November 18, 2025 • 22 mins
A campus turned into a killing ground.
In May 2014, the quiet college town of Isla Vista was shattered when a 22-year-old student launched a brutal, premeditated attack inspired by incel ideology and violent misogyny. What began with online rants and a 141-page manifesto exploded into one of the most infamous mass killings of the decade.
In this episode of Murder U, we examine Elliot Rodger’s path from resentment to violence, the online communities that validated his rage, and the grief left behind for the families of six students whose lives were taken. We also explore how this case exposed a dangerous subculture that had been hiding in plain sight — and why experts now consider it a form of extremist violence.
This is the story of the Isla Vista killings… and the warning signs that were missed.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/murder-u--6152042/support.
In May 2014, the quiet college town of Isla Vista was shattered when a 22-year-old student launched a brutal, premeditated attack inspired by incel ideology and violent misogyny. What began with online rants and a 141-page manifesto exploded into one of the most infamous mass killings of the decade.
In this episode of Murder U, we examine Elliot Rodger’s path from resentment to violence, the online communities that validated his rage, and the grief left behind for the families of six students whose lives were taken. We also explore how this case exposed a dangerous subculture that had been hiding in plain sight — and why experts now consider it a form of extremist violence.
This is the story of the Isla Vista killings… and the warning signs that were missed.
Become a supporter of this podcast: https://www.spreaker.com/podcast/murder-u--6152042/support.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:02):
Abnornia. From high school hallways to expansive college campuses and
the sanctity of their homes, these once secure spaces have
transformed into hunting grounds for sinister individuals seeking to inflict
harm on the unsuspecting. Join me, Maddie each week as
we delve into the bone chilling stories of senseless murders
(00:26):
occurring in and around our centers of education. Welcome to
Murder You, an Abnormia original.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
Welcome to murder You. I'm your host, Mattie.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Now. Today's case enlightened the world about a threat that
many didn't even know what's a threat. This case highlights
a disturbing movement that was once buried within the deepest
parts of the Internet, in cell culture. If you're not aware,
let me break down in.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Cell culture to you.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
In cell short for involuntarily celibate, is a term often
used to refer to men who feel ignored and slighted
by the opposite sex.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
We all know people like that, right.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
The guy who, no matter how hard they try, can't
seem to get a girlfriend. It's not uncommon. But where
this kind of thinking gets dangerous is that a self
proclaimed in cell will never blame themselves for this inability
to form romantic and or sexual relationships. The blame is
put on the woman they feel ignored by, and this
(01:50):
manifests in something really disturbing where because of this, women
become the main targets of the insul's anger and resentment.
And it only gets when members of this self identifying
group find validation for this kind of thinking through online communities.
This kind of stuff got so out of hand that
(02:11):
the popular online forum read It had to shut down
the r slush in Cell subreddit because of all the
hateful language against women. Now you might be saying, Maddie,
what does all of this have to do with a
campus murder? Well, I want to put this issue into
context because today we'll be the discussing the Isla Vista
murders carried out by narcissistic Santa Barbara City College student
(02:35):
and self proclaimed inceell Elliott Roger. If this name sounds familiar,
it's because this is a fairly recent case. It became
infamous because the killer documented his hatred of women on
his YouTube channel, but also in his one hundred and
forty one page manifesto called My Twisted World. In this manifesto,
(02:57):
he detailed everything in the twenty plus years he'd been
alive that brought him to this point. Seriously, no mundane
thought was spared. His entire life story, his disdain for
the female sex, his white supremacist ideologies.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
It's a lot. Now.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
I don't want to publish too much of my twisted
world because that would be the kind of fame and
notoriety the killer wanted.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
But it does give some really.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Intriguing insight into the mind of a killer.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Let's get started.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Elliott Roger was born on July twenty fourth, nineteen ninety one,
in London to a white father, Peter Roger, and a
Chinese Malaysian mother Chin. His family was well traveled and
eventually left London to live in California, where his father
became pretty successful in Hollywood as a commercial director and
second director on the film The Hunger Games. Elliott was
(03:51):
very excited by the jump from London to Los Angeles,
adapting to American life, quickly developing an American accent and
fascination with US culture. Shortly after Elliot's seventh birthday, his
parents got a divorce. After being introduced to his father's
new girlfriend. Elliott claims this is where he began to
think about what type of men are capable of receiving
(04:14):
attention from women. He saw his father as the type
of guy who could easily attract the opposite sex and
quickly rebounded after his divorce by dating a string of women,
and as Elliott grew, he wondered why he didn't have
the same appeal as his father In online in cell circles, Traditionally,
attractive men who are presumed to attract women based on
(04:36):
looks alone are called chad's, and a chad is the
polar opposite of an incell, making them a group that
is often resented by men who feel socially inferior.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Watching the way his dad.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Bounced from women to women after his divorce was Elliot's
first exposure to a chad, and he began growing resentment
towards men who behaved that way. The introduction of his stepmother,
Sumaya in to his wife also sparked Elliott's resentment towards women.
