Remembering the École Polytechnique Massacre, 25 years On.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

On the evening of 6th December, 1989, a gunman entered Montreal's École Polytechnique, and murdered 14 female students and staff, wounding 14 others, all but four of them women.

These women died because they had dared to study in a field -- engineering -- traditionally reserved for men. They died because their murderer, as he himself expressed it, hated "feminists."

This Saturday, 6 December, 2014, at 9am SLT, you are invited to a brief vigil to commemorate, honour, and, above all, remember these young women and what they represented. Please join with us in celebrating their tragically shortened lives, and in vowing to continue to strive for equality for all.

The vigil will be held, as noted above, at noon SLT, at the FIMS Virtual Collaboratorium.

For more information about the Montreal Massacre, you can visit this site which features a documentary video:

http://www.cbc.ca/montreal/features/remember-14/

Thank you. I hope to see you there.

[Derek Torvalar]

---

Scylla Rhiadra wrote:

On the evening of 6th December, 1989, a gunman entered Montreal's École Polytechnique, and murdered 14 female students and staff, wounding 14 others, all but four of them women.

These women died because they had dared to study in a field -- engineering -- traditionally reserved for men. They died because their murderer, as he himself expressed it, hated "feminists."

This Saturday, 6 December, 2014, at 9am SLT, you are invited to a brief vigil to commemorate, honour, and, above all, remember these young women and what they represented. Please join with us in celebrating their tragically shortened lives, and in vowing to continue to strive for equality for all.

The vigil will be held, as noted above, at noon SLT, at the

FIMS Virtual Collaboratorium

.

For more information about the Montreal Massacre, you can visit this site which features a documentary video:

http://www.cbc.ca/montreal/features/remember-14/

Thank you. I hope to see you there.

---

Now Scylla, have you forgotten that the members of the victim's families had requested that the memory of their loved ones be left in peace and not be used as a political foil? That was more than 5 years ago. Perhaps you should reconsider your characterization of the event perpetrated by a lone lunatic who was not necessarily interested in only singling out 'feminists' or women, as pointed out by Barb Kay here;

 

"Most people assume Lepine's rage was entirely focused on women. In fact, the perpetually troubled misfit entertained serial and disparate revenge fantasies. An earlier ambition, noted in his suicide note as one of several "projects," was to join the Armed Forces as an officer cadet, gain access to the arsenal and embark on a shooting rampage. In that case, those murdered would have been males, and Marc Lepine, along with his victims -- their names inscribed on a commemorative plaque in the armory perhaps -- would by now have faded from our national memory. Something for Canadian "equality" buffs to ponder at the vigil tonight."

http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/columnists/story.html?id=75e56e58-5238-4d65-82ff-e87f841303e3

 

I do believe I had to remind of you of this the last time to you tried to whip the LWL into a frenzied narcissistic sympathy.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

Derek, I am too weary and too saddened by my memories of that night to get into this with you. 

Believe it or not, I'm actually not interested into turning this into a "teaching moment." I myself simply want to remember 14 young women who were brutally murdered. I will do so tomorrow, at the SL vigil, and tomorrow night at the RL one.

You are most welcome not to attend either vigil, as their deaths clearly hold no meaning for you.

We can have this discussion another day perhaps. But not now.

[Derek Torvalar]

---

Scylla Rhiadra wrote:

Derek, I am too weary and too saddened by my memories of that night to get into this with you. 

Believe it or not, I'm actually not interested into turning this into a "teaching moment." I myself simply want to remember 14 young women who were brutally murdered. I will do so tomorrow, at the SL vigil, and tomorrow night at the RL one.

You are most welcome not to attend either vigil,

as their deaths clearly hold no meaning for you.

We can have this discussion another day perhaps. But not now.

---

That is awfully presumptuous of you isn't it?

Just becaue I do not subscribe to the populist view of events doesn't mean that I am insensitive to what occurred. But that is typical isn't it in todays world, if you do not espouse the 'party line' you obviously aren't capable of comprehending or being 'empathetic' (just ask Drax) and must therefore be unfeeling and hateful, and not  allowed to express your opinion for fear of shattering everone's illusions and ruining their contagion.

