This is, for the most part, unrelated to this essay but it keeps coming up in my life. A lot of people in my town have been dosed at bars recently. Mostly women but sometimes men. The suspected perpetrator has always been a man. It's impossible to know if the Men's Rights movement has had any role in these attacks but the hearts of the people who are doing these acts have to be just as black.
None of the victims that I know of have been raped but I'm sure it's happening all the time. The victims have no knowledge that they have been drugged and usually proceed with their evening in a bizarre and dangerous fashion, afterwards having no recollection of what transpired.
As soon as the the drugged person is approached by friends or things get a little dicey the poisoner just cuts them loose and walks away.
Two women I know got in accidents on their bicycles after being dosed, both were hospitalized and one had to have major facial reconstruction.
Other people have gotten behind the wheel of their car and driven all over town. They eaisly could have killed themselves or someone else.
Another guy I know well got beaten up, later menaced his girl friend, ended up in the psyche ward for a few days and lost his job. Nice guy, his actions were totally out of character. A guy offered him some drugs at a bar, he declined, next thing he remembers the guy was caressing his face, he remembers scuffling with the guy. Later he remembers attacking a good friend of his and some kind of scuffle. He remembers getting in a fight with someone else and ending up flat on his back in the middle of a busy street bleeding. He went home menaced his girlfriend with a kitchen knife when she tried to help him.
We haven't had a poisoning that we know about at our bar but two women have entered our bar who were obviously in mental distress. They later reported that they believe they were poisoned. One we knew and were able to get her family to come and assist her the other one was passed of to first responders.
Everyone who is victim of these attacks seems to experience several weeks of harsh depression, most sustain injuries during their experience.
The anonymity and casual predation of these incidents make them pretty terrifying. Dealing with someone who you think has been dosed is hard, they don't understand what's happening to them, they don't make good decisions and generally aren't appreciative of efforts to guard their well being. The after effects of major depression, the confusion of having no recollection of what has transpired and often dealing with the consequences of ones behavior (legal, estrangement from friends and family who you did strange things to just walking into your local bar and being told to get the fuck out an never come back) are all pretty horrible. These are the people who haven't been raped, given a communicable sexual disease, or what ever horrible shit these fucking horrible people where going to do them. The worst case scenario is obviously much darker.
I find it terrifying.
Grassrootss awareness campaign. If you got picked up by the police It's a night in jail and a dui or an evening in the drunk tank with no investigation. I'd say it's an endemic problem that is hard to really do much about. Long history of people getting shanghid into the merchant fleets going back to the dawn of Portlands history, you can take a tour and see the cells the head hunters used to put their victems in under some of the older parts of town.
You keep an eye on creepers and 86 them for good when you get a chance (creeper is a prety generic term for people ranging from seeming malevolence to plain annoying). You pull people's drinks if they are left unattended, and Call the authorities when someone goes from sober to smashed in one drink or get their friends to take them home.
One of my friends has been dosed before, but at a party. He was drinking, somebody offered him a drink at the "bar" (where everyone was drinking) of the house, and the next thing he knows he's halfway across campus as his friends are basically carrying him. That experience jarred him, and I can see why. It's fucked up, and the people that prey on people at bars and parties are despicable human beings.
As much as I'd like to dump the blame on this catastrophe on his clear association with red pill/men's rights concepts, this guy obviously had a host of mental issues and imbalances. Ignoring that while blaming it all on his ideology is willful ignorance. There's going to be a lot of talk about how the men's rights movement factors into this, but I think it's unlikely it was really the source of the problem rather than a channel for it. Hopefully though, people associated with the movement (and particularly anyone subscribing to red pill ideas), will step back and really evaluate their views. Maybe some people will come to their senses upon realizing how much of that worldview stems from sheer hate.
For the record, I am not an adherent of the red pill/ men's rights association, but perhaps those movements are a counterreaction to certain feminist groups?Maybe some people will come to their senses upon realizing how much of that worldview stems from sheer hate.
It definitely is, but if you look around these movements (Red Pill in particular, "men's rights" is such an amalgam of things it's harder to generalize) you'll see that they borrow heavily from plain misogyny to fuel themselves. The Red Pill is an odd creature. Half of it is centralized around this alpha/beta doctrine which they take stupid seriously, and in that essence it's a sort of self-help cult. The other half is the antithesis of self-help: just blaming women for your sexual frustration. It's saying women are at fault for this ridiculous alpha/beta thing that you're totally gonna embrace, but yeah, it's all women's fault.
I have no idea what issues this man was dealing with but from the videos he was clearly a narcissist of breathtaking proportions. I think it's interesting to note that on the outside Rodgers seemed to have everything going for him. Good looks, BMW, wealthy hotshot producer father. His personality must have been horribly poisonous if he couldn't find a girl. I get that he felt lonely and slighted but his reasoning is faulty. I was a late bloomer. Girls have and will constantly confuse and intimidate me but I accept that we, man and woman, are really looking for the same things in a relationship. Instead of blaming an entire gender for shunning you perhaps step outside yourself and try to look through their eyes. After many lonely years I was lucky enough to find a girl that could stand me and I've learned more about myself (good and bad) then I ever would have just stewing in my own self-righteousness. The "nice guy" paradox is just an excuse. Companionship is a living, breathing thing. Not just a mountain to climb and conquer but like a flower that needs constant water and sunshine to flourish. I'm ranting. This guy sickens me with his ego and his selfishness. Troubled? Perhaps. Are aspergers sufferers inherently violent? We've seen too many unbalanced individuals in the news lately but Rodgers was a real chameleon. How many more "men" are there like that out there? Scary to think about.
Just dropping this here. I found it enlightening.
Just a couple weeks ago I was trying to explain r/theredpill to someone and get across how fucked up and potentially dangerous it is. It was only a matter of time. As much as the internet creates amazing communities for those from all walks of life and allows us to connect with those we would never otherwise connect with, I sometimes believe it would be better if disenchanted youth didn't have a forum of likeminded individuals to hive-mind and echo-chamber with.
this is a decent overview of why trigger warnings exist: On warnings, boundaries, & not being a jerk
You shouldn't be on the internet if you're afraid to get offended. The only people who adher to the usage of trigger warnings are American feminists, who think that everyone should adapt to them, simply because they are offended by something.