Once more with feeling: Media Must Report Gender Motivation for Mass Shootings
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Posted by Jennifer L Pozner August 5th, 2009 |
A health club in Collier County, PA this week was the site of yet another horrific mass shooting by yet another disaffected man armed with ammo and a deep hatred of women. The shooter specifically targeted women, reportedly firing 52 shots, killing three women and injuring nine more before committing suicide.
Today, the Associated Press’s Genaro C. Armas reports that the alleged shooter, George Sodini, maintained a website detailing his desire –and plans — to kill women. The calculated nature of the crime, and the gunman’s stated intention to target only women, is eerily similar to the Montreal Massacre of 1989, in which a man opened fire on students after screaming, “You’re women, you’re going to be engineers. You’re all a bunch of feminists. I hate feminists.”
Perhaps it takes this level of hit-us-over-the-head bluntness for media to notice that a mass murder is also a hate crime, when the victims of that crime are solely women. In contrast to many other shootings in which similar motivations have gone unreported over the past two decades, the AP (and several other news outlets picking up Armas’s story) have chosen to discuss the extremely relevant role of misogyny as the root cause of the bloody tragedy in Collier County.
According to the Editor & Publisher blog, Sodini’s website also contained slams against “the liberal media,” Obama, the election of “The Black Man,” and jokes about black men and white women. E&P notes that the AP and other outlets have omitted these details. Had Sodini aimed his guns specifically and only at people of color, ignoring information about his bigotry would not only be racist, it would also deprive the public of a full understanding of the nature of his crime. But while his racist webpages certainly add a fuller picture to this disturbed killer’s mindset, in this case the AP discussed the part of the website most relevant to the crime: Sodini’s anger at being sexually rejected, his deep-seated resentment toward women, and his stated plans to kill women.
So, finally, a gender-based hate crime is being reported (at least by the AP, at least for now) within the context of the killer’s actual anti-woman agenda. It’s an important step forward in media understanding of and coverage of this sort of crime. But if the press’s previous track record is any indicator, Sodini’s misogyny could potentially fall out of the frame of follow-up reporting.
Since such context has been woefully missing from most corporate media coverage of mass shootings over the last two decades, WIMN’s Voices would like to offer some helpful history from the WayBack machine:
From Jonesboro to Virginia Tech - sexism is fatal, but media miss the story
***This includes a discussion of the sexist underpinnings of the murders at Virginia Tech in 2007, and a full reprint of “Jonesboro: Sexism Kills Girls,” May, 1998, Sojourner: The Women’s Forum
Also potentially of interest:
video and transcript of my Fox’s Hannity & Colmes debate about the gender-based aspect of the Virginia Tech shootings and similar crimes over many years.
Women In Media & News urges reporters, editors, news anchors, analysts, commentary writers, pundits and bloggers to keep the spotlight on the dangerous implications of Sodini’s sexism whenever the PA shooting is discussed. More broadly, we encourage media to report this crime within the context of the prevalence of gun violence against women and girls, and the fact that sexism has been the (largely unexamined) motivation behind a great many of the mass shootings we’ve seen in the last two decades.
For additional comment from WIMN, email info[at]wimnonline[dot]org, or call 347-564-5190 during normal business hours.
August 5th, 2009 15:04
Here’s to hoping outlets take notice of hate crimes that target women and add depth and context to reporting on this and other instances such as this. Another example of this hidden reality are femicides on the US/Mexico border.
August 5th, 2009 15:07
As I remember, gender was only grazed the case of that Amish school house shooting, too.
It seems to me that most journalists fail to connect the term “hate crime” with women–it’s only talked about in terms of racism, homophobia, and anti-religious acts of violence. With women, it’s just chalked up to an ultra-violent, angry streak that goes hand-in-hand with misogyny. That may be true–a tradition of violence is inextricably connected with our macho culture–but it still warrants some discussion and gender analysis!
August 5th, 2009 15:38
Thank you for this piece, Jenn.
Women suffer disproportionately from gun violence considering they’re rarely the ones who buy and use guns. And we have to keep emphasizing the fact that there are uncounted assaults during which women are victims of gun violence without a shot being fired. The threat of death alone, the lethality of the gun, enables rapists around the world. That’s why campaigning against and regulating the international small arms trade is so vital, it can contribute greatly to the fight to end violence against women.