If you care not to engage in a discussion that is fine. Another time then.

Nice to see you again btw. Hope you are around more as Christmas break approaches.

 

[Scylla Rhiadra]

Thanks, Derek. And I apologize if I assumed too much about your attitude toward these women.

I probably won't be here too much -- I'm really only here to do this vigil. But, with the Fall term just ending, my doppleganger may be around a bit. So perhaps we can chat then.

Take care. :-)

[Ted McGregor]

---

Scylla Rhiadra wrote:

I myself simply want to remember 14 young women who were brutally murdered. I will do so tomorrow, at the SL vigil,

We can have this discussion another day perhaps. But not now.

---

Perhaps, when organizing such events, you'd better post these in the Upcoming Events and Activities-section of the forums instead of General Discussion.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

---

TDD123 wrote:

---

Scylla Rhiadra wrote:

I myself simply want to remember 14 young women who were brutally murdered. I will do so tomorrow, at the SL vigil,

We can have this discussion another day perhaps. But not now.

---

Perhaps, when organizing such events, you'd better post these in the

Upcoming Events and Activities

-section of the forums instead of

General Discussion

.

---

Perhaps I don't think a memorial vigil to 14 murdered women belongs in a section of the forum devoted to upcoming DJ appearances at virtual clubs or open casting calls for modeling agencies.

But thanks for the advice. :-)

[Madelaine McMasters]

---

Scylla Rhiadra wrote:

On the evening of 6th December, 1989, a gunman entered Montreal's École Polytechnique, and murdered 14 female students and staff, wounding 14 others, all but four of them women.

These women died because they had dared to study in a field -- engineering -- traditionally reserved for men. They died because their murderer, as he himself expressed it, hated "feminists."

This Saturday, 6 December, 2014, at 9am SLT, you are invited to a brief vigil to commemorate, honour, and, above all, remember these young women and what they represented. Please join with us in celebrating their tragically shortened lives, and in vowing to continue to strive for equality for all.

The vigil will be held, as noted above, at noon SLT, at the

FIMS Virtual Collaboratorium

.

For more information about the Montreal Massacre, you can visit this site which features a documentary video:

http://www.cbc.ca/montreal/features/remember-14/

Thank you. I hope to see you there.

---

My last semester of engineering graduate school ended in December of 1989. I remember the École Polytechnique story, but it was not a galvanizing moment for me. As I recall, the murderer was (pardon the crude condensation of his condition) nuts. Thirty years earlier, Ed Gein made Wisconsin famous after killing two women and stealing numerous female bodies from graves. Police found lampshades and chairs upholstered in women's skin. Two years after École Polytechnique, Jeffrey Dahmer got us into the news again after killing numerous men and boys in similary gruesome fashion. Both of those men were... nuts.

It's a tragedy that lives were lost, but I can't draw larger conclusions from the actions of nuts. Gein was fixated on women, Dahmer on men. I don't think either was a reflection of society at large.

It's the actions of sane people that give me pause, as there are so many of them. Just as I was beginning to hope that recent scrutiny of the behavior of athletic programs and fraternities would finally bring to light their disproportionate population of misogynistic asshats, Rolling Stone magazine tosses a wrench in the works in the form of craptastic reporting and editorial misjudgment in a story written by a woman about a woman. Dammit, dammit, dammit.

This vexes me as much as watching my college girlfriends swoon over (well, actually under) basketball players who dropped crumpled $20 bills (the smallest denomination used as packing material for the "complimentary" athletic supporters they received from athletic supporters) for $3 slices of pizza to avoid an aneurysm trying to compute the tip.

Fortunately, we are not always our worst enemies. Nor are the fellas.

And finally, I didn't "dare" to study engineering. It was and is what I love to do. I don't ever want to meet an engineer who entered the profession to be daring. I want to meet engineers who, like me, love what they do and want to make a difference.

Carry my best wishes with you to the vigil, Scylla.

[Ted McGregor]

Then perhaps we better have moderation decide what to do with this.

[Derek Torvalar]

---

TDD123 wrote:

Then perhaps we better have moderation decide what to do with this.

---

LMAO

'Mr. Smiiiiiith, Janey is putting the red crayons in the spot for the blue crayons!'

