Two female students at Virginia Polytechnic Institute complained to authorities about the behavior of Cho Seung-Hui, the killer in the shooting rampage there, when he contacted them in separate incidents in 2005. Police questioned Mr. Cho and he was sent to a mental health facility, but no charges were filed against him. […]
Also in 2005, Lucinda Roy, an English professor, shared her concerns about Mr. Cho with the Virginia Tech police, but no official report was filed. The writings did not express threatening intentions, or allude to criminal activity, the police said today.
In the incidents involving the female students, the police said that in late November 2005, Mr. Cho contacted a fellow female student, by phone and in person, and she notified the campus police. She later declined to press charges, but officers spoke with Mr. Cho, who was referred to the University’s disciplinary system.
On December 12, 2005, a second female student complained to the police about an instant message Mr. Cho sent to her by computer. The police then spoke with Mr. Cho and asked him to have no further contact with the student. The police said the message was not threatening, and the student characterized it as “annoying.” […]
Neither of the female students who complained about Mr. Cho were among the shooting victims, and the police said they did not know if they were in the vicinity of the shootings. […]
Federal investigators said Mr. Cho — a South Korean immigrant who Americanized his name and preferred to be known as Seung Cho — left behind a note that they described as a lengthy, rambling and bitter list of complaints focusing on moral laxity and double-dealing he found among what he viewed as wealthier and more privileged students on campus.
It’s too early to know for sure, but it’s my guess that Seung Cho was not just an asshole but a misogynistic asshole.1
Everyone’s noticed that these kinds of mass shootings are exclusively perpetrated by men? Just like rapists are almost exclusively male. I don’t think the parallel is a coincidence; I think both kinds of attacks are usually rooted in strong feelings of male entitlement, and in strong fears of failing to be a man. Whether or not that’s true of Seung Cho remains to be seen, admittedly.
- As Myca said in comments, “What do you want to bet this guy was a misogynist twit?” I have to admit, though, that I was also expecting that he’d be white, and I was mistaken about that. [↩]
How about a highly maladjusted mentally ill individual who was clearly decompensating over the last two years?
He doesn’t have my sympathy, exactly, I’ve spent the last three days waiting for lists of the dead to figure out whether any of the four people I know who are currently at VT were injured or killed, but still, this is a guy whose general background does not portend his eventual demise.
I have problems viewing this through the lens of misogyny, especially given that both his female and male classmates reportedly felt threatened by his actions (continually taking cellphone pictures of them) and demeanor (showing up in class with sunglasses and refusing to address anyone in the class even when directly spoken to). His problems were way deeper than misogyny, and he didn’t apparently target women when he was picking out victims.
The dilemma here doesn’t have to do with male on female violence, in my opinion, it has to do with how “inchoate” threats to others are defined and acted upon by society. Whether and to what extent we actually provide treatment to the mentally ill figures in that debate.
Seriously, as a white guy, I think that in general both of those assumptions are generally justified, and that scares the ever-living shit out of me.
—Myca
“It’s too early to know for sure, but it’s my guess that Seung Cho was not just an asshole but a misogynistic asshole.1”
It is more likely that he was severely mentally ill, and while this does not excuse his behavior or cause me to feel sympathy for him, to minimize the severity of mental illness and how society deals with/or fails to deal with the mentally ill, by dismissing this individual as a “mysoginist asshole” is completely irresponsible…..and trivializes the very serious issue of mental illness.
One response I had to this event was that men who commit such crimes invariably have a history which involves disappointment with women and that their experience of disappointment is usually based on misogynistic thinking.
Spicy, and so it might turn out that fits Cho to a tee. But so far, the picture is very incomplete — his note apparently did not focus on women or failed relationships, but railed against rich people and religion, which, in fairness, this blog also rails against to one degree or another from time to time. His roommates stated that he had an imaginary girlfriend and talked to himself about her constantly. This was a very disturbed individual.