August 5th, 2009 15:47
this is a great piece. i think it’s important to highlight the synergy between sexists and racists, and how organized movements promoting hatred against women and POC are moving both policymakers and vigilantes to take actions that kill people directly, or in the medium and long term.
I’m glad about AP’s accurate reporting. I didn’t look at his blog, but seems like there are threads of him killing those women (of i’m not sure what race) to protect them from men of color in general, and Obama in particular, reporting both the gender and race aspects would be necessary to understand the actual story.
i’d remind nona that any number of different cop killers were defended as not being racist, and there are other examples regarding homophobia, so i feel it’s only some religions that are understood to be targets of hate crimes, and the rest of the oppressed identity groups are on our own.
August 5th, 2009 16:14
AnotherPundit, I’m glad to see the connections being drawn between this sort of crime and the massive violence and murder of women on the US/Mexico border. I continue to encourage media to cover femicide as well as other forms of violence against women not only domestically but abroad. In particular, as we know, sexual and physical violence against women has become not only a disturbing byproduct of war, but a TOOL of war itself. We don’t hear enough about this in corporate media, but the feminist press and sometimes the independent media have connected those dots.
Ludovic, I didn’t see the killer’s actual webpage; since I’m not a crime reporter I felt I had enough information about the site from multiple reported sources to write about it without subjecting myself to his writings; I made the choice as an act of mental health-maintenance. But I’m interested in hearing more about your point about Sodini’s possible motivation to kill the women to “protect” them from men of color. Did he specifically write that? If so, then yes, I would amend my post above, in that racism would then be of particular relevance in the crime. On the other hand, if he just made racist rants not related to his desire to (and plans to) kill — since those plans were all about killing women — I’d stick with my original interpretation. Can you cut/paste any pull quotes you think are particularly relevant?
August 5th, 2009 16:26
i too made the choice not to look at his stuff, i’m not even a reporter! i’ll wait for someone else my courageous than me to do so. i think it’s a possibility that if his blog included thoughts on “Obama, the election of “The Black Man,” and jokes about black men and white women”, that seems quite in line with the old reasoning behind most lynchings of black men–’protecting’ the white women from the black man…and every now and then the white women who were being ‘protected’ also got punished for ’soliciting’ the savages’attention.
admittedly, there’s a few things i don’t know:
what are the races of the women killed and injured?
how did his blog connect his racism and femicidal plans?
Not trying to distract from his obvious targeting of women. Just wondering if the media, like in the Columbine case, are also ‘whitewashing’ the clearly racial intentions of the white shooters.
August 5th, 2009 16:39
Please explain to me why men think women are objects only for their amusement and satisfaction. When a woman refuses to reflect men back at twice their normal size, that is reason enough for her to no longer live? . Think of the Amash girls that were murdered at the school house before the killer could use his lubricant gel with them. I recently heard a man complain because he went to Hooters and was served by a woman who was 7 months pregnant. A woman’s life is always threatened.
August 5th, 2009 16:43
Hate crimes have been of particular interest to me since my recent work with and research on _The Laramie Project_, a play about the murder of Matthew Shepard and subsequent descent of the media on the town of Laramie, Wyoming where the murder took place. The most interesting aspect of the play was the sense the audience gets that the townspeople were angry with the media because of their inaccurate and sometimes sensationalized portrayal of the entire town as a bunch of bigots and murderers.
Of course, this is the exact opposite of the situation we have here; in Laramie, the coverage of Matthew Shepard’s murder was all about the hate crime and here, the media seems to be ignoring the fact that this was a hate crime. I think both types of inaccurate media coverage are equally damaging. On the one hand, when a whole town or area is involved, the media runs the risk of painting a bad picture of the entire region. On the other, if the media does not cover it as a hate crime, we are not made aware of underlying issues in our society.
Personally, I believe honesty is the best policy, especially when it comes to media coverage. This was a hate crime, and it needs to be presented as such.
Great and very informative commentary on this important issue. Thanks for raising it to our attention!