Hey TDD, are you the new forum tattle-tale?

If so, then you are remiss in your duties as the GD Forum is replete with inappropriate threads that need to be deleted and/or moved.

God, whatta bunch of babies.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

---

Madelaine McMasters wrote:

My last semester of engineering graduate school ended in December of 1989. I remember the 

École Polytechnique story, but it was not a galvanizing moment for me. As I recall, the murderer was (pardon the crude condensation of his condition) nuts. Thirty years earlier, Ed Gein made Wisconsin famous after killing two women and stealing numerous female bodies from graves. Police found lampshades and chairs upholstered in women's skin. Two years after École Polytechnique, Jeffrey Dahmer got us into the news again after killing numerous men and boys in similary gruesome fashion. Both of those men were... nuts.

It's a tragedy that lives were lost, but I can't draw larger conclusions from the actions of nuts. Gein was fixated on women, Dahmer on men. I don't think either was a reflection of society at large.

It's the actions of sane people that give me pause, as there are so many of them. Just as I was beginning to hope that recent scrutiny of the behavior of athletic programs and fraternities would finally bring to light their disproportionate population of misogynistic asshats, Rolling Stone magazine tosses a wrench in the works in the form of craptastic reporting and editorial misjudgment in a story written by a woman about a woman. Dammit, dammit, dammit.

This vexes me as much as watching my college girlfriends swoon over (well, actually under) basketball players who dropped crumpled $20 bills (the smallest denomination used as packing material for the "complimentary" athletic supporters they received from athletic supporters) for $3 slices of pizza to avoid an aneurysm trying to compute the tip.

Fortunately, we are not always our worst enemies. Nor are the fellas.

And finally, I didn't "dare" to study engineering. It was and is what I love to do. I don't ever want to meet an engineer who entered the profession to be daring. I want to meet engineers who, like me, love what they do and want to make a difference.

Carry my best wishes with you to the vigil, Scylla.

---

Thank you, Maddy.

That the gunman (whose name I will not mention) responsible for these deaths was "nuts" I will not for a moment dispute. It is hard to imagine anyone capable of shooting 28 people in cold blood not being deeply disturbed. And yet, disturbed as he may have been, he did not choose to shoot mail carriers, or corporate executives, or fire hydrants. He deliberately targeted women, and, what is more, left a manifesto explaining why he did -- because he blamed them, and their "feminism," for his own failures.

The point is not that a single lunatic hated women. It is that he lived in a culture that provided him with a ready-made scapegoat for those failures. Decades of public discourse -- even in the days before a resurgent fundamentalist right-wing, and the currency of the term "Feminazi" -- had identified for him the "enemy" responsible for feeling inadequate as a man. His culture did not, does not, condone the killing of women -- that's where the "nuts" becomes relevant -- but it did inform him that, if he had failed to become an engineer himself, it could be blamed on those women who had succeeded.

The gunman himself is really a symptom, rather than the disease. And his actions, wildly out of tune with what was acceptable as they were, are an index of a broader, deeper, and ultimately more troubling (if less murderous) problem with our culture.

Your point about "daring" to be an engineer, in relation to your own experiences, is entirely to the point. I used the term "dared" somewhat ironically: it should not require daring, of course, to undertake a career path associated with another gender.

When the gunman announced to the women he had sequestered from the males in one of the classes that he was "fighting feminism," one of the students, Nathalie Provost, replied, "Look, we are just women studying engineering, not necessarily feminists ready to march on the streets to shout we are against men, just students intent on leading a normal life."

And that, really, is actually what feminism is ABOUT: its aim is to allow women and men everywhere to go on "leading a normal life," whatever their choices. Feminism isn't a club or a political party: it's a set of values. And of those values, the only one that ultimately really matters is this belief in the right of everyone to equal opportunity and treatment. Interestingly, two decades later, Provost (who was shot four times, but survived) articulated the same conclusion: "I used to see feminism as a conflict between men and women, but it's not that for me now. ... It's making sure women have an equal chance."

December 6 was an enormously important day for me. It's the day when I first consciously started thinking of myself as a "feminist." That was not because I adopted a reductive view of violence against women, or the events at École Polytechnique. It was because I suddenly realized, in the face of the madman's shouted insults at these women before he killed them, how very, very important equality -- for everyone -- was to me.