I have to agree that from what has come out so far, this case seems to be primarily about mental illness rather than misogyny. I know someone who is petrified that a relative of hers will someday hurt someone; this person’s family has explored every avenue they can think of to get them help and/or lock them up before this happens, to no avail. As long as there are no direct and specific threats made against specific people and no illegal acts, nothing can be done unless the individual seeks it — and evaluations are so short and cursory as to be easily gamable. And mental-health treatment and resources in this country are pathetic for most people (that is people without a lot of money).
I would certainly agree that violent men are most often misogynistic and will often blame any and all women for their troubles, but that doesn’t seem to be the primary motivation here.
Just to clarify, it does appear that the photographs were being taken only of female students, and to boot “under the desk.” Ick. He was still clearly deranged.
Well, what it is indisputably about is male violence.
A few months ago two female hikers were shot to death in an area where my co-worker often hikes (left-leaning libertarian, ex-biker, ex-druggie, computer programmer), and my co-wroker told me about it and went on this long rant about “Have you noticed how when this sort of thing happens it is always ‘some guy’ who is the murderer” ending with talking about how sometimes he felt like he should cut his balls off. It was totally unexpected and absolutely beautiful.
Mentally ill women somehow manage to not decide to shoot up their school or their work place (although they do sometimes decide to kill their children).
Ignoring the mental illness, and trivializing Mr. Cho as “a misogynist asshole” is as inappropriate as calling Andrea Yates a “child hating c*nt.”
Mental illness takes many forms, and if, in the case of so many men, it takes the form of homicidal rages . . . and too often, homicidal rages specifically at women, it seem to me that it’s worth examining that.
However, there are also serious problems with treating his mental illness as though it were the cause of this. People with serious mental illnesses are no more likely to commit violence than people without serious mental illnesses.
I tend to agree with Charles and Myca. Mental illness is not soley male, but this kind of reaction is. However, I wouldn’t focus on the misogyny as much as how intimately violence and masculnity have been connected.
Based on some of the killer’s statements, I’m also wondering if he was sexually abused in the past. It’s just speculation, but perhaps we will find out more later.
I’m also amazed at how many warning signs there were about his violent tendencies, and it seems that several of the people who noticed his problems were women–Two female professors, two female students, and perhaps others we haven’t heard about.
Money doesn’t help. I’ve know very wealthy families with exactly the same problem. The bottom line is, you either get the sick person to cooperate with treatment (and good luck with that, the sicker they are the less likely they are to cooperate) or you wait until they break the law.
For a mentally ill individual to be committed against their will in this country is nearly impossible – until they hurt someone.
This morning on the radio, the Talky Radio Guy was talking about the VT massacre, and was discussing the lack of mental health aid available to most people. His take was that we need to start addressing mental illness the same way we address heart disease . . . look at root causes and risk factors. Lower your cholesterol, if you need to, that kind of thing.
I think that that’s the link I may see between misogyny and mental illness in men. It’s not that one leads inevitably to the other, but it’s certainly a risk factor, and if you’re mentally ill and misogynist, I think the odds are that you’re more likely to become violent than someone who’s just mentally ill.
—Myca
Myca, I am trying to understand where you are coming from but I admit that your perspective strikes me as tail wagging the dog territory.
As the sister and daughter of some seriously mentally ill people, I can tell you that mental illness magnifies what for many people are ordinary obsessions or problems. A typically taxaphobic person might rail against the government and complain loudly about unnecessary government expenditures, and so on, but if that same person becomes seriously paranoid or delusional he might, for instance, build a bunker in his backyard and live there forever, or he might even hitchhike to Washington D.C. and blow away some of the security guards at the entrance to the Capitol (yes, that’s a true case). And take an example from my own family, which I thought of because it appears to be parallel to something that Cho did: she had an “imaginary” boyfriend — I think the man was real but her relationship was imagined, and she talked about him all the time and I won’t go into how, just that it was seriously delusional in ways that you probably can’t even imagine (I couldn’t and that’s why when she told me I knew immediately that she was mentally ill).