August 5th, 2009 16:59
[…] Though this shooting is specific, some articles have pointed out that even at Virginia Tech and at Columbine, gender was a definite issue. […]
August 5th, 2009 17:06
When the media decide not to report the aspect of cases like this that involve stated misogyny, I have to wonder if it is the flip side of the coin where many in the media either promote sexist descriptions of women — is there an attitude that it’s OK to poke fun at the type of beer Secy of State Hillary Clinton might have had at the beer summit because it’s a quick hit, but heaven forbid the media take a long, hard look at hate crimes toward women because that would take too long to write about and explain …???
August 5th, 2009 17:34
It is without question a tragic event. My question is: Will this trigger discussion on despondency of some males? I read portions of his online diary and he was a man in terrible pain. While the issue of gender will come up after this event, I wonder if there will be discourse on the environment that breeds not so much the actions of Sodini but also his pain.
August 5th, 2009 19:29
Jennifer,
I can’t tell you how important I think this issue is. I hate to sound like a conspiracy theorist, but increasingly, I’m coming to believe that unless the violence is being committed against men, it’s simply not reported as being important enough. I think about what’s happening to the women of Afghanistan, or what is happening to the women of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, and I wonder why when women are targeted, that is not seen as an act of “hate?”
August 5th, 2009 20:29
“Women suffer disproportionately from gun violence considering they’re rarely the ones who buy and use guns.”
This gender divisive mindset ignores nuance to the point that it is dishonest, and cancerous. Innocent men — yes, innocent men — suffer violent attacks at the hands of strangers far more than women. The fact that the perpetrators are predominantly male doesn’t make a damn bit of difference to the innocent men.
The problem here is that you all want to lump all men together — if innocent men are killed by the small percentage of bad men driven by aggression, hate, or other terrible motive, you blink at that reality. After all, it’s just men killing other men (the fact that the men being killed are innocent is of no moment). It is only when innocent women are killed by those same bad men that it matters to you.
Isn’t it more logical, and just, and factual to talk about attacks by the bad guys against innocent PEOPLE, regardless of their gender? What furnishes an innocent woman a greater entitlement to the mantle of victimhood than an innocent man or boy?
Yes, this shooting appears to be a classic “hate” crime since it targeted members of a class for violence. But make no mistake — that doesn’t mean that the streets are safe for innocent men, or that innocent men don’t need to “take back the night” every bit as much as women do.
August 5th, 2009 21:08
Pierce, nothing in this blog post, or in my WIMN’s Voices posts on this topic, or in the Sojourner article I wrote in 1998, remotely suggested that crimes against innocent men should be overlooked by media, or by society. Of course crimes against innocent men should be examined — as they very often are in the media. Instead, this post is about the need for media to pay attention to the real context for a specific kind of crime — mass shootings, a great many of which have been motivated by misogyny. When journalists ignore this context, it hinders our culture’s ability to prevent such violence.
Seems knee-jerk to rail about crimes against innocent men on a post that is specifically about hate crimes against women. Providing ethical, comprehensive reporting about women does not disparage men.
August 6th, 2009 05:00
Pierce,
Jennifer’s piece is about gender-based violence (hate crimes against women) and the fact that the media tend to report insufficiently on the _gender-based_ aspect of mass shootings like the one in PA.
In this context, my post was about gun violence against women. The disproportionality I was talking about refers to empirical data on femicides (”Risk Factors for Femicide in Abusive Relationships: Results from a Multisite Case Control Study”, cited in an Amnesty International Report on The Impact of Guns on Women’s Lives):
“having a gun in the home increased the overall risk of someone in the household being murdered by 41 per cent; but for women in particular the risk was nearly tripled (an increase of 272 per cent)”
August 6th, 2009 13:29
WomanistMusings has a layered discussion of Sodini’s sexism and racism, linking his racism to his crime, here:
http://www.womanist-musings.com/2009/08/george-sodini-misogynist-and-racist.html
August 6th, 2009 13:34
After reading this article and the comments left, I’m saddened by the all too predictable willingness to point fingers, and the equally predictable unwillingness (of either sex) to step up and take a long, hard look into the mirror.
I don’t hear anyone asking the hard questions… “Have MY actions ever contributed to another’s feelings of rejection and despondency?” “Have I always treated the opposite sex fairly?” “Could I have handled another’s advances in a more sensitive way?” And most important, “What can I do to ensure this never happens to another woman or man again for this very reason?”
