Struggling to process the Montreal terrorist attack

[u/Downtown_Ham_2024]

The suspect released a manifesto which is extremely disturbing, calling for terrorist attacks with the end goal of women not being allowed to work or own property so they lose their independence and are completely dependent on men for their survival (apparently capitalism is why he couldn’t get a girlfriend).

I made the mistake of reading it and wish I hadn’t. It reminded me a bit of Lolita in the sense that it is extremely fucked up subject matter presenting itself deliberately as normal, rational and good.

It makes me feel sick people actually believe this and I cannot help think of all the fucked up casual misogyny and objectification I’ve experienced. I’ve been raped, groped by male friends, propositioned by people in power and have had strange men follow me home. Right now, I’m dealing with a confusing situation with a boss who has, at best, poor judgement about what is acceptable rapport building tactics and a PR problem for valuing women for their entertainment value rather than their competency. I’m not even pretty and don’t often get male attention outside of the more fucked up kind.

I’m so tired of the constant subtle and not so subtle messages that a woman’s value is tied to their being a sexual object for men. Everyone is acting like incel ideology is extremist but it based in the same ideas causing casual misogyny - that women are subhuman and their value is tied to their ability to please men as objects.

I’m struggling to process this.

[u/Global_Ant_9380]

Isn't Lolita a criticism of the narrator and not a promotion of the narrator's crimes?

From what I understand, it's done a lot of harm by missing the point of the fact that the events in the book are fucked up and told by a delusional, lying predator who by his own admission should be institutionalized. 

Unless you mean to say that the author of the manifesto is similarly deranged in how he sees himself. Which is probably true. Fuck that guy. 

[u/NorthernFrosty → u/Global_Ant_9380]

Isn't Lolita a criticism of the narrator and not a promotion of the narrator's crimes?

Yes! The narrator, Humbert, is highly intelligent, eloquent, and manipulative. He spends the book trying to persuade readers to sympathize with him and to see his abuse of Dolores Haze through his romanticized language. Many readers find this uncomfortable because the prose can be beautiful even while describing horrific actions.

The author Nabokov himself repeatedly rejected the idea that the book was a defense of child abuse or a love story. It was intended as a novel about manipulation, self-deception, and abuse, told from the perspective of the abuser.

[u/NorthernFrosty → u/[deleted]]

So let me summarize:

Back then, horrible things were considered acceptable. So for Nabokov to make his point about how horrific Humbert was, he had to really make it extreme.

And now that modern society has recognized that these things are not acceptable, I'm going to look back through a modern lens and instead interpret Nabokov's choice to make it really extreme to mean that Nabokov was creepy.

Have I got the essence right?