So I agree completely that a misogynist person who is mentally ill will carry around particularly illogical and extreme versions of his basic personality, and might be unable to control them in ways that he could were he not mentally ill. All true. And eradicating misogyny is a worthy goal in its own right. But misogyny doesn’t CAUSE mental illness. It’s possible that those misogyny is a symptom of paranoia or other features of psychosis, but it still isn’t the cause. You could talk to a psychotic person for an entire lifetime and try to reason him out of his misogynistic views and you would get nowhere.
In truth, the research on mental illness and treatment for illness is caught up in such a vortex of competing interests that I have long stopped expecting any improvement. People who are “sort of” disturbed seek treatment, in some cases, too much treatment given the benign nature of the underlying pathology. People who are seriously disturbed must be coaxed and cajoled into treatment, often refuse, and even if they accept resist treatment or the implications of their diagnosis. And the treatment is often about as effective as hitting them over the head with a sledgehammer, with similar side effects.
Exactly. So to the extent that our society fosters a “women are to blame for everything” meme, mentally ill men will tend to be misogynist, even more so if they come from a misogynistic background, and to the extent that society equates masculinity with violence, mentally ill men who fear they’re not masculine enough will tend to be violent.
Misogyny isn’t peculiar to mental illness, though, it just can be a handy hook (like taxaphobia, or UFOs, or a particular celebrity) for a mentally ill person to latch onto.
I would also note that the vast, vast majority of mentally ill people of both sexes are not violent, or at least don’t direct violence outward. I also have a relative who has lived for many years with mental illness; we have never worried that this person will harm other people. There’s also a difference between mental illness and personality disorder (although the same person can have both); mental illness can be treatable, but personality disorders are not.
To the extent it wasn’t clear, I am totally in favor of addressing misogyny in our culture, but it just bears repeating that a mentally ill person who is not misogynist will most likely find another target for his or her paranoia, and will still be in need of treatment. Likewise, if we tried to instill a more positive view of government we also wouldn’t have so many crazies arming themselves and provoking showdowns with the FBI. We would still end up with John Hinckley and the woman who targeted David Letterman — and ultimately threw herself under a train. That’s why I resist clumping the two together.
Brenda Spencer, Laurie Dann, and Jillian Robbins would suggest that this type of violence is not perpetrated exclusively by men.
Exclusively is an absolute word. Not exclusively, but predominantly. Women are more likely to direct their violence inward at themselves or outward at their children. Women also fail more than men in their suicide attempts because they don’t tend to use the “overwhelming force” that men do (i.e., guns). Women are also less likely to “get attention” by use of force, think John Hinckley, and more likely to do so by non-violent means, think David Letterman’s stalker.
Absolutely, and I also think it’s worth thinking about how masculinity and gun fetishism intersect.
I mean, I favor gun control, but even for those who don’t, hopefully we can agree that some crazy misogynist dude going on a rampage with a switchblade just isn’t going to get as far.
As Barbara pointed out, this is also probably part of why so many more male suicide attempts are likely successful.
bean, I don’t know whether this is wholly or partly attributable to mental illness. But his thought patterns seem so bizarre and obsessive, they are probably magnified if not caused by mental illness. But moral and legal responsibiliity for one’s actions are not necessarily extinguished because one’s actions were prompted or influenced by mental illness. I have a horrific example in mind of someone I know who was clearly disturbed and ill but who knew what he was doing and knew it was wrong and is in prison because of it, even though, had he not been mentally ill, it is unlikely he ever would have done it. Mental illness might be a cause or contributing factor but that doesn’t make it an all-purpose excuse, much as childhood abuse is not an all-purpose excuse for adult criminality even if it clearly led to the criminality, as with child sexual abuse. Anyway, this is one of the most difficult areas of the criminal justice system, gauging the culpability of the mentally ill.