We can analyze and nit-pick people’s motives until the cows come home. But a hate crime is a hate crime whether it involves race, religion, sex, one person or a hundred. Fact is, the dynamics of social intercourse, as well as our underlying value system, has changed (eroded) dramatically over the last few decades - probably more so than any other period in recorded history. It is this erosion and change that has fueled the hate crimes that have become all too common.
Only we as individuals can stop this catastrophic phenomenon. Yet few appear capable, inclined, and/or motivated so to address the underlying issues.
I sympathize with the victims of this senseless act. Certainly, no one in their right mind can justify any act so horrific. But vilifying the extremist misogynists (like the ones on YouTube) is not the answer - even they offer some shreds of truth when we clean out our ears and honestly look inside ourselves.
And, let’s also not kid ourselves - rivalry and hatred between the sexes is not a new phenomenon. Misogyny and misandry (female hatred toward men), has been happening as long or longer than the phenomenon of love itself. Just this very week, a Boynton Beach woman was arrested for planning a “hit” on her husband of 6 months - ironic to say the least.
So I encourage every man and woman who reads this to look at themselves and ask what they can do to ensure this is the last unnecessary, hateful, murder between sexes. Look in the mirror today, look tomorrow, next week, next month, and next year. Keep looking and keep treating the opposite sex with the kid gloves that every human heart and soul deserves.
August 6th, 2009 13:53
NetCentric, what makes you think that a post encouraging media to report accurately and seriously the misogyny underlying this and other similar murders, is in any way contrary to the idea that women and men should both treat each other with kindness and compassion? Of course, men should treat men with compassion, and men should treat women with compassion.
What no one should EVER do, regardless of gender, is blame the victims of crime. So, no, we should not be asking here if women were nice enough to Sodini. We should be asking how our culture can encourage men to cope with feelings of rejection in ways other than attempting to blow the heads off any women they see.
We all deserve compassion. No one deserves violence. And trying to redirect a question about journalistic ethics, accuracy and accountability into some sort of discussion about how we need to ask how women treat the men in their lives… well, no one here is going to fall for that bait.
August 6th, 2009 15:42
Thank you admin for proving my point. You took a ‘cant we all get along’ comment and an attempt to get people - not just women - to look inside, and you twisted it into feminist talking points. You also made a number of incorrect assumptions about my motivations for the contrib and then proceeded to lecture about journalism and blame. When you can see me as a person and not a man, only then can meaningful dialog take place. And i repeat once again, the answers lie within ourselves for those with genuine introspection, conscience, and desire for a better world. The women who lost in this ordeal deserve better than a ‘me vs you’ debate.
August 6th, 2009 21:51
“egocentric”, oh i mean “netcentric”, it’s a mindset like yours that’s part of the problem. i do NOT have to be “nice” to any one. and how about men see me as a person, hmmm? like the creep who sat down against me on the bus & wouldn’t take my “good morning” in reply to his as good enough and basically physically intimidated me into talking to him so that i got off the bus 8 stops before i needed to on a 95 degree day? or how about the creep who propositioned me as i WALKED MY DOGS at 5 a.m.? yeah, i guess it was my fault seeing as how wearing pajamas & walking dogs is the universal sign for a sex worker, huh? and i was even NICE to him, though he didn’t deserve it. or the guy who pulled up next to me while i took an evening stroll & asked “how much”? and before you assume - i was wearing jeans, a hoody, and converse tennis shoes; not exactly screaming “sex worker”. or how about the guy the other day who made noises at me as if he was calling a dog? those are just a few instances from the PAST FOUR DAYS. so, maybe i’ll start seeing men like those creeps as people when they give me the same respect so many men feel instantly entitled to. and maybe i’ll be sincerely “nice” when so many men stop forcing me through creepy means to be either fake “nice” or as cold as possible while trying to keep the creep from getting angry.
sorry my reply is a bit long & rambling & i know it’s pretty much feeding the derailing of the post. i’ve spent too much of today reading far too many disgustingly sympathetic posts about a MURDERER and/or victim blaming comments & i just couldn’t handle one more victim-blaming comment without replying.
August 7th, 2009 01:06
I’m curious how people think that labelling this as a hate crime and writing about the gendered nature of violence will actually help the situation and save lives. Can anyone help me understand?
