect of the Skoptsys, who practiced castration. Maybe he could follow in their footsteps.
O/T: A couple weeks ago, Reddit banned r/GenderCritical, the main TERF hangout, but left some other TERF subs up. They’ve banned most of those left over now, including r/itsafetish and r/LGBDropTheT. Some TERFs are now threatening to sue Reddit, demanding $1,000,000 per woman in a class action suit.
So Roosh now thinks his bang days were a mistake. Agreed. But he’s unsurprisingly focused on what this meant to him, which is consistent with his approach to, well, everything.
I’ll think better of him once he realizes that other people have a right to exist beyond their interactions with him.
OT:
Guess who’s employed again? I start the new job in a month, which gives me time to finish up some fiber arts projects and work on the ol’ watchlist.
@ Vicky P
Hooray!!! I am so chuffed for you!
Can you let me back on aeroplanes?
@Alan
Chuffed ter naafi breaks?
And far as I’m concerned, you can get on any airplanes you want. But do you really want to fly in a time of corona?
Congrats, VP! You are truly victorious this day.
@ Vicky P
Well, so long as they don’t adopt my local pub’s policy of only allowing you to drink outside.
@VP
Congrats!
I’m not quite sure what this means.
@Alan Robertshaw
I find the beer goes a bit flat with the pressure at 30,000 feet. And Bernoulli’s principle doesn’t help at 300 knots.
All joking aside, it is actually very difficult to serve tap beer in airliner cabins because most tap systems rely on CO2, which cannot be brought on airplanes, and the pressure changes from takeoff to cruising present additional challenges for the foam. So much so that it made international headlines when KLM became the first airline to serve beer on tap in 2015.
@Naglfar
British Army slang I learned from a squaddie back in the 1990s. It means something like “very pleased.”
Hope these embed.
Being Britain; it’s all about tea.
Been, there, seen that, got the…
This incident was attested to in a couple of memoirs.
@VP, Alan
Thank you, that makes far more sense.
That man has always exuded “terrible in bed” energy.
At least he’s not become a Quiverfull fundie?
Honestly, I don’t think that “er” is required. Seeing as conquering generally involves forcing unwilling people to submit to you, it seems like just the right word for his behavior.
As for the NAAFI discussion, it just makes me think of that moment in the Harley Quinn show where Batman mocks Alfred for having been in the British Army with words to the effect of “Oh yeah? What did you ever fight over, who’d get the last cup of tea?” Alfred: “Occasionally, sir, yes.” (I don’t remember the actual dialogue, but it was something like that.)
I’m with LindseyIrene: If masturbating makes you unhappy, the problem isn’t that you were willing to masturbate.
@Victorious Parasol:
I’m so happy for you! Hope working the job is even better than hearing the news you got the job.
…. I think someone hit their wall and now their looking for a nice beta girl to be their beta wife so they can have children, but he’s so used up no one wants his shriveled up, deflated dick anymore. Should have spent his prime years being a good little boy to find a wife and earn money for lots of babies, but instead he used them up being a “player” and now he’s empty and alone.
(I’m sorry I had to, it was to perfect)
So if you stop having sex, you turn into a great person?
I remember an asexual man who also happened to be a sexist jerk. He didn’t understand why he couldn’t get an asexual girlfriend (because he treated women like dirt, basically). That roosh v sounds like a terrible person.
Why does Roosh look like he’s slowly mutating into the reincarnation of Grigori Rasputin?
Congratulations on the new job, VP!
In my opinion, every time Roosh confessed to rape, it was intentional. If his readers revel in one description of him raping a woman, they’re going to revel in all of them.
Nah, Roosh will never stop being self-serving.
@Victorious Parasol
All best wishes!
@Lainy
And he’s now an old bratwurstie. He should have chosen the sperm, not the shoes, but it’s too late now. All those years riding the vagina carousel with Stacies mean that no woman will ever want him.
I can hear the world’s smallest violin playing.
All joking aside, that does seem to be what happened more or less. He spent all those years having casual sex, yet now that he’s older he finds it harder to hook up with young women, who now see him as a creepy old man. So now he’s scrambling to find a wife and has taken on this orthodox grift as a new way to be misogynistic.
@ rabid rabbit
There’s probably a book to be written about the British Army and its relationship with tea; you’d have plenty of material:
D-Day
Waal Crossing
Arnhem
I think that last passage provides the context though. Brewing up can be both a morale booster; and a worthwhile exercise if there’s nothing else to do. To quote from the video clip: “Couldn’t hurt Sir”.
Hence all British Army armoured vehicles have built in tea making facilities.
https://www.wearethemighty.com/articles/this-is-why-every-armored-vehicle-has-british-tea-making-gear
@VP
Congratulations on the new job!