I’m not assuming any such thing. There is a tension that often arises when someone goes completely off the rails and engages in particularly senseless and random violence, that is, against people he doesn’t even know and who could not possibly have done anything that could even be perceived as a slight or injury to the perpetrator. One wants to say: he must have been crazy! In other words, he must have been “other” or so outside the norm that I don’t have to rearrange my world view to account for the actions of people like him. And you’re saying, I think, anyway, that no, while he might be extreme, he’s swinging out there on the same pendulum as you, me and more importantly, every other man in the world — he just went particularly far and wide of the normal arc.
The difficulty I’m having with your analysis is that Cho didn’t seem to be targeting women. I do agree that seeing violence as some kind of solution or appropriate response to his complaints (and I had the same question as Rachel about potential child sexual abuse) is in keeping with our view that violence can solve all kinds of problems instead of just really creating a lot of new ones. Now I would agree in that sense he was on the extreme fringes of what we often view as normal behavior.
Charles wrote:
A presumably harmless person sometimes feels like he should mutilate himself because other people categorized with him commit atrocities? What’s beautiful about that?
Nancy, I may be mistaken, but I think you’re taking the statement more literally than Charles’ co-worker intended it to be taken.
Yes, I don’t think he is a risk to himself or others.
Also, “other people categorized with him” is a radically inadequate description of the system of gender. The socialization that leads men to commit crimes of senseless violence against strangers is the socialization of men, not the socialization of some weirdos who happen to sometimes be categorized with me as men. Men are socialized in this manner. My co-worker’s comment about wanting to cut his balls off was an acknowledgment that the ways that all men are socialized is what creates men who commit atrocities. This is a more feminist and more conscious awareness of this than I see in most men, so it was beautiful to see it in a man in his mid-fifties (I tend to see feminist awareness in men as something that has improved greatly if totally inadequately over the past 30+ years, and as something that doesn’t seem to improve hugely with age, which may just be my biases, but is why it was particularly unexpected for a man in his fifties).
Yet another example of Alas as a teaching tool. I had always understood that sociopaths were born that way and stayed that way. What is DBT?
As for the male tendency toward violence, I’m not sure how much is nature, testosterone poisoning as my dad calls it, and how much nurture (socialization, patriarchy). There’s definitely an unhealthy synergy there. I’m also not sure to what extent misogyny is entangled with that. Take John Wayne Gacy, for example: all (AFAIK) of his victims were male. Likewise Jeffrey Dahmer.
[OT interjection]
“DBT is Dialectical Behavior Therapy”
It works on personality disorders? That is some seriously cool shit. (didn’t check out link yet, but will!)
[/OT interjection]
Most murderous violence is related to gender (masculinity, misogyny and homophobia):
It seems in the case with the Virgina Tech killer that there would be more of a look at Schizoid personality disorder as a possible cause rather than antisocial personality disorder. A lot of the traits that they know now that he exhibited are symptomatic of the former disorder, which can produce psychotic behavior in its extreme. The lack of expression down to his monotone voice on his video tapes, the lack of social interaction or appearance of external interest in social interaction. Because most schizoid personality order individuals shun treatment, it’s not yet known whether or not there’s an internal desire for social interaction but an inability to do so with other people, or if there’s simply no desire for social interaction. I would guess in his case, it was the former.
OTOH, Cho lacked the qualities found in antisocial personality disorder including impulsive acts and contacts with police(outside those more associated with other personality disorders and/or mental illness). The fire setting if that took place may or may not be a behavior found in sociopaths(as they used to be called) and is often more familiarly known as part of a triad of behaviors known as the pet/set/wet triad that’s most commonly associated in the media with serial killers.
Or you can have different personality disorders involved. Two that are often found together are narcissism personality disorder and antisocial personality disorder including in serial killers.
Like bean said, personality disorders may have genetic predispositions. Sometimes parents have them but even with that, it’s not easy to clarify whether that ties in with genes, environment or both. The earlier years are often the root period of development and they often intensify or peak in adolescence or young adulthood although they are all considered chronic conditions.