August 7th, 2009 09:45
Viv, I’m sorry you had to deal with that, just walking through the world. First time I remember that sort of thing starting with me was when I was about 12; it never stopped. As for an outlet: do you know about the various “HollaBack” sites (there’s one in NYC, and many others) — they are great catharsis for street harassment, in that the sites act as places where you can photographically or otherwise document those who harass you. I haven’t visited the sites in a long time; the NYC site used to have a mission statement that was very on-target related to noting that the site wouldn’t and shouldn’t be a haven for racist or otherwise inappropriate targeting of people. I’ve heard from others that some of the HollaBack sites have become a bit problematic in terms of racist comments about some of the harassers (which is bigoted/racist and also obscures the problem of street harassment, which is wrong regardless of who is doing the harassing).
August 7th, 2009 09:57
RedRedRobin: you ask:
“I’m curious how people think that labeling this as a hate crime and writing about the gendered nature of violence will actually help the situation and save lives. Can anyone help me understand?”
In the above post I link to a piece I wrote in 1998, on the school shootings at Jonesboro. I address this question in that article, so I won’t reiterate in much depth here.
But I will say this: whenever these sorts of crimes happen, media generally do a lot of “What could have caused this?” hand-wringing, but usually look for all sorts of potential “causes” that usually have very little to do with the actual case: they point to video games even when the killer didn’t play them; “gangsta rap” even when the killer didn’t watch music videos; “the breakdown of family values,” etc — anything other than listening to the clues left by the killer(s), which have so often pointed directly to the perpetrator in question’s feelings of anger/hostility/pain/alienation/frustration and other emotions tied to their belief that they are entitled to women’s bodies, they are entitled to date, or kiss, or grope, or have sex with, or marry, or have the baby of, or control the actions of, girls and women… and if particular girls or women rebuff them, they feel it is their right or their option to blow their heads off.
Too, too often, media have looked for any cause other than the *real* cause, which is a person acting out extreme forms of violence and control, acting out the twisted messages of entitlement he learned from a culture that encourages violence against women.
If we are to start to solve these sorts of cries, prevent these sorts of crimes, we need to understand them. Media must accurately identify, discuss and hash out the real causes of such violent targeting of women (which, as in Virginia Tech, also spilled over into violence against men, too, once the woman-hating killer started shooting at the woman who he had manufactured a relationship with, he didn’t stop shooting… and men died alongside women in that case). Without accurate media coverage of these crimes, the public will not have the information we need to begin to act responsibly as a culture to potentially prevent such crimes.
August 7th, 2009 10:03
[…] WIMN’s Voices: Once more with feeling: Media Must Report Gender Motivation for Mass Shootings. “So, finally, a gender-based hate crime is being reported (at least by the AP, at least for now) within the context of the killer’s actual anti-woman agenda. It’s an important step forward in media understanding of and coverage of this sort of crime. But if the press’s previous track record is any indicator, Sodini’s misogyny could potentially fall out of the frame of follow-up reporting.” […]
August 7th, 2009 13:02
[…] Once more with feeling: Media Must Report Gender Motivation for Mass Shootings (by @jennpozner) – WIMN’s Voices A fantastic article on media coverage of hate crimes against women. […]
August 7th, 2009 13:28
[…] As I said, I have been struggling with this piece of news for a few days now. I was first told about it by a co-worker who was sure I would have heard about it already. When I finally got onto the internet, I had to dig around a bit to find a brief story. Finally, the feminist blogs I follow had postings. […]
August 7th, 2009 13:58
Jennifer,
I blogged on this, and Dave Cullen’s analysis of the shootings in PA here: http://open.salon.com/blog/fingerlakeswanderer/2009/08/05/men_are_being_raped
August 7th, 2009 19:28
Dear Ms. Viv, I wanted my contribution so much to be an “above the fray”, honest, heart felt conversation - something beyond the finger pointing that is all too common both on the Internet and in real life. I now realize that my idealistic nature got the best of me and your response confirms beyond a doubt that human nature often doesn’t allow for conversation, but sadly, only confrontation.
I will just make a few points here and be gone - much to the appreciation of others like yourself.
1) You are correct in that you don’t have to be nice to anyone. In this scary world where people snap like so many dried twigs in a forest, go ahead, wear a target on your back. I honestly feel for you when the bullets start to fly. But there is an alternative and it is called leading by example and being a force for positive change.