May I ask about the fiber arts you enjoy and are working on? I myself am working on a big cross stitch as a wedding gift for a friend right now. I’m very glad the wedding isn’t until summer 2021 because I started it in February and I’m a little less than halfway through. O_O
@Naglfar
And after he spent all those years crowing about men aging like Chateau de George Clooney, and warning women not to waste their fleeting youth riding the cock carousel. As usual, it’s pure projection with these guys.
Roosh 2.0 isn’t an improvement over Roosh 1.0. He’s still the same tightly wound misogynistic scold he always was. All he’s done is go from viewing women as prey to viewing women as obstacles to spiritual attainment, which is a very short and undemanding moral journey. Nothing original or special about it. It’s just a different way of being awful towards women, only with Biblical Authority™ behind it.
If he were truly enlightened, and not just a fraudulent, self-absorbed hustler, he would feel remorse over the damage he did to the women he targeted, manipulated, and raped. But no, as usual he’s focused on himself as the victim. All those conquests didn’t do HIM any good and didn’t make HIS life any better and didn’t reward HIM with a wife and family. I think he’s angry that he fell for his own lies.
At least he’s not bothering women any more, so that’s a plus?!
@Viscaria
Thanks! Currently I have a spinning project going – almost done with the last bobbin of singles, and then I can ply everything together. The fiber was blended by me; I dyed the Shetland Sliver myself, mixing it with milk protein and silk waste. I’m spinning it semi-worsted, and it’ll be a 2-ply yarn of about DK weight.
The other two main projects are knitting WIPs. One of them is a placemat for Mr. Parasol’s sister and her husband, and the other is a lace scarf. I keep changing my mind about who the scarf is for.
@Buttercup
This seems to be the case for many conservatives. They repeat lies until they believe them, then when those lies start negatively impacting them they get angry but instead of being angry at the party that lied to them, they blame it all on various scapegoats so they can keep voting for the people who got them into the mess.
@Naglfar : when a human is being foolish, he or she will do a lot of efforts to not admit it, either by doubling down on his previous attitude, or by finding a scapegoat.
Providing an escape hatch allowing thoses fools to keep their face can help them quit, but it don’t alway work. Pride is sadly a very big problem in general, and with thoses kind of fool in particular.
@VP
CONGRATS!!
@Naglfar
I think that just goes to show that as much as it’s about hate, it’s also about the grift.
@VP:
Ooooh
@Garnetstar
Castration to prevent lust? I believe there was something in the Bible about how you should cut off your hand or pluck out your eye if it offends you (ie: if you can’t stop using them to “sin”). I think it was Jesus who said that too, curious be wrong–too lazy to to fix our right now.
Yep, that was what Jesus said. Matthew 5:30
@alan:
Well, according to Asterix, Julius Caesar was unable to conquer Britain until he realized that all he had to do was attack only on weekends at 4:00 in the afternoon…
That is so neat. I’ve never done anything like that.
@ all fiber artists
My blending board is an indie I bought on Etsy, but it looks a lot like the Ashford blending board, and this video is a great demo of how blending works:
@VP, congrats and also your fiber arts sound ah-maze-ing!!! I can sew but that’s it; I am always so impressed by knitters, spinners, crocheters (I think that last one may not be a word, but you know what I mean…) 😁
O/T: Following the banning of more of their subreddits, TERFs have taken to Twitter to rant about cis women’s exclusive sex-based right to…get cervical cancer. They don’t seem to give a fuck about people who actually have cervical cancer, but they are very happy to weaponize them for transphobia. Sort of like that time MRAs pretended to care about prostate cancer.
So who’s going to break the news to them that trans men can get it too?
@Surplus
The point of the TERFs doing this seems to have mainly been to invalidate trans* men and AFAB non binary people. So I think they know, they’re just being assholes as usual.
Ok, since this has been fairly icky (it is Roosh) I’m putting up some new pet brain bleach.
I got pet mice! They are the coolest and cutest and most distracting little guys ever!!
This is Philo
//s.imgur.com/min/embed.js
And this is Gunge
//s.imgur.com/min/embed.js
And yes I am a big Fraggle Rock fan.
I’m having trouble getting the images to show still but that might be the inebriated state I’m in, we’ll see tomorrow.
Image embeds require that the URL starts with “http://“, because this site is still using HTTP (as opposed to HTTPS).
http://imgur.com/8eUFXj4
Awww!!!
Hello Philo and Gunge!
@Yutolia
They’re so cute!
As for the embed, you’ll want to make sure the URL is in full (including the https:// bit, and make sure the text is directly to the image file.
@Yutolia
Don’t mind me, I’m just testing Imgur embeds.
https://imgur.com/8eUFXj4