He hated when she played the role of a parent
and disciplined him with minor punishments like sending him to
(05:08):
his room for an hour. You know, the kind of
You're not my real mom. Childhood angst, but I'm sure
many children from divorced families can relate to. After the divorce,
Elliot dreaded visiting his father's house because he didn't want
to be around Sumaya. Roger also described himself as a
very jealous person who resented other boys who thought they
(05:28):
were better than him because they were taller, more athletic,
or more.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
Popular with girls.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
When Elliott was nine, he came to the conclusion that
life had hierarchies and the boys that he was jealous
of were the ones who were dealt a better hand
at life. He also felt othered in school because he
was one of the only Asian kids. Elliott was half
Malaysian in his predominantly white school, conveniently leaving out any
aspects of his personality that might have caused that type
(05:54):
of ostracization. He was shy, narcissistic, and blamed others for
his mistreatment in life.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
Those really aren't the kinds of people that are too
popular in school.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
And remember, at this point, Elliott idolized the American life,
which stereotypically glamorized being Caucasian. His dark hair and Asian
features didn't fit the beauty standard that he placed on himself.
Wanting to fit in with the white kids, Elliot began
bleaching his hair blonde.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
He didn't just change his.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
Looks to fit in, he changed his interest in hobbies too,
fully molding himself to what he thought a successful adolescent
American boy should be. Clearly, he never took any of
those motivational just be yourself posters to heart. In middle school,
there was nothing Elliott feared more than being rejected by girls.
He even begged his parents to send him to an
(06:46):
all boys Catholic private school nearby called Crespy Carmelite so
he wouldn't have to face any potential rejection. At this point,
he avoided many social interactions due to his fear of rejection,
choosing to play World of Warcraft though home instead of
engaging with his peers. When it came time for him
to go to high school, and yes he was granted
(07:07):
his wish of attending an all boys school, Elliot felt
even more ostracized from his peers. He recalled on the
first day seeing all of the quote huge high school
boys and crying in the car, telling his father how
scared he was to get out. Even though Crespy held
less torment from the opposite sex. Elliot still faced rejection
from male classmates. The boys bullied him for being small
(07:29):
and weak, and Roger would retreat into his fantasy World
of Warcraft life even more, his stepmother got on his
case about how much time he wasted on the game,
and I'm going to warn you all his next.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
Part is a little ichy.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Elliott decided to shift his hobbies to something else. Rather
than spend all of his time playing World of Warcraft,
he spent some of it on horn and masturbation. I'll
spare you the details, because boy does he go into
detail in this manifesto. But that was apparently his new obsession. Sure,
he was a sexually repressed teenager who was going through puberty.
(08:06):
That's perfectly normal. What was abnormal was the extreme jealousy
and rage he felt towards classmates who were sexually active.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
He even found himself having.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
Verbal outbursts challenging his peers who bragged about their sex
lives in front of him. One humiliating incident, in particular,
a boy in Elliot's pe class bragged about having sex
with his girlfriend. Elliot verbally accused him of being a liar,
expecting to humiliate the boy in front of their peers
when he was proven correct. However, the boy responded with
(08:38):
explicit proof in the form of audio clips of his
sex acts yuck by the way, but I digress. The
entire class then teased Elliot for being wrong, the exact
opposite of what he expected from speaking out. He was
humiliated and decided this was the final straw. At Cresby,
Roger was transferred out of the all boys school and
(09:00):
into Taft High School for his tenth grade year. However,
much to his horror, it was a co ed school,
which meant girls, and a public school with five times
the amount of students at Cresby, which meant a lot
of girls. As Elliott expected, he didn't escape the bullies there.
He was still perceived as small and weak, and noticed
(09:23):
that even the worst of his bullies had girlfriends. He
described it in his manifesto, saying this was what truly
opened my eyes to how brutal the world is. The
most meanest and depraved of men come out on top,
and women flocked to these men. Their evil acts are
rewarded by women, while the good, decent men are laughed at.
(09:43):
It is sick, twisted, and wrong in every way.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
I hated the girls even more than the bullies.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
Because of this, he once again begged to be transferred
out of school, and his parents agreed, sending him to
a hybrid homeschooling program in Van Eys. With this, Elliott
Roger was allowed to avoid the social interactions he felt
were ruining his life. But I'm sure most would consider
those interactions a crucial part of adolescence. Elliott wanted more
(10:11):
than anything to gain the attraction of a girl, and
it only got worse when he left home to attend university.
He imagined he would blossom during this time, reinvent himself,
meet a girl, and lose his virginity. But life didn't
change for Elliot the way he imagined it would in college. Honestly,
this guy was disturbingly obsessed with the fact that he
(10:32):
was not having sex. He believed that was all life
was about, and even when he began attending Moore Park College,
girls didn't warm to him as easily as they did
to his peers, and he still felt like a loser.