2) I think your bus episode says more about you and your intolerance than it makes your point. The “creep” as you so elegantly labeled him, surely sat “against” you to glow in your overwhelmingly warm aura. In most cultures and by most standards, people that offer a good morning are not considered creepy. That’s called friendliness and it’s becoming a very rare phenomenon because of people like you. I won’t even address the “physical intimidation” issue you spoke of but many people actually enjoy social interaction even though you are well within your rights to be anti-social. But getting off the bus 8 stops early is a hoot… I hope you took that long walk to work on your social skills… repeat after me, “good morning, how are ya?”… “Excuse me sir, but would you mind giving me a bit more room in this seat?”… “oh, thank you very much - the bus is soooo crowded this morning.”… “Hey, I appreciate speaking with you but I really don’t feel like talking today. Maybe another time?” I highly encourage you to try it, accompanied with a warm smile, and perhaps you won’t find the people surrounding you as creeps - but rather different people with different personalities, different sets of challenges, and different skill sets.
3) Don’t like being proposed to in your jammies before sunrise in front of Fido? I get it. But some folks just don’t (guys and gals alike). Don’t take someone’s advances as creepy - take it as a compliment (especially if you look like most do fresh out of bed). Be grateful. Or maybe instead, make it a point to know your neighbors (again, requires some social interaction) so that they know that you are either married, unavailable, a lesbian, or frigid, and clearly not interested in any sexual advances prior to your morning Starbucks or ever for that matter. With that done, all you have to do is worry about the early morning garbage men and yard workers which rarely propose to women walking dogs. This may be a news flash Viv dear, but some people like to “do it” in the morning… hormones and all that, go figure. Some are “nooners” and some like the evening time. In all actuality, this is a more complex problem. If you don’t like men approaching you, change the standards that have been imposed upon us all. You do the approaching in the future - you and all your (assuming) female friends. I assure you, 99.99% of men don’t like always being on the “dog begging for a bone” side of male/female interaction. Most men would trade their left nut to swap places with you - to be the “chooser” instead of the “asker”. You mentioned that you were even nice to this other “creep.” My guess is that your idea of nice is somewhat astray from the center but what do I know, I’m egocentric.
4) Your other solicitation problem is perplexing and you are understandably offended… but again, just be nice. Then write down this dirtbag’s license plate number and report him to the police. Or, don’t be nice, throw a fit, get offended, run your mouth and end up another rape or murder headline in the paper. Darling dearest, all through your life you’ve had to deal with people of lesser and greater intelligence, social skills, and tact. As my example above illustrates, being “not nice” will not fix this and other problems one little bit. But from the sounds of, I’m guessing you’re pretty HOT (wink, wink). Perhaps you need to lighten up just a shade or two.
5) OK, one more. Men calling you like a dog… Don’t think for a second, anyone with a spine and a heart believes these kinds of behaviors are acceptable. As reasoning adults, most of us have some idea of socially acceptable boundaries. But you say, “maybe I’ll start seeing men like those creeps as people when they give me the same respect so many men feel instantly entitled to.” Sounds to me like you already feel some kind of instant entitlement, now doesn’t it? This makes you part of the problem, not part of the solution. Like two little children… “I’ll give him back his toy when she gives me back mine and not a second before.”
Viv, the kind of men you described above (except for maybe the bus rider) are not men. They are socially outcast little boys striving for attention just like an infant does when it has a wet diaper or is hungry. But do you throw the baby out with the bath water? No. Why? Because there is much more to the baby than the dirty bath water it lies in.
Likewise, throwing all men out with the other losers and creeps is counterproductive. Joining the man-hating, feminist camp doesn’t help either. All this further divides the sexes with a vast and growing void between them. By dividing, you give power to the “my camp vs. your camp” phenomenon that makes jerkwaters like the Pennsylvania gunmen go bonkers. Sitting ever so comfortably in your little “camp” empowers you to hold men in contempt as they do you - like little, pissy, whiny Republicans and Democrats (God help us if we ever get that bad). And so long as you’re comfortable in your little corner, your little sphere, you don’t have look inside or make one single change for the better. You can just blame everybody else.
My point is that generalizations and dividing into opposing camps (based on whether they have a penis or perhaps an opposing viewpoint), is just outright stupid and does nothing to remedy the problem. Throughout history there are thousands of examples of “my camp vs. your camp” and nearly all of them end with some kind of tragedy. Many of them still exist today after thousands of years… i.e., the Arabs and Israelis, Protestants and Catholics, Muslims and Christians, Republicans and Democrats, Pro Choice and Pro Life… the list goes on forever.
