Seven people were needlessly murdered in cold blood over the weekend in what has been dubbed the
Isla Vista shootings in California’s Santa Barbara University.
Their murderer, Elliot Rodger who also shot himself had uploaded a YouTube video and a 140-page manifesto validating the killing spree as a reaction to women not feeling attracted to him.
The chilling video depicts him saying, “For the last eight years of my life, since I hit puberty, I’ve been forced to endure an existence of loneliness, rejection and unfulfilled desires, all because girls have never been attracted to me. Girls gave their affection and sex and love to other men, never to me.”
Rodger, the son of a Hollywood film director, lamented that he would punish women for these transgressions by targeting the ‘hottest sorority house’ at UCSB and ‘slaughtering’ every ‘spoiled, stuck-up, blonde slut [he sees] inside there.’
And so he did, first by stabbing three people in his apartment and then shooting three others near the University before he finally shot himself.
The two women and four men (standing in the way) who were killed were aged 19 to 22 and were students at the school. Thirteen people were wounded, including eight shot by Rodger as he sped through town in his black BMW, exchanging fire with police, authorities said.
The Internet:
An outpouring of grief and anger both on the ground and the internet has since followed the incident with the hashtag #YesAllWomen dominating the Twittersphere. Women and men enraged by the violence expressed their solidarity to one another and their desire for a misogynistic free world.
[Link]
Lebanon and the Middle East joined in on the trending campaign, expressing longstanding views on what it is like to be a woman from this particular region in the world.
Yet, and as we can clearly see, misogyny still reigns as a common and widely accepted rule of conduct among many who still hold Eve accountable for the downfall of humanity. Those who embrace archaic notions of belief close to their hearts (?) have yet to accept that it is not okay to bully a woman into submission, nor are unwelcome sexual advances and the promotion of obscene material validated under any circumstance.
Many have even downplayed the web campaign as ‘armchair activism’ as opposed to a meaningful public response to an uncalled for hate crime. Those in particular have a trending use to their social media accounts synonymous with misogyny,
bullying en-masse, public displays of hatred and a sense of overbearing entitlement to women and what defines them, similar to the thoughts shared by Rodger’s himself.
The internet is a powerful tool of communication. Interaction through the web can be viewed as neural synapses in a large conscious mind. Only unlike cells, we have the choice to choose what we are transmitting onto the larger consciousness that bounds us to one another. Choosing to show empathy en-masse with a heart breaking cause is a step in the right direction to remolding our collective consciousness towards a better reality down the line.
We are all connected and nothing is trivial save for wasted energy and depleted resources personified by those who have come to submit to the notions of a lost cause and a “know it all” creed.
The Law:
Using World Bank and UN data,
The Gaurdian had put together an infographic that specifically depicts the status of women’s rights by law in many countries including Lebanon. Here’s the
link for all those disillusioned, or worse off dependent on a wasta (connections) to save them from the backlash of abuse with the lack of legislation in the country.
In a nutshell, there is no law to specifically address domestic violence, sexual harassment in public spaces and the workplace, nor are there criminal sanctions for such offenses. Women until this day do not have the right to pass down their nationality or the right to abortion even in cases of rape. Speaking of which, rape is still legal in the country! Men have the right to non-consensual sex with their wives or even with single women on the condition that they marry them after the act. Do you now see the ‘power’ women have?
Power is not synonymous with sex, the ability to dress provocatively and hold the position of the nation’s temptress. That is an illusion and a prison of which we are desperately attempting to escape.
Misogyny and the Media:
There is an Elliot Rodger inside each and every one of us, but it’s a matter of taming the monster as opposed to feeding him. Rodger displayed a colossal sense of entitlement (the God complex) in his manifesto, taking it upon himself to punish all women for not reciprocating his feelings.
Bullies alongside misogynists share this pattern of thought, one that unmistakably appears as an attempt to prove self-worth and manhood among other males and peers.
In recent studies, it has been revealed that all but one of the mass murders in the US have been committed by men with most victims being female. Romantic rejection is a common feature in these sorts of incidents and perpetrators target ex-girlfriends or classmates who have refused advances.
In one unfortunate school shooting incident that took place in 1989, Marc Lepine said, "You’re women, you’re going to be engineers. You’re all a bunch of feminists. I hate feminists."
He then killed 14 girls at the Montreal school.
The media is to blame in as much sense over the hypersexualization of our nation, the overbearing display of violence and gender discrimination in terms of granting such incidents the correct angle when it comes to coverage.
Media has so far tackled this story from a viewpoint that depicts the shooter as a victim and a mental health sufferer but not a misogynist. The victims, who were clearly hated based on their gender were not even addressed, but the story instead revolved on the attacker and how the police had done “all they can” to stop him, when clearly they had not.
This scenario clearly mimics the situation in third world countries and specifically reminds me of the recent murders of Roula Yaacoub, Roqaya Mounzer and Manal Assi (et al) whose husbands were notorious for their abusive behavior. The police had failed to intervene here as they did in the Isla Vista incident. Rodger’s mother had pleaded with authorities to check in on her son who had been displaying aggressive material on his social media accounts; however, her warnings were all but heeded.
Today, the University of California at Santa Barbara canceled classes for a day of mourning to honor and remember the victims and think of the future, as a public statement from the school said. I, in turn, invite you to do the same. Let us think of the future we want for our children, our sons and daughters, because thought is the first step to creation. It is time to change our story as human beings in relation to one another. Enough hate, enough misogyny, enough cowardice. Enough!
And just in case you have not had enough, here’s hoping you’ll one day face a situation similar to the story above.
Nadine Mazloum is currently a freelance editor and news producer. She received her Honors in Communication Arts (Media Production) from The University of Western Sydney in 2008.