Elliott had watched a movie called Alpha Dogs, which depicted
college life in Santa Barbara as a haven where attractive
(10:53):
people had all the sex they wanted. This was when
Elliott began to hatch the Santa Barbara plan. He would
attend college there and his life would become like the movies,
or so he thought. After discussing it with his parents,
Elliott transferred from Moorepark to Santa Barbara City College to
begin his new life in the town of Ela Vista.
(11:14):
But surprise, surprise, nothing changed because Elliot himself hadn't changed.
He blamed everything, his environment, the women, the more attractive men,
for his inability to obtain his goal of losing his virginity,
but he never blamed himself. Honestly, reading the manifesto is
(11:35):
infuriating for this reason. This is when Elliott's identity as
not only an incel, but as a white supremacist is
truly made clear. His SBCC housemates had a friend named
Chance who came over often, and Elliot had immediate disdain
for him, calling him inferior in his manifesto, purely based
(11:56):
on his race. And to find out the Chance that
lost virginity at thirteen to a white girl, Elliot was Leavid.
He couldn't believe that a black man, whom Elliott believed
to be inferior gained the attraction of a white girl.
He watched girls walk through campus in the arms of obnoxious,
(12:17):
tough jock type men and believed that they should have
been going after intelligent gentlemen. And you'd be correct to
think that Elliot was referring to himself when he said
that it's not very gentlemanly to hate women, but that's.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
What he thought.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
He described the men with girlfriends as filthy scum and
couldn't believe girls would choose them over him.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
It's honestly kind of absurd.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Elliot said in his manifesto that he suffered from virginity
as if it were an affliction of some sorts, not just.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
A fact of life.
Speaker 1 (12:51):
Just goes to show how warped his sense of reality was.
His intolerance of being a virgin became such an obsession
that one day, when he was getting coffee from his
local Starbucks, he saw a couple making out in line
and threw his coffee on them before running away.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
He described this as the first.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
Moment he'd felt truly capable of harming people whose sex
lives were an affront to him. Roger wrote that he
had thought of harming others since he was seventeen, but
he didn't truly feel capable of acting on them until
that moment. After feeling so rejected by everyone at Ayla Vista,
Elliott began planning what he called the Day of Retribution.
(13:31):
This would be the day that he would carry out
an armed massacre against everyone living in the life he
felt he deserved. He wanted to quote destroy all women
because he could never have them, and the quote hedonistic
scum they chose to fraternize with. He wanted them to
pay for rejecting him, and considered their deaths a reasonable
(13:52):
form of justice. Like I said, he had a totally
warped sense of reality, and the Day of Retribution remained
just a thought until the evening of Friday, May twenty third,
twenty fourteen, when it became a horrible, horrible reality. The
first three victims of Roger's Day of Retribution were his
roommates and their friend, nineteen year old George Chen, twenty
(14:17):
year old Wai Hon Wing, and twenty year old.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Chang Yuan Hon.
Speaker 1 (14:22):
The three boys were University of California Santa Barbara students
who lived off campus in an apartment with Elliot.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
They were all.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
Very close but as you can suspect did not get
along with Roger due to his white supremacist worldview. He
regarded them as annoying and ugly. Armed with two long,
fixed blade knives, Roger stabbed them all to death in
their apartment. George Chen was stabbed ninety four times.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
Talk about overkill.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
Then Roger went to his car and filmed what would
become an infamous YouTube video titled Retribution. He also emailed
his manifesto to family members and acquaintances, explaining why he
was doing what he was about to do. I know
I've cited his manifesto several times, but I can't stress
enough how manic and hard to follow it is. Most
(15:18):
of it is nonsensical, and his reasoning for committing these
horrible acts are really disturbing. A few hours after killing
his roommates and their friend, Elliott drove to the Alpha
Phi sorority house on UCSB campus armed with three guns.
He tried to gain entry by knocking, but wasn't allowed in. However,
once he went back to his car, he saw three
(15:40):
female students walking towards the building and shot them. The
three girls were part of the Tri Delta sorority and
while once survived with multiple gunshot wounds. Nineteen year old
Veronica Weiss and twenty two year old Katherine Cooper were killed.