What happened in the Pennsylvania health spa was an example of extremism - the result of mental illness fueled by two parties unable to understand each other’s motivations and actions. I would never take up for that murderer but I have to wonder what would have happened if he had even one positive interaction with a woman in the days prior to his killing rampage. The fact that no woman stepped up to do that is not their fault - nor their responsibility - but the question still begs to be asked. Would it have changed anything? Could it have prevented this tragedy. I bet even you would have volunteered to interact with him if you knew it would have saved the lives that were lost.
In your eyes, men will always be a$$holes, and more than likely, most men (and perhaps some women too) will tend to see you as an icy, self-centered, feminist, bitch. But it will be this way because of our own choosing and an unwavering inflexibility that screams, “I won’t budge until you come over to my side.” What that leaves us with is one simple solution. Change what we CAN change. Change our selves and hope that our examples rub off on others and become contagious until the gulf between the sexes recedes.
My contrib was designed to bring people together and to impact the only sure part of the world we have influence on - ourselves. It was about nothing more than “people” treating each other nicely and with respect… not about singling women or men out, not about placing blame, or justifying the unjustifiable act of mass murder. I’m sorry that you and possibly others read more into it than that.
But the very fact that you would attack me for an opposing view validates that you are part of the problem - just another piece of the sad, ‘me-centric”, “live in my own little bubble” world. Very few want to look in the mirror because they don’t like what they see or because the problems that need addressing seem too daunting. Instead they just remain content with their own shallow little existence, invalid impressions of themselves, and a stubborn will to “fight all change” unless it’s of their own idea. I don’t know how many examples you need to understand that people, their stubborn egos, and their unflinching will have gotten us into nearly every major problem this world faces and has faced. How many examples do you need until you take a hard look at yourself and decide to forgive those who offend and choose to be a part of the solution instead of another source of fuel for ignition.
Christianity teaches us that the world will end with all kinds of trials and tribulations - a portion of the Bible that I’ve always resisted believing. Yet, as each new astounding disaster (like this murder) reaches our ears and eyes, and responses like yours come in, it proves beyond a doubt that mankind is unable to stop the approaching storm due to our own stubborn will, jaded hearts, and an unwillingness to change and grow.
Peace out good people and apologies to anyone I’ve offended with a call to reflection and change for peace.
August 8th, 2009 00:37
[…] Once more with feeling: Media Must Report Gender Motivation for Mass Shootings (WIMNs Voices) […]
August 15th, 2009 09:16
[…] That’s just one example of how having women at the decision table is important. Is the fact that yet another mass shooting had gender as a focal point important? How are rape stories covered? Are there enough women’s health stories? Is there enough content that is important to women that they even want to read your newspaper? We’re not all looking for fashion and Hollywood gossip. Maybe we’d like to read about our baseball team without having to see strong women athletes treated as pin up girls in the sports pages? […]
August 22nd, 2009 07:16
I read the mans website. There was nothing racist about it. He was saying that black men (brothas) should hook up with white women, hardly a white supremacists philosophy is it. Please try to be more accurate in your reporting next time and less sensationalist.
I agree that this was a hate crime against females though.
September 16th, 2009 20:10
Pity you don’t have a policy on deleting idiocy (netcentral who doesn’t deserve a response, let alone a “nice” one).
Steve, she said in her article that she didn’t go on the person’s website for her own mental health. She also said you were free to pull any relevant quotes from his website and let her know, so that she could change the article. You could have done that.
June 8th, 2010 15:05
[…] This time it was Gerardo Regalado, half-brother of former baseball star Orlando “El Duque” Hernandez, and the crime took place in South Florida. Last year it was George Sodini in Collier County, PA, who opened fire in an all-female aerobics class in an act of misguided revenge for a sexually frustrated existence. Before that, it was Cho Seung-Hui, the mentally unstable stalker of women at Virginia Tech, who ended up being responsible for the worst school shooting in U.S. history. In 2006, it was the school shootings in Amish country and in Colorado’s Platte Canyon. And in 1998, it was the murder of four elementary school girls and their female teacher in Jonesboro, AR. […]