And really, it will be that commitment, and the memory of these women, that I will be honouring today.

[Ted McGregor]

---

Derek Torvalar wrote:

Hey TDD, are you the new forum tattle-tale?

If so, then you are remiss in your duties as the GD Forum is replete with inappropriate threads that need to be deleted and/or moved.

God, whatta bunch of babies.

---

No, but I did ask moderation to move it, if you insist on knowing.

I also don't pretend to 'own' these forums by either acting no moderation is present or by denying certain rules are applicable to me.

Whatever you think of that is of no concern to me.

Usually those needing to grow up are those that think rules for common conduct do not apply to them. Consider yourself one of them.

But you of course already knew that.

You may now assist in bumping this thread.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

---

Derek Torvalar wrote:

---

TDD123 wrote:

Then perhaps we better have moderation decide what to do with this.

---

LMAO

'Mr. Smiiiiiith, Janey is putting the red crayons in the spot for the blue crayons!'

Hey TDD, are you the new forum tattle-tale?

If so, then you are remiss in your duties as the GD Forum is replete with inappropriate threads that need to be deleted and/or moved.

God, whatta bunch of babies.

---

*sigh*

I wasn't even going to bother commenting on this, to be honest, but thank you Derek for doing so.

The world is sadly full of gray little kindergarten cops luxuriating in a sense of their own self-importance. They are harmless enough, fortunately.

Perhaps I can take solace in the reflection that this little "victory" probably made his day.

[Ted McGregor]

---

Scylla Rhiadra wrote:

---

The world is sadly full of gray little kindergarten cops luxuriating in a sense of their own self-importance. They are harmless enough, fortunately.

---

Therefore it's all the more tragic you abuse a massacre to link it to a 'sole attack on feminism', while the victims were never associated with that.

Will you also remember the man present in class who took his life afterwards because he witnessed these events ?

'Enjoy' your vigil.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

---

TDD123 wrote:

---

Scylla Rhiadra wrote:

---

The world is sadly full of gray little kindergarten cops luxuriating in a sense of their own self-importance. They are harmless enough, fortunately.

---

Therefore it's all the more tragic you abuse a massacre to link it to a 'sole attack on feminism', while the victims were never associated with that.

Will you also remember the man present in class who took his life afterwards because he witnessed these events ?

'Enjoy' your vigil.

---

Ooops. Your agenda is showing.

I remember -- and mourn -- the senseless death of any man or woman even when I don't know her or his name. Were you a more nuanced reader, and one not so blinded by your own reductive view of "feminism," you'd have picked up on that rather key word, "equality." It is a fundamental tenet of feminism that the lives of all, regardless of gender, ethnicity, sexual preference, or class are equally valuable.

I will not be "enjoying" my vigil. Today is a day that is still, 25 years later, one that resonates with horror and pain for me, as also for many thousands of women, and men, throughout my country. But I appreciate your good wishes.

[Ted McGregor]

---

Scylla Rhiadra wrote:

Your agenda is showing.

---

 Yeah, sure. Keep thinking that.

 

---

Scylla Rhiadra wrote:

But I appreciate your good wishes.

---

No, you don't.

I'll refrain from further comments in this thread, so it will not get pulled by moderation.

[Ted McGregor]

*bump!*

[Ted McGregor]

The site contains this.

A memorial with the names of 14 female victims of the massacre.

Three commemorating gifts :

 

• A candle
• A red rose ( which should be white if this should be associated with the Order of the white rose. )
• A white ribbon

Final courtesy bump.

[Scylla Rhiadra]

Thank you for this, and for the bumps. 

It is appreciated. :-)

[Scylla Rhiadra]

"Thank you all for being here today, and for sharing with us your time and your quiet reflections upon this day.

For those of us old enough to remember that terrible day clearly, and perhaps for all who commemorate it, December 6, 1989 holds a host of very personal meanings. It is from this day, 25 years ago, that I date my own self-conscious emergence as a “feminist,” but it is also a day that still resonates with a terrible sense of sadness and horror.