A lot of them are extensions or exaggerations of behavior that might not be abnormal in lessor amounts. An occupatonal hazard of psychology students is to read the symptomology of personality disorders which are divided into different axii categories(four based on two factors if memory serves me or a box with four squares) and think that they have three or four of them, because there’s not much explanation in often bare-boned explanations of these disorders to emphasize how severe they can be manifested. There’s still much that is unknown about them or how to treat them. It’s different for different disorders and it’s partially dependent on age of individual, stage of progreession of disorder(s) and which disorder it is(i.e. antisocial personality disorder is one of the toughest but it tends to wane a bit in terms of external behavior with age).
It doesn’t absolve or totally explain what he does, but if personality disorders are involved, then it’s one tragic reason why further research needs to be done, in order to recognize them and to do intervention when and in ways that might stem off the fairly rare but serious violent behavior. That was tried in Cho’s case to the best of the abilities of those who took that on, especially the creative writing instructors but what was going on with him had been going on for years by the time he was at university and it was beyond their ability to help him.
I read his writings and his social maturity was somewhat younger than being a college senior. He appeared in his writing to be operating at an adolescent level and dealing with issues in his writing that strongly impact that age group. It was very disturbing how he expressed himself, especially using violent pornographic imagery, but in one of his stories, there was the typical step child fantasy of a parent being killed and replaced by the evil step parent. The mother in that story appeared weak and at the same time he treated her with contempt, he wrote her in a way where she sided with him against the stepfather, when in real life, maybe she took a different position when he had conflict with his father/step father or authority figures. His other story is another violently pornographic fantasy of killing a male authority figure in this case a teacher who he viewed as stealing something that belonged to him. Authors like Lois Duncan who writes young adult fiction have written books, i.e. Killing Mr. Griffen on a similar theme(though far different in style and tone than his).
It’s the way he expresses his fantasies, rather than the themes of them(which are not unusual in teenagers) that’s disturbing and that this was the only writing he seemed to be interested in. Abuse including sexual was a theme but it’s not indicative by itself of abuse in his childhood. It’s complicated in this case because it seemed that part of what he wrote in his fiction was intended to shock people.
He harassed women through the internet, probably to a greater extent than they are aware of but it would be difficult to determine to what extent given that it’s largely an anonymous medium.
Thank god a man said it. [/sarcasm]
Oh, of course!
And isn’t it interesting how this comment hasn’t generated any discussion here?
Which comment do you mean by “this comment” – #36 or #37?
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Radfem,
That’s a really cool analysis.
The last time I heard anyone say that personality disorders had a genetic component, it was a Republican who was trying to convince me that it was a good reason for why the government shouldn’t be in the business of trying to fund welfare or other social programs (because it doesn’t matter how kids are raised; it’s all in the genes).
So, I’m just curious because I was taught the opposite in psych classes. Where does the genetic component research come from? Is it newish?
As to “misogyny v. mental illness,” (per the brief snippet of Muttering in a Corner’s trackback) I’m not sure I’m reading anyone saying that mental illness had nothing to do with it. Seems to me this is a lovely both/and situation.
I’ve read more recently that there’s some research suggesting some genetic connection for the personality disorders. When I was in university doing the psych part of my degree, the jury was still out. Particularly when covering areas in classes including mass murder and serial killers and connections with mental illness, genetic componants and personality disorders.
Sometimes children have the same personality disorders their parents have but how do you attribute it to what is called “nature vs nurture”?
If you have a parent(s) who has antisocial personality disorder and they rear you, will you be more or less likely to also have that disorder and if so, how? From a genetic componant, from being reared by someone with that disorder(which most likely will have some affect on how your personality is shaped) or both?
Interestingly enough, I think antisocial personality disorder, narcissist personality disorder and borderline personality disorder were the three that came up as having the strongest ties to a genetic componant in some articles I read.
But even so, is a genetic componant if it exists a cause? Or is it a contributing factor? If it’s the latter, under what conditions? I would think that socialization beginning at birth is the strongest causal factor. In the definitions of contributing factors for different personality disorders, there’s lists of “risk factors” which are separate for each one.
