I didn’t know what
to think when I read that Rodger’s violence against women wasn’t really about
women at all. Don’t get me wrong, toxic masculinity is a problem that feeds
into misogyny. And I find it really uncomfortable to remove women from the
conversation all together. This is kind of like those movements to stop
violence against women by focusing on men and then lets men lead the movement
resulting in women being objectified through silencing.
Dexter Thomas. Jr. has
an opinion piece for Al
Jazeera on Rodger and Japanese pop music. Thomas draws comparisons between
a violent assault against Japanese pop singers and the Rodger’s attack. Both
are disturbing. Both put the emphasis on women for “doing this to men.” Thomas
rightly notes that in the US the conversation immediately becomes about gun
control and mental health.
Then Thomas takes
this turn toward, well Rodger’s cared about men not women. Well, yeah. In the
patriarchy and a misogynist society everything is about men and the
perspectives of men. Women are always objects, dehumanized, and irrelevant to
the narrative. That doesn’t mean women aren’t important; that means women aren’t
important to people who want to keep the status quo.
Rodger’s is completely
wrapped up in white US masculinity. He doesn’t care about men of color either,
but they should be included in the conversation too. See we can’t leave the
white guys alone to handle the problems in their house…we also can’t use their
tool because things will remain the same. For every individual dude who has a
problem with men treating people this way we have many more who give exactly
zero fucks about it.
I agree with Thomas
that Rodger’s was consumed by not being white and what that means for his
masculinity, but to say “To him [Rodger], his failure to seduce a white woman
was embarrassing proof of his inferiority to his white peers. Elliot’s main
problem was that he was not white.”
Nope, Rodger’s main
problem was he sees women and people of color as subhuman there for him to use
and judge as he will. Thomas goes on to say that Rodger’s entitlement to women’s
bodies is second to his self-loathing due to his biracial heritage. Um maybe?
But he did target women for violence. He didn’t do to the black student union
to shoot people. It would have been horrible if he did, and Rodger’s was a
racist, but he targeted women for violence.
Thomas then
connects Rodger’s rants to that white privilege article from a few weeks ago…where
the guy won’t check his white privilege because he will no long be oppressed by
people of color.
This whole
conversation makes me think of the race and gender conversations during the
civil rights movement. Are you a person of color or are you a woman? It is an
unfair dichotomy because you are no more your race than you are your gender or sexuality
or any other part of your identity. Rodger’s racism and misogyny are linked;
you cannot separate them out and we shouldn’t try. Instead, we should once
again bring the discussion back to what is it about white masculinity in the US
that permeates our culture with violence and hate towards people of color and
woman. We know these men feel threated by the leveling of the metaphorical playing
field. But I’m offended by the suggestion that we should erase women from the
discussion because obviously Rodger’s is a racist. Because maybe, just maybe,
we shouldn’t continue to make everything men focused.
