Pittburgh shooter was a believer in "the Man Owns the Woman" theology.

[annabanana]

http://www.alternet.org/blogs/politics/141814/shooter_read_sexist_christian_author%27s_book_before_pittsburgh_female_aerobics_class_massacre/

Media analysis has so far ignored or glossed over Sodini's religious affiliations but the shooter's Internet diary suggest his last readings were the Bible and a book by a Texas evangelist, R.B. Thieme, Jr. who has written that husbands own their wives, as literal property and promoted an odd teaching that for each man on Earth there exists only one correct "right woman" in all creation.

~snip~

George Sodini's weblog lays considerable blame for his self-admitted psychological problems on the Pittsburgh-based Tetelestai Church which by his account Sodini attended for 13 years, up through 2006. The pastor of Tetelestai, James R. Knapp, is one of a few luminaries in the small fundamentalist universe under the sway of Texas evangelist and prolific author R.B. Thieme, Jr. -- a retired US Air Force Colonel known to wear his old military uniform while giving sermons who has been accused of cultic and authoritarian practices and wrote doctrine asserting that " married woman is the property of the man she marries."

~snip~

In his final weblog entry on August 3rd, 2009, written before carrying out the LA Fitness Center slaughter, Sodini wrote, "I was reading the Bible and The Integrity of God beginning yesterday, because soon I will see them." The Integrity of God was a privately published book by R.B. Thieme, Jr. and the apparent reference suggests that while George Sodini was estranged from the Tetelestai Church he was still under the influence of Thieme's writing, which may have exacerbated Sodini's social maladjustment and inability to meet women because of an extreme, idealistic doctrine Thieme espoused known as "right man/right woman".

(more at link)

[Heidi]

1. Thieme: "Bitchiness in a woman is an indication of the wrong woman."

No mention, though, that bitchiness could be an indication of the wrong man.

[Hannah Bell]

2. of course he was. racist too. & a loner. & mentally unbalanced.

& he smoked cigarettes.

[aquart]

3. How did that work for him?

He did seem to be trying to lure some exotic species into a net.

[Orsino]

8. His illness and resulting isolation would have produced such an outlook...

...perhaps as part of a more generalized solipsism.

[no_hypocrisy]

4. Two thoughts:

1. Maybe the slavery provision discouraged serious dating.
2. He really must have been extreme if he couldn't find a woman in his church who believed in the wives and slaves bit.

[Berry Cool]

7. His church did indeed discourage dating; said it wasn't necessary.

Some excerpts from their beliefs:

The man cannot work to get his right woman; it is a grace gift from God. God always brings the right woman to the right man. Grace takes up the slack before you find right woman. Doctrine is your right woman until God leads her to you. You don't need to date others while waiting.

The church, while telling men they couldn't actively do anything to bring their one "right woman" to them--that God would handle it--told them at the same time that they would remain socially maladjusted until God provided them with that woman.

This guy probably gave off scary vibes to any woman who met him, just on the basis of his beliefs. No wonder he had so little success with them.

Of course, I would make the argument that the sentimental fairy tale so many people believe irrespective of religion--that there is only "one right person" for each of us in this world, and that once we find that one right person, we will have perfect relationship harmony and happiness--is equally destructive. And I see around me every day people who believe that.

[H2O Man]

5. I was watching

a forensic psychiatrist discussing this person, on tv. He said the killer appears to have many of the diagnostic traits of a schizotypal personality disorder. Another forensic psychiatrist on the same channel said he was a typical sociopath. I would tend to agree with the first, though there is often overlap with other PDs.

He was a diseased human being, filled with hatred. He processed information in a way that turned his self-loathing outward, in a paranoid, vicious way. And that includes the sick version of religion that this OP provides: though it seems unlikely, he increased the hateful message he was hearing. The tragic result was the deaths and injuries of people who were simply minding their own business, living their own lives. His hatred translated into violence directed against women, but he sure as hell victimized everyone. And while he is an extreme example, he is still a clear warning to all that violence -- anywhere in the community, directed at any person/group -- victimizes and threatens all.

Thank you for this OP.

[HillbillyBob]

6. Putting the mental back into fundamentalism

I was raised around those people they are a danger to any society no matter what religion they base their brain sickness on.
Outlaw religion something we need to do soonest.