This is another great example of how misogyny hurts men too! I wish more men understood this- the same toxic masculinity that is oppressing women is also making their lives worse in some ways (though not as much, of course). But by training men not to engage with their feelings in responsible ways, well, all sorts of terrible things happen instead. Feminism is making the world a better place for everyone, not just women.
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I do think that’s part of it. There’s a large number of classic flavor serial killers that were closeted homosexuals or bisexuals. And they do seem to be more common the further back in history you go.
It seems to be part and parcel of the male entitlement runner that’s so common with these guys. Where that’s not accepted, considered disqualifying and emasculating it seems to become part of the system of grievances, self hate and justifications these people build up.
It’s obviously not causative, especially not on it’s own. And there’s no evidence LGBTQ folks are any more likely to go down this path (quite the opposite much more likely to be victims). But it does seem to slot into the socialization end of what triggers this. Almost always with a history of abuse along some really weird, really specific sexual and gender lines.
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Accidental death in children also seems to have had a precipitous decline so maybe also frontal lobe injuries.
I believe I was making the point you are making, albeit without doing the judging for the reader. I advocate for showing and not telling, but say what you need to say.
Apparently my Swiftian tone could use some work.
I think there’s another connection too. A lot of serial killers have the death of a sibling in their past. Along with a really weird, and abusive reaction from parents. Although some of them seem to have been responsible for that death either accidentally, or in a few cases deliberately.
The going theory on what makes a person a serial killer is a mix of nurture and nature.
You get some specific sorts of neurological differences and developmental delays. Especially the head injuries and specific mental illnesses that are probably genetic. Especially sociopathy, narcissistic personality disorder and borderline personality disorder.
If that person is subjected to an abusive or violent up bringing. Specific kinds of socialization especially around their own importance, sex, gender, often enough race. Violence (especially violence linked to sex) and intense social pressures.
Then you’ve got the preconditions. You sprinkle that liberally with personal failures and inadequacies and a lack of a social safety net, support system and a few intense triggering events or unchecked opportunities for escalation. And you got a serial killer.
So probably just about everything everyone is mentioning here is probably a factor.
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- How can you kill more people than our lame duck president?
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There are very much some MRAs who are murders, more spree killers. However, their ideology isn’t caused by that. It’s caused by their own embracing of poisonous ideologies. That’s it. Full stop.
We all suffer and most of us don’t embrace such harmful world views to make ourselves feel better.
Both what @the_borderer said and…
This.
Especially this. And it’s true of anti-racism as well.
There was a woman on NPR a while back (I can’t seem to find it tho), talking specifically about how if you improve the lives of working class Black women, we all benefit. And I can see not a single flaw in her logic.
Others suffer when people who are hurt decide to become bullies themselves. The fact that they suffered doesn’t get them off the hook. Again, many of us suffered and did not end up embracing caustic world views.
It is rather hard to hear a tone in text… 
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These go together.
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The part about personal failures and inadequacies too.
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I was trying to tie misogyny to predatory violence, and sought to explain the diminishing popularity of serial killing by connecting it to the expanding popularity of misogynist support groups, where the free written expression of violent hostility provides an illusion of being understood, dulling some of the impulse to find actual people to harm and terrorize. I thought the snotty remark about free porn was equal parts germane and gestural, seeking to characterize the violent impulse in a less heroic way than experienced by the incel. I’m sorry I didn’t get across from the start here we are decrying the same sociopathic things.
S
| Mindysan33
18 December |
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There are very much some MRAs who are murders, more spree killers. However, their ideology isn’t caused by that. It’s caused by their own embracing of poisonous ideologies. That’s it. Full stop.
We all suffer and most of us don’t embrace such harmful world views to make ourselves feel better.
Both what @the_borderer said and…
VeronicaConnor:
This is another great example of how misogyny hurts men too!
This.
Feminism is making the world a better place for everyone, not just women.
Especially this. And it’s true of anti-racism as well.
There was a woman on NPR a while back (I can’t seem to find it tho), talking specifically about how if you improve the lives of working class Black women, we all benefit. And I can see not a single flaw in her logic.
Steven_Strauss:
I believe I was making the point you are making
Others suffer when people who are hurt decide to become bullies themselves. The fact that they suffered doesn’t get them off the hook. Again, many of us suffered and did not end up embracing caustic world views.
Apparently my Swiftian tone could use some work.
It is rather hard to hear a tone in text… 
I’m confused by the formatting here… 
Overall, though, I’m glad we agree. Both understanding why people do horrific things and not giving them sympathy when they do horrific things are important.
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Oh I had comments on this I forgot to add.
I think i remember the firefighter/arsonist thing being a myth. But I’d have to look it up to be sure.
There doesn’t seem to be a large connection between police personnel and serial killing. Though there is with domestic abuse and the REALLY large number of murders that result or follow from domestic abuse.
What is very much there is that serial killers (along with some other sorts of pathologically violent people) are very often obsessed with the police. There are a ton of them that attempted to become police officers, they’ll often impersonate officers, seek to socialize with law enforcement. And frequently insert themselves into investigations of their own crimes, typically with a helpful or “just interested” justification.
There’s been more than a few instances where an obvious suspect was discounted by investigators because they knew the guy. And considered him harmless, and the clear warning signs just examples of the weird sort of hangers on police tend to attract. Basically that they’re just fanboys, or enthusiastic local weirdos.
There seems to be something in the power fantasy of being a police officer that appeals to these guys. And causes them to seek the association and the validation. Given how core that exact thing has become to everything about law enforcement. And militarization and adversarial policing have escalated. We might see more of that now rather than less…
But on average serial killers are less intelligent (and lower IQ), have less education and tend to have lower social standing. More likely to work in menial jobs or have difficulty maintaining employment than the general population. So the more typical story is that they’re unable to become police officers.
You’ve got two competing standards for what “serial killer” means. The technical, statistical line is just 2 or more killings, in more than one location in at least 2 distinct events separated by time (as opposed to spree killing where it’s 2 or more killings in at last one event in a close time span in a single area).
There’s pretty obviously cops who hit that marker.
But you get in the psychology and criminality end of it. And you’re talking about pathological killers following a specific cycle of escalation and killing, with specific (but varied) motivations and systems of justification and method. Much more what we think when we hear “serial killer”.
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Not being afraid to judge entitled misogynistic man-children as such (or at least talk about them seething or such rather than suffering) might have gotten you a different response.
Telling is important because, unfortunately, we’ve seen people here make excuses for the toxic behaviour of the “poor, sexually frustrated socially inept dudes” in the manosphere even though in reality they cause more suffering than they supposedly endure. I’m glad you took the time to clarify.
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Just another victim of Poe’s Law. /s
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How about cereal killing? Have the bodies of Cap’n Crunch, Tony the Tiger, and the Rice Krispy elves been found yet?
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Yeah, maybe associated with bike helmets and seat belts.
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I didn’t mean to imply the total homicide rate was higher, just that the mass attacks outpaced the body count from traditional serial killers. My wording should have been better.
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Then why are so many serial killers white men? Doesn’t lead damage the frontal cortex of women and POC as much as anybody else?
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Women tend not to be violent murderers. They are also much less likely to act out on aggressive urges, but will engage in behavior that harms them rather than others.
There may be POC who are serial killers whose work has been unrecognized because their victims, being other POC, were of less interest to the police. (Serial killers tend to kill within their own racial group) Or their work is taken as killings for a gang. With the thousands of untested rape kits out there there are likely to be dozens of serial offenders identified, many of whom may have killed some of their victims.
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