Yet another mass shooting in the U.S. has left seven dead and the country deeply disturbed by the alleged killer’s motives.
Authorities believe that on Friday, 22-year-old Elliot Rodger stabbed three people in his apartment complex, shot three women — killing two of them — and fatally shot a University of California, Santa Barbara student in a local deli.
Police have strong evidence against Rodgers. According to the Los Angeles Times, he left YouTube videos and a 140-page manifesto detailing his plan to kill his roommates before murdering all members of a sorority, as part of a plan to incite a “war on women.”
This shooting is unique in its extra layer of complexity: Rodgers is not a man who displayed clear signs of mental illness, according to his parents and peers, and he obtained his weapons legally (neither of these, for example, applied to Sandy Hook shooter Adam Lanza). What sets this horrible incident apart from shootings we’ve experienced in previous years is intent. Rodgers voiced an articulate, singular desire: to hurt as many women as possible. It’s the kind of sobering thought that keeps us awake at night — that somewhere, out there, a man wants to kill you simply because of your sex.
And while many women in the U.S. aren’t in immediate danger of being murdered, the UCSB tragedy was a horrifying anomaly. Yet many don’t realize that fear is an everyday part of life as a woman.
Indeed, fear of male violence dictates many parts of women’s lives: who she talks to, where she goes and when, what kinds of pocket-sized weapons she should keep handy at all times, if that man she rejected at the bar will follow her home, if she should confront the stranger on the train who put his hand up her skirt when no one was watching.
The UCSB tragedy and other mass shootings are so terrifying because they remind us that, on some level, we are powerless to protect ourselves from blind hatred. Of course, everyone has the same fear of being hurt — of home invasions, of terrorist attacks, of car hijackers and of other random acts of violence that occur every day.
But women are uniquely impacted by fear of violence from others, and we are constantly reminded of our powerlessness. Cars full of men yelling catcalls make us wonder if they will stop to assault us. Slasher flicks depicting hot girls being carved up make us wonder who is deriving pleasure from these images. Rodger’s YouTube videos make us wonder which quiet boy in the back of the classroom is harboring resentment toward women.
In addition to opening conversations about mental healthcare resources and tighter gun laws, we hope that this fresh tragedy will cause everyone — not just lawmakers — to examine the way women presumably owe men sex. As Margaret Atwood put it, “Men are afraid women will laugh at them. Women are afraid men will kill them.”
[A version of this editorial ran on page 6 on 5/27/2014 under the headline "When can women stop living in fear?"]