This is when Roger set aside any plan and begun haphazardly,
shooting and wreaking havoc on the entire campus. He shot
(16:02):
indiscriminately inside an unoccupied building, but luckily injured null one
before shooting twenty year old Christopher Michaels Martinez outside of
a local market, who had just gone in to purchase
some chips. The cashier, Alyssa Hopper, tried to perform CPR,
but unfortunately could not save him. Eliot's killing was truly
(16:23):
indiscriminate at this point. Not only was he targeting any
and everyone with guns or knives, but he also used
his car as a weapon. Driving away from the market
drive in, Roger plowed into another student with his car,
then shot.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Two students as he drove past them.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
He continued this pattern of running into and shooting random
pedestrians until the police were on his trail. The police
shot at him, injuring him in the hip, but Roger
continued on injuring more innocent pedestrians. Finally, he hit a
cyclist with his car and turned the gun on himself,
ultimately dying by suicide, and sent his car crashing to
(17:01):
a stop into another vehicle.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
Fourteen people were wounded in.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
The attack and six lost their lives. Roger's roommates Wei
Han Wang and Chang Yuan Hong were computer programming and
students with promising futures. Their friend, George Chen, who was
also killed in the stabbing, was described as being generous
and kind. Ronica Weiss, one of the Tri Delta sorority
members who was killed, was a star athlete who also
(17:28):
excelled in academics, and her sorority sister, Katherine Cooper, was
about to graduate with degrees in art history and archaeology.
Christopher Michaels Martinez, the victim outside of the market, was
going to graduate early and go to law school. As
for Elliott Roger, his father Peter has since spoken out
against his son's actions in an interview with Barbara Walters,
(17:50):
where he revealed that he always thought that Elliott's strange
behavior and low self worth could possibly lead to him
being suicidal, but he didn't think they would make him homicidal.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
This was a very high profile case.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
I mean think about it the son of a Hollywood director,
published a journal and posted YouTube videos about the crimes
he was going to commit before ultimately becoming a killer.
But that's not the only reason Elliott Roger became infamous.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
This case also had a major effect.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
On the in cell community. You might be shocked to
learn that online in in cell circles, Roger is regarded
as a hero. I get the chills just saying that
other men who feel the same way as Roger, men
who feel like dejected losers who place all of.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
Their value on whether or not women find them.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
Sexually attractive, believed that he did what needed to be done.
They thought that the Isla Vista shootings brought awareness to
the fact that men out there like Elliott like them,
deserved respect in the form of sexual attraction from women.
Absolutely disgusting on What's even more disgusting is that they
(19:00):
capitalized off of this belief by making T shirts with
his face on them and called him the Supreme Gentleman,
something he referred to himself as in his manifesto.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
This happened so.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Much that T shirt distributing websites had to interfere and
shut down cells of this material, and as I mentioned
at the beginning, Reddit banned its r slush and self
forum due to hate speech against women, because, as this
proves in groups, these men are more dangerous than we realize.
It's honestly become like some kind of sick joke online.
(19:35):
Those who identified with Roger read his manifesto and felt
themselves to be in a similar situation, turned him into
a meme, a symbol of their twisted ideologies, completely disregarding
the lives lost, the family's grief, and the school that
had gone through an unthinkable tragedy. It's one thing to
understand where someone like Elliott Roger was coming from. It's
(19:57):
another thing to view what he did on Mayie twenty fourteen,
as here browan. The bottom line is that six students
lost their lives due to a senseless attack on campus. Now,
I know we spent a lot of time talking about
Roger's life and what led him to commit these crimes,
but this is truly one of those cases where the
(20:18):
victims were just at the wrong place at the wrong time.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
They ended up in the path of a man.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
With displaced anger determined to carry out a destructive massacre.
It's unlikely anyone could have seen what was coming. Even
Elliott's family, who saw him at his worst and knew
how horribly he felt about himself, couldn't predict that he
would murder you see.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
Santa Barbara Students.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
I think this case got so famous because it opened
so many people's eyes to something that the International Center
for Counter Terrorism at the Hague describes as misogynistic terrorism.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
When a man feels bad about his.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Own life and blames women for that, he can find
ways to justify why the world would be better with
fewer women in it.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
I also think it's.
Speaker 1 (21:01):
Important to note that Roger came from a wealthy family.
The way he describes his father's different houses in the
manifesto show a certain level of entitlement and materialism.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
I think it's safe to say that.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
Roger could have felt entitled to the best things in
life without putting in the effort to receive them. If
Elliott had viewed women as more than just sex objects,
then they might have treated him differently too. It's honestly
so scary to think of how many men out there
have such violent hatred towards women and could potentially lash
out like Roger by committing violent acts of revenge. For
(21:35):
their perceived slights.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
Luckily, society is.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
So much more aware of men who think like him now,
and that is perhaps the only silver lining in such
a heinous massacre. That's it for the long wild story
of Elliott Roger and this episode of Murder You. Thanks
for listening, and remember, if anyone you know is struggling
with mental illness, you can contact the Samson National Helpline
(21:58):
at one eight hundred.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
Sixty six y two help.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
That's one eight hundred six six two four three five seven.
Be sure to liken subscribe to Murder You on Spotify,
Apple Music, Amazon Music, or wherever
Speaker 2 (22:11):
You get your podcasts.