With Cho, the two that come to mind are schizoid personality disorder and narcissist personality disorder(especially in terms of him blaming everyone for his actions which he clearly did in his note and videos as well as the martyr Christ-like way he viewed himself). It’s hard to say, because his contact with mental health professionals was limited, forced and most of all, confidential.
But based on the limited information about his background especially his childhood(which is very important because while most personality disorders peak during adolescence, they begin earlier), he was showing problems and his relatives particularly those in South Korea couldn’t seem to recall a time that he wasn’t having problems.
OTOH, there is a strong misogynist bent and violent sexual content in his writing too, writing that clearly set off alarm bells not only in his instructors but other students. And there’s documentation that this was going on before the shootings by these individuals, most of whom were women, and not just thinking they should have done something after the fact. He’s got quite a paper trail too. It’s too bad that the guy at the pawn shop and the guy at the gun shop didn’t have access to it.
He stalked women, photographed women and had an imaginary highly idealistic “model” type girlfriend whom he talked to. His first victim was a woman and experts have said in some cases of these types of shootings that the first victim often has some significance in some way.
He also shot 4-5 male and female teachers and none of them survived. At least two died trying to protect students, others appeared to be the first killed in a particular room, but if you read one of his short plays, it was about plotting to kill a teacher who his main character perceived as having taken something from him that was rightfully his. Some of the people who tried to intervene with him earlier were teachers. But by the time he got to university, it was probably way too late.
Another thing that’s noticible is that at some point, the complaints against him stopped. There were fewer or no reportable incidents. I think that if you trace back to when this began to occur, it’s probably when he began planning his final actions because doing so would have consumed all his time and energy. The news stories mentioned that his hours of sleep changed and he was changing his hair and clothing style and adopting a fitness routine for example.
What these Republicans are doing as I’m sure you know is simplifying a complex series of personality disorders to further their own political agendas. It’s self-serving and it definitely doesn’t help those who have the disorders, their families and in some cases, their victims. I think it’s odious that they do this but hardly surprising.
What’s bothering me is the investigation’s obsession with Emily Hilscher and Cho. The media is playing up Yellow Peril stereotypes to keep white women away from Asian men. This is evident in videos like VTech shooter stalked campus women and Probe continues into Va. tech shooter. His roommate already guessed Cho was schizophrenic and a stalkee believed he was psychotic:
Koch: do u want to know who spankyjelly is
Koch: he is seung ho something
Female student: yeah i knwo who he is
Koch: he is a creep i would block him just doing u a favor
Female student: ahahha yeah
Koch: well i would block him he got in trouble forr stalking recently so i just wanted to warn you
Female student: yeah..hes called me…written on my door…all of that
Female student: kinda freaky
Koch: written on your door? like your room
Female student: yeah
Female student: the funny thing bout that…
Female student: is im unlisted…like everywhere
Female student: SO he had to do some investigations or something…into my roommate and what not
Koch: the ra’s are trying to do something about him
Female student: yikes
Female student: at first i thought he was one of my friends joking around…and i only accepted him cuz i saw a few of my friends were friends with him
Female student : then he turned out all psycho
Koch: i think he is is schophrenic or however you spell it
Dangerous or savage stereotypes about men of color are meant to keep white women away from men of color.
Amp: actually, I was referring to 36, but I guess you could include 37.
Having written what I did, though, I later realised that most people’s energies were being concentrated elsewhere.
*nod*
I think Mandolin has this spot on.
What I would add, I guess, is that I’m not sure the division between extreme misogyny and mental illness is all that clear cut. Misogyny (like racism) is an irrational hatred or fear, and if you’re embracing an essentially irrational thing to that degree, I think at some point it’s the same thing.
I mean, if you think the government is monitoring your thoughts through your fillings, you’re crazy, but somehow if you think the feminists are keeping you from having the sex, you’re not?
—Myca
Also, just as a followup, I think the both of these belief structures are essentially crazy, and the fact that one is taken seriously while the other is soundly derided indicates a lot about how our culture thinks about feminist ideas.
—Myca