I don’t want, however, to dwell upon that today. Tomorrow, the struggle for equality and social justice will continue, as it must, but today I want to answer the hatred of those who believe that the lives of women don’t matter with the only thing that can defeat such hatred. I want to answer it with hope. Because when I think of the lives of these 14 young women, I am filled with hope.

And I want to remember them, and their courage, and their determination to live their own lives as they chose, because it is these things that give me hope for a better future.

I want to remember Sonia Pelletier, from St-Ulric, Quebec, who was looking forward to returning to her home town, and her family, to start her own engineering firm. I remember Anne-Marie Lemay, who sang in a rock band, and Anne-Marie Edward who loved skiing so much that she was buried in her ski jacket. I remember also Annie St-Arneault, who wrote poetry, and Annie Turcotte, who loved messing about with cars.

I will not forget Barbara Daigneault, who had the opportunity to work alongside her father as a teaching assistant, and Barbara Klucznik-Widajewicz, who had moved to Canada from Poland with her husband, her high-school sweetheart. Geneviève Bergeron played the clarinet: I will not forget you, nor will I forget Hélène Colgan, who died beside her best friend, Nathalie Croteau.

I celebrate the lives of Michèle Richard, who was about to be married, and of Maud Haviernick, who lived with her long-time boyfriend in Laval. I remember Maryse Leclair, one of the top students at the Ecole, and Maryse Laganiere, who had been married for only three months at the time of her death.

We cannot ever forget why they died, but it is even more desperately important that we remember how they lived, and that these young women enjoyed joyful and fulfilled lives, that they were loved, and are terribly missed, and that the way that they chose to live was an affirmation of what feminism is really, ultimately, all about: the right of women everywhere to live lives of their own choosing, free of prejudice and fear.

And so, although we must continue always to fight to achieve that end, I believe we must also choose, deliberately, consciously, steadfastly, not to dwell upon the hatred and fear that led to the death of these beautiful and valued young women, but rather upon the hope embodied by their lives.

When feminism succeeds, as succeed one day it must, in banishing the hatred and fear of women that still, even today, scars our culture, it will have succeeded not because we were driven by these qualities, but because we hoped, and believed, that things could be better.

Remember them, celebrate them, honour them. And let their greatest, most important legacy, be the sense of hope in which they lived, and that still today drives our struggle for equality and justice.

I would ask you now to join me in observing a minute of silence to remember and honour these 14 women."

[Ted McGregor]

/me returns a cold 1,000 yard stare. :robotindifferent:

[LlazarusLlong]

Is it a good time now to remember the start of World War I a century ago?

In which more horses were killed than women.

And considerably more men died.

[ColonelObvious]

No, Scylla only promotes very specific things that may or may not fit her own personal agenda, although she accuses others of doing or not doing the same thing.

I guess you have to be a feminist to understand.

[Dillon Levenque]

---

ColonelObvious wrote:

No, Scylla only promotes very specific things that may or may not fit her own personal agenda, although she accuses others of doing or not doing the same thing.

I guess you have to be a feminist to understand.

---

 

Wow, out of what woodwork did you just crawl? I've seen less than a dozen posts from you, all made LONG afer Scylla pretty much vanished from this forum, yet you seem to think you know all about her.

That kind of thing usually only happens when someone who doesn't have the guts to post under her/his original SL name alts up. Is there a different explanation in your case?

 

ps: don't bother trying to suggest you were here earlier as a Captain: the same question applies to that alt.

[Dillon Levenque]

---

LlazarusLlong wrote:

Is it a good time now to remember the start of World War I a century ago?

In which more horses were killed than women.

And considerably more men died.

---

 

Not sure what you meant about the start of WWI. The Archduke's assassination? The usually accepted start is Summer of 1914, but what has that to do with anything in this thread? There is already a day set aside to commemerate the end of WWI. In the United Kingdom and the Commonwealth nations (as in France & Belgium) it's called Remembrance Day, and is considered a day to remember all who perished in that conflict—not just the young men who died in their millions on both sides, but the civilians who died in their millons as well.

I would think someone who chose that namesake (what's the matter, did someone already have the single-L version?) would have understood that, considering yiour namesake was a participant in the conflict.

 

ETA a syllable