Abnornia. From high school hallways to expansive college campuses and
the sanctity of their homes, these once secure spaces have
transformed into hunting grounds for sinister individuals seeking to inflict
harm on the unsuspecting. Join me, Maddie each week as
we delve into the bone chilling stories of senseless murders
(00:26):
occurring in and around our centers of education. Welcome to
Murder You, an Abnormia original.
Speaker 2 (00:58):
Welcome to murder You. I'm your host, Mattie.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Now. Today's case enlightened the world about a threat that
many didn't even know what's a threat. This case highlights
a disturbing movement that was once buried within the deepest
parts of the Internet, in cell culture. If you're not aware,
let me break down in.
Speaker 2 (01:15):
Cell culture to you.
Speaker 1 (01:17):
In cell short for involuntarily celibate, is a term often
used to refer to men who feel ignored and slighted
by the opposite sex.
Speaker 2 (01:26):
We all know people like that, right.
Speaker 1 (01:28):
The guy who, no matter how hard they try, can't
seem to get a girlfriend. It's not uncommon. But where
this kind of thinking gets dangerous is that a self
proclaimed in cell will never blame themselves for this inability
to form romantic and or sexual relationships. The blame is
put on the woman they feel ignored by, and this
(01:50):
manifests in something really disturbing where because of this, women
become the main targets of the insul's anger and resentment.
And it only gets when members of this self identifying
group find validation for this kind of thinking through online communities.
This kind of stuff got so out of hand that
(02:11):
the popular online forum read It had to shut down
the r slush in Cell subreddit because of all the
hateful language against women. Now you might be saying, Maddie,
what does all of this have to do with a
campus murder? Well, I want to put this issue into
context because today we'll be the discussing the Isla Vista
murders carried out by narcissistic Santa Barbara City College student
(02:35):
and self proclaimed inceell Elliott Roger. If this name sounds familiar,
it's because this is a fairly recent case. It became
infamous because the killer documented his hatred of women on
his YouTube channel, but also in his one hundred and
forty one page manifesto called My Twisted World. In this manifesto,
(02:57):
he detailed everything in the twenty plus years he'd been
alive that brought him to this point. Seriously, no mundane
thought was spared. His entire life story, his disdain for
the female sex, his white supremacist ideologies.
Speaker 2 (03:14):
It's a lot. Now.
Speaker 1 (03:16):
I don't want to publish too much of my twisted
world because that would be the kind of fame and
notoriety the killer wanted.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
But it does give some really.
Speaker 1 (03:23):
Intriguing insight into the mind of a killer.
Speaker 2 (03:26):
Let's get started.
Speaker 1 (03:29):
Elliott Roger was born on July twenty fourth, nineteen ninety one,
in London to a white father, Peter Roger, and a
Chinese Malaysian mother Chin. His family was well traveled and
eventually left London to live in California, where his father
became pretty successful in Hollywood as a commercial director and
second director on the film The Hunger Games. Elliott was
(03:51):
very excited by the jump from London to Los Angeles,
adapting to American life, quickly developing an American accent and
fascination with US culture. Shortly after Elliot's seventh birthday, his
parents got a divorce. After being introduced to his father's
new girlfriend. Elliott claims this is where he began to
think about what type of men are capable of receiving
(04:14):
attention from women. He saw his father as the type
of guy who could easily attract the opposite sex and
quickly rebounded after his divorce by dating a string of women,
and as Elliott grew, he wondered why he didn't have
the same appeal as his father In online in cell circles, Traditionally,
attractive men who are presumed to attract women based on
(04:36):
looks alone are called chad's, and a chad is the
polar opposite of an incell, making them a group that
is often resented by men who feel socially inferior.
Speaker 2 (04:47):
Watching the way his dad.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Bounced from women to women after his divorce was Elliot's
first exposure to a chad, and he began growing resentment
towards men who behaved that way. The introduction of his stepmother,
Sumaya in to his wife also sparked Elliott's resentment towards women.
He hated when she played the role of a parent
and disciplined him with minor punishments like sending him to
(05:08):
his room for an hour. You know, the kind of
You're not my real mom. Childhood angst, but I'm sure
many children from divorced families can relate to. After the divorce,
Elliot dreaded visiting his father's house because he didn't want
to be around Sumaya. Roger also described himself as a
very jealous person who resented other boys who thought they
(05:28):
were better than him because they were taller, more athletic,
or more.
Speaker 2 (05:32):
Popular with girls.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
When Elliott was nine, he came to the conclusion that
life had hierarchies and the boys that he was jealous
of were the ones who were dealt a better hand
at life. He also felt othered in school because he
was one of the only Asian kids. Elliott was half
Malaysian in his predominantly white school, conveniently leaving out any
aspects of his personality that might have caused that type
(05:54):
of ostracization. He was shy, narcissistic, and blamed others for
his mistreatment in life.
Speaker 2 (06:00):
Those really aren't the kinds of people that are too
popular in school.
