Anyguey Advice For Men: Maybe, Perhaps, Try Not To Shoot A Whole Bunch Of Women

Welcome to Anguey’s Advice For Men, where we will try to tackle some of the common and not-so-common sense things that we, as men, can do to become better, awesomer dudes. Spurred by yesterday’s horrific news, we’ll kick things off with some kooky words of wisdom: how about not shooting a whole bunch of unarmed women just because you can’t get a fucking date, cabron?

In case you haven’t heard, two nights ago a 48-year old man by the name of George Sodini marched into an LA Fitness club in Pittsburgh, turned out the lights on an all-women’s aerobics class, and randomly opened fire. He killed three and injured nine before turning the gun on himself, leaving behind a note instructing people to visit his website where he described his plan in excruciating detail. The website is now down (either crashed or just plain pulled), but the NY Post has helpfully re-posted the entire thing here.

It is a fascinating thing, filled with all kinds of charming racial and religious bigotry, and (of course) a whole bunch of anger at women who won’t touch his dink. But what’s most intriguing is that, unlike what you’d expect, the guy wasn’t crazy. In fact, he seems quite lucid throughout the journal, while still holding a six-figure programming job. He was just pissed off, because he couldn’t get laid. Really, he sums it all up nicely in this section from last December:

I actually look good. I dress good, am clean-shaven, bathe, touch of cologne - yet 30 million women rejected me - over an 18 or 25-year period. That is how I see it. Thirty million is my rough guesstimate of how many desirable single women there are. A man needs a woman for confidence. He gets a boost on the job, career, with other men, and everywhere else when he knows inside he has someone to spend the night with and who is also a friend. This type of life I see is a closed world with me specifically and totally excluded.

And this from the day before the shooting:

Probably 99% of the people who know me well don’t even think I was this crazy. Told by at least 100 girls/women over the years I was a “nice guy”. Not kidding.

Amanda Marcotte has been writing about the “Nice Guy Syndrome” forever, and we’ve had our problems with some aspects of the theory here and there, but this dude just turned into her mascot. Here was a guy who wrote over and over about how not a single one of the 30 million women out there would give him the time of day, in spite of the fact that he’s supposedly this really great guy. His neighbor’s getting laid, people on his chat rooms are getting laid, but he’s stuck here tugging on it. When will the mean ladies come and give him the poon he deserves?

What’s really scary about this guy is that he originally intended to strike in January, but he chickened out (after admitting that doing it while it’s snowing would be disappointing, since the gym would be less crowded.) He was a member of the gym, and wrote excitedly about how good it felt to lift weights and feel strong. But he was always casing the place, cursing the women there who ignored him, and kept refining his plan even as he attended cocktail parties, got a promotion, and even went on a date. To all eyes he probably seemed totally normal, but there’s no way this level of day-to-day misogyny in his journal didn’t spill out into real life. Probably, it was just written off.

So, long story short: dudes out there! You can’t get a date? Try a different approach, try different people, try different friends. Mix it up, let your guard down, have fun. Whatever. And if it doesn’t work out, and this is the important part, TRY NOT TO DEVOLVE INTO A TOTAL PSYCHOPATH OVER IT. Cuz, hey guess what, that doesn’t help your cause. Women can sniff that out. “Oh yeah Mom, I met this guy and he’s really nice and clean shaven and has a great job but I just get this feeling that one day he’s gonna shoot up an aerobics class or something.” They know, man, they know!

There are some idiot dudeblogs out there that are saying that all Sodini needed was to get laid, or increase his game. But that’s not it. Life comes with ups and downs, triumphs and rejections. What happens to a dude like this if that girl breaks up with him, or it’s just a one-night stand, or things do go exactly as he’d hoped for all time? This isn’t about some poor lonely guy or some guy who needed pussy. This is some Super Nice Guy, some guy who felt like the ladies of the universe were required to do him a solid because he was just so great, and he just needed to get over it.

FULL TEXT OF GYM KILLER’S BLOG [NY Post]
These crimes don’t happen in a vacuum [Pandagon]