Speaker 1 (06:06):
And remember, at this point, Elliott idolized the American life,
which stereotypically glamorized being Caucasian. His dark hair and Asian
features didn't fit the beauty standard that he placed on himself.
Wanting to fit in with the white kids, Elliot began
bleaching his hair blonde.
Speaker 2 (06:23):
He didn't just change his.
Speaker 1 (06:24):
Looks to fit in, he changed his interest in hobbies too,
fully molding himself to what he thought a successful adolescent
American boy should be. Clearly, he never took any of
those motivational just be yourself posters to heart. In middle school,
there was nothing Elliott feared more than being rejected by girls.
He even begged his parents to send him to an
(06:46):
all boys Catholic private school nearby called Crespy Carmelite so
he wouldn't have to face any potential rejection. At this point,
he avoided many social interactions due to his fear of rejection,
choosing to play World of Warcraft though home instead of
engaging with his peers. When it came time for him
to go to high school, and yes he was granted
(07:07):
his wish of attending an all boys school, Elliot felt
even more ostracized from his peers. He recalled on the
first day seeing all of the quote huge high school
boys and crying in the car, telling his father how
scared he was to get out. Even though Crespy held
less torment from the opposite sex. Elliot still faced rejection
from male classmates. The boys bullied him for being small
(07:29):
and weak, and Roger would retreat into his fantasy World
of Warcraft life even more, his stepmother got on his
case about how much time he wasted on the game,
and I'm going to warn you all his next.
Speaker 2 (07:41):
Part is a little ichy.
Speaker 1 (07:43):
Elliott decided to shift his hobbies to something else. Rather
than spend all of his time playing World of Warcraft,
he spent some of it on horn and masturbation. I'll
spare you the details, because boy does he go into
detail in this manifesto. But that was apparently his new obsession. Sure,
he was a sexually repressed teenager who was going through puberty.
(08:06):
That's perfectly normal. What was abnormal was the extreme jealousy
and rage he felt towards classmates who were sexually active.
Speaker 2 (08:15):
He even found himself having.
Speaker 1 (08:16):
Verbal outbursts challenging his peers who bragged about their sex
lives in front of him. One humiliating incident, in particular,
a boy in Elliot's pe class bragged about having sex
with his girlfriend. Elliot verbally accused him of being a liar,
expecting to humiliate the boy in front of their peers
when he was proven correct. However, the boy responded with
(08:38):
explicit proof in the form of audio clips of his
sex acts yuck by the way, but I digress. The
entire class then teased Elliot for being wrong, the exact
opposite of what he expected from speaking out. He was
humiliated and decided this was the final straw. At Cresby,
Roger was transferred out of the all boys school and
(09:00):
into Taft High School for his tenth grade year. However,
much to his horror, it was a co ed school,
which meant girls, and a public school with five times
the amount of students at Cresby, which meant a lot
of girls. As Elliott expected, he didn't escape the bullies there.
He was still perceived as small and weak, and noticed
(09:23):
that even the worst of his bullies had girlfriends. He
described it in his manifesto, saying this was what truly
opened my eyes to how brutal the world is. The
most meanest and depraved of men come out on top,
and women flocked to these men. Their evil acts are
rewarded by women, while the good, decent men are laughed at.
(09:43):
It is sick, twisted, and wrong in every way.
Speaker 2 (09:47):
I hated the girls even more than the bullies.
Speaker 1 (09:49):
Because of this, he once again begged to be transferred
out of school, and his parents agreed, sending him to
a hybrid homeschooling program in Van Eys. With this, Elliott
Roger was allowed to avoid the social interactions he felt
were ruining his life. But I'm sure most would consider
those interactions a crucial part of adolescence. Elliott wanted more
(10:11):
than anything to gain the attraction of a girl, and
it only got worse when he left home to attend university.
He imagined he would blossom during this time, reinvent himself,
meet a girl, and lose his virginity. But life didn't
change for Elliot the way he imagined it would in college. Honestly,
this guy was disturbingly obsessed with the fact that he
(10:32):
was not having sex. He believed that was all life
was about, and even when he began attending Moore Park College,
girls didn't warm to him as easily as they did
to his peers, and he still felt like a loser.
Elliott had watched a movie called Alpha Dogs, which depicted
college life in Santa Barbara as a haven where attractive
(10:53):
people had all the sex they wanted. This was when
Elliott began to hatch the Santa Barbara plan. He would
attend college there and his life would become like the movies,
or so he thought. After discussing it with his parents,
Elliott transferred from Moorepark to Santa Barbara City College to
begin his new life in the town of Ela Vista.
(11:14):
But surprise, surprise, nothing changed because Elliot himself hadn't changed.
He blamed everything, his environment, the women, the more attractive men,
for his inability to obtain his goal of losing his virginity,
but he never blamed himself. Honestly, reading the manifesto is
(11:35):
infuriating for this reason. This is when Elliott's identity as
not only an incel, but as a white supremacist is
truly made clear. His SBCC housemates had a friend named
Chance who came over often, and Elliot had immediate disdain
for him, calling him inferior in his manifesto, purely based
(11:56):
on his race. And to find out the Chance that
lost virginity at thirteen to a white girl, Elliot was Leavid.
He couldn't believe that a black man, whom Elliott believed
to be inferior gained the attraction of a white girl.
He watched girls walk through campus in the arms of obnoxious,
(12:17):
tough jock type men and believed that they should have
been going after intelligent gentlemen. And you'd be correct to
think that Elliot was referring to himself when he said
that it's not very gentlemanly to hate women, but that's.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
What he thought.
Speaker 1 (12:33):
He described the men with girlfriends as filthy scum and
couldn't believe girls would choose them over him.
Speaker 2 (12:40):
It's honestly kind of absurd.
Speaker 1 (12:42):
Elliot said in his manifesto that he suffered from virginity
as if it were an affliction of some sorts, not just.
Speaker 2 (12:49):
A fact of life.
Speaker 1 (12:51):
Just goes to show how warped his sense of reality was.
His intolerance of being a virgin became such an obsession
that one day, when he was getting coffee from his
local Starbucks, he saw a couple making out in line
and threw his coffee on them before running away.
Speaker 2 (13:07):
He described this as the first.
Speaker 1 (13:09):
Moment he'd felt truly capable of harming people whose sex
lives were an affront to him. Roger wrote that he
had thought of harming others since he was seventeen, but
he didn't truly feel capable of acting on them until
that moment. After feeling so rejected by everyone at Ayla Vista,
Elliott began planning what he called the Day of Retribution.
(13:31):
This would be the day that he would carry out
an armed massacre against everyone living in the life he
felt he deserved. He wanted to quote destroy all women
because he could never have them, and the quote hedonistic
scum they chose to fraternize with. He wanted them to
pay for rejecting him, and considered their deaths a reasonable
(13:52):
form of justice. Like I said, he had a totally
warped sense of reality, and the Day of Retribution remained
just a thought until the evening of Friday, May twenty third,
twenty fourteen, when it became a horrible, horrible reality. The
first three victims of Roger's Day of Retribution were his
roommates and their friend, nineteen year old George Chen, twenty
(14:17):
year old Wai Hon Wing, and twenty year old.
Speaker 2 (14:20):
Chang Yuan Hon.
Speaker 1 (14:22):
The three boys were University of California Santa Barbara students
who lived off campus in an apartment with Elliot.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
They were all.
Speaker 1 (14:29):
Very close but as you can suspect did not get
along with Roger due to his white supremacist worldview. He
regarded them as annoying and ugly. Armed with two long,
fixed blade knives, Roger stabbed them all to death in
their apartment. George Chen was stabbed ninety four times.
Speaker 2 (14:52):
Talk about overkill.
Speaker 1 (14:54):
Then Roger went to his car and filmed what would
become an infamous YouTube video titled Retribution. He also emailed
his manifesto to family members and acquaintances, explaining why he
was doing what he was about to do. I know
I've cited his manifesto several times, but I can't stress
enough how manic and hard to follow it is. Most
(15:18):
of it is nonsensical, and his reasoning for committing these
horrible acts are really disturbing. A few hours after killing
his roommates and their friend, Elliott drove to the Alpha
Phi sorority house on UCSB campus armed with three guns.
He tried to gain entry by knocking, but wasn't allowed in. However,
once he went back to his car, he saw three
(15:40):
female students walking towards the building and shot them. The
three girls were part of the Tri Delta sorority and
while once survived with multiple gunshot wounds. Nineteen year old
Veronica Weiss and twenty two year old Katherine Cooper were killed.
This is when Roger set aside any plan and begun haphazardly,
shooting and wreaking havoc on the entire campus. He shot
(16:02):
indiscriminately inside an unoccupied building, but luckily injured null one
before shooting twenty year old Christopher Michaels Martinez outside of
a local market, who had just gone in to purchase
some chips. The cashier, Alyssa Hopper, tried to perform CPR,
but unfortunately could not save him. Eliot's killing was truly
(16:23):
indiscriminate at this point. Not only was he targeting any
and everyone with guns or knives, but he also used
his car as a weapon. Driving away from the market
drive in, Roger plowed into another student with his car,
then shot.
Speaker 2 (16:37):
Two students as he drove past them.
Speaker 1 (16:39):
He continued this pattern of running into and shooting random
pedestrians until the police were on his trail. The police
shot at him, injuring him in the hip, but Roger
continued on injuring more innocent pedestrians. Finally, he hit a
cyclist with his car and turned the gun on himself,
ultimately dying by suicide, and sent his car crashing to
(17:01):
a stop into another vehicle.
Speaker 2 (17:04):
Fourteen people were wounded in.
Speaker 1 (17:05):
The attack and six lost their lives. Roger's roommates Wei
Han Wang and Chang Yuan Hong were computer programming and
students with promising futures. Their friend, George Chen, who was
also killed in the stabbing, was described as being generous
and kind. Ronica Weiss, one of the Tri Delta sorority
members who was killed, was a star athlete who also
(17:28):
excelled in academics, and her sorority sister, Katherine Cooper, was
about to graduate with degrees in art history and archaeology.
Christopher Michaels Martinez, the victim outside of the market, was
going to graduate early and go to law school. As
for Elliott Roger, his father Peter has since spoken out
against his son's actions in an interview with Barbara Walters,
(17:50):
where he revealed that he always thought that Elliott's strange
behavior and low self worth could possibly lead to him
being suicidal, but he didn't think they would make him homicidal.
Speaker 2 (18:01):
This was a very high profile case.
Speaker 1 (18:03):
I mean think about it the son of a Hollywood director,
published a journal and posted YouTube videos about the crimes
he was going to commit before ultimately becoming a killer.
But that's not the only reason Elliott Roger became infamous.
Speaker 2 (18:17):
This case also had a major effect.
Speaker 1 (18:19):
On the in cell community. You might be shocked to
learn that online in in cell circles, Roger is regarded
as a hero. I get the chills just saying that
other men who feel the same way as Roger, men
who feel like dejected losers who place all of.
Speaker 2 (18:36):
Their value on whether or not women find them.
Speaker 1 (18:39):
Sexually attractive, believed that he did what needed to be done.
They thought that the Isla Vista shootings brought awareness to
the fact that men out there like Elliott like them,
deserved respect in the form of sexual attraction from women.
Absolutely disgusting on What's even more disgusting is that they
(19:00):
capitalized off of this belief by making T shirts with
his face on them and called him the Supreme Gentleman,
something he referred to himself as in his manifesto.
Speaker 2 (19:11):
This happened so.
Speaker 1 (19:12):
Much that T shirt distributing websites had to interfere and
shut down cells of this material, and as I mentioned
at the beginning, Reddit banned its r slush and self
forum due to hate speech against women, because, as this
proves in groups, these men are more dangerous than we realize.
It's honestly become like some kind of sick joke online.
(19:35):
Those who identified with Roger read his manifesto and felt
themselves to be in a similar situation, turned him into
a meme, a symbol of their twisted ideologies, completely disregarding
the lives lost, the family's grief, and the school that
had gone through an unthinkable tragedy. It's one thing to
understand where someone like Elliott Roger was coming from. It's
(19:57):
another thing to view what he did on Mayie twenty fourteen,
as here browan. The bottom line is that six students
lost their lives due to a senseless attack on campus. Now,
I know we spent a lot of time talking about
Roger's life and what led him to commit these crimes,
but this is truly one of those cases where the
(20:18):
victims were just at the wrong place at the wrong time.
Speaker 2 (20:21):
They ended up in the path of a man.
Speaker 1 (20:23):
With displaced anger determined to carry out a destructive massacre.
It's unlikely anyone could have seen what was coming. Even
Elliott's family, who saw him at his worst and knew
how horribly he felt about himself, couldn't predict that he
would murder you see.
Speaker 2 (20:39):
Santa Barbara Students.
Speaker 1 (20:41):
I think this case got so famous because it opened
so many people's eyes to something that the International Center
for Counter Terrorism at the Hague describes as misogynistic terrorism.
Speaker 2 (20:52):
When a man feels bad about his.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Own life and blames women for that, he can find
ways to justify why the world would be better with
fewer women in it.
Speaker 2 (21:00):
I also think it's.
Speaker 1 (21:01):
Important to note that Roger came from a wealthy family.
The way he describes his father's different houses in the
manifesto show a certain level of entitlement and materialism.
Speaker 2 (21:11):
I think it's safe to say that.
Speaker 1 (21:13):
Roger could have felt entitled to the best things in
life without putting in the effort to receive them. If
Elliott had viewed women as more than just sex objects,
then they might have treated him differently too. It's honestly
so scary to think of how many men out there
have such violent hatred towards women and could potentially lash
out like Roger by committing violent acts of revenge. For
(21:35):
their perceived slights.
Speaker 2 (21:37):
Luckily, society is.
Speaker 1 (21:38):
So much more aware of men who think like him now,
and that is perhaps the only silver lining in such
a heinous massacre. That's it for the long wild story
of Elliott Roger and this episode of Murder You. Thanks
for listening, and remember, if anyone you know is struggling
with mental illness, you can contact the Samson National Helpline
(21:58):
at one eight hundred.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
Sixty six y two help.
Speaker 1 (22:01):
That's one eight hundred six six two four three five seven.
Be sure to liken subscribe to Murder You on Spotify,
Apple Music, Amazon Music, or wherever
Speaker 2 (22:11):
You get your podcasts.
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