Ecole Polytechnique massacre (Montreal Massacre) 6 December 1989
(wiki's article is actually quite good)
(and the PATRIARCHAL WAR ON WOMEN continues apace)
École Polytechnique massacre (Montreal Massacre) 6 December 1989
(Please take note that, although the fucking murderer actually stated that his was an anti-feminist, anti-woman attack, people STILL tried to pretend that his hatred for women had absolutely NOTHING to do with his insane attack.)
École Polytechnique massacre
Plaque at École Polytechnique commemorating victims of the massacre
Location Montreal, Quebec, Canada
Date December 6, 1989; 34 years ago
Target Women at École Polytechnique de Montréal
Attack type
Mass shooting, mass murder, school shooting, femicide, murder-suicide
Weapons
Ruger Mini-14 semi-automatic rifle
Hunting knife
Deaths 15 (including the perpetrator)
Injured 14 (including Nathalie Provost)
Perpetrator Marc Lépine
Motive Antifeminism, misogyny
The École Polytechnique massacre (French: tuerie de l'École polytechnique), also known as the Montreal massacre, was an antifeminist mass shooting that occurred on December 6, 1989 at the École Polytechnique de Montréal in Montreal, Quebec. Fourteen women were murdered; another ten women and four men were injured. Perpetrator Marc Lépine, armed with a legally obtained Ruger Mini-14 semi-automatic rifle and hunting knife, entered a mechanical engineering class at the École Polytechnique. He ordered the women to one side of the classroom, and instructed the men to leave. After claiming that he was "fighting feminism", he shot all nine women in the room, killing six. The shooter then moved through corridors, the cafeteria, and another classroom, specifically targeting women, for just under 20 minutes. He killed eight more women before ending his own life. In total, 14 women were killed, and 14 others were injured.[1][2][3]
The massacre is now widely regarded as an anti-feminist attack and representative of wider societal violence against women; the anniversary of the massacre is commemorated as the National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women. After the attack, Canadians debated various interpretations of the events, their significance, and the shooter's motives. Other interpretations emphasized the shooter's abuse as a child or suggested that the massacre was the isolated act of a madman, unrelated to larger social issues. The incident led to more stringent gun control laws in Canada, and increased action to end violence against women. It also resulted in changes in emergency services protocols to shootings, including immediate, active intervention by police. These changes were later credited with minimizing casualties during incidents in Montreal and elsewhere. The massacre remained the deadliest mass shooting in Canada until the 2020 Nova Scotia attacks over 30 years later.[4]
. . . . .
REMEMBER THEIR NAMES
Lépine killed 14 women (12 engineering students, one nursing student, and one employee of the university) and injured 14 others, 10 women and four men.[3][5][17]
Geneviève Bergeron (born 1968), civil engineering student
Hélène Colgan (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
Nathalie Croteau (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
Barbara Daigneault (born 1967), mechanical engineering student
Anne-Marie Edward (born 1968), chemical engineering student
Maud Haviernick (born 1960), materials engineering student
Maryse Laganière (born 1964), budget clerk in the École Polytechnique's finance department
Maryse Leclair (born 1966), materials engineering student
Anne-Marie Lemay (born 1967), mechanical engineering student
Sonia Pelletier (born 1961), mechanical engineering student
Michèle Richard (born 1968), materials engineering student
Annie St-Arneault (born 1966), mechanical engineering student
Annie Turcotte (born 1969), materials engineering student
Barbara Klucznik-Widajewicz (born 1958), nursing student
. . .
circular monument in a park, and made of multiple grey stones. The large central stone contains a bilingual inscription in memory of women killed by men's violence. Many much smaller irregularly shaped stone shafts are carved with women's names
Memorial in Minto Park, Ottawa
The massacre profoundly shocked Canadians. Government and criminal justice officials feared that extensive public discussion about the massacre would cause pain to the families and lead to antifeminist violence.[21] As a result, a public inquiry was not held,[36] and Lépine's suicide letter was not released.[29] In addition, although an extensive police investigation into the perpetrator and the killings took place,[37] the resulting report was not made public, though a copy was used by the coroner as a source in her investigation.[5][38] The media, academics, women's organizations, and family members of the victims protested the lack of a public inquiry and paucity of information released.[10][21][39]
circular monument in a park, and made of multiple grey stones. The large central stone contains a bilingual inscription in memory of women killed by men's violence. Many much smaller irregularly shaped stone shafts are carved with women's names
Memorial in Minto Park, Ottawa
The gender of the victims, as well as his oral statements during the massacre and in the suicide note, has led to the event being seen as an antifeminist attack and as an example of the wider issue of violence against women.[40][41][42][43][44] Lépine's suicide note contained a list of 19 "radical feminists" he wanted to kill if he had time to do so.[1] Initially, however, politicians and the media downplayed the antifeminism of the attack.[45][46] Political leaders such as Robert Bourassa, Claude Ryan, and Jacques Parizeau spoke about "victims" and "youth" rather than "women" or "girls".[47] The television journalist Barbara Frum, pleaded that the massacre not be seen as an antifeminist attack or violence against women, and questioned why people insisted on "diminishing" the tragedy by "suggesting that it was an act against just one group?"[45][48]
. . . .
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%89cole_Polytechnique_massacre#References
École Polytechnique Tragedy (Montreal Massacre)
Article by Stéphanie Lanthier
Updated by Celine Cooper
Published Online January 5, 2012
Last Edited March 29, 2021
On 6 December 1989, a man entered a mechanical engineering classroom at Montreal’s École Polytechnique armed with a semi-automatic weapon. After separating the women from the men, he opened fire on the women while screaming, “You are all feminists.” Fourteen young women were murdered, and 13 other people were wounded. The shooter then turned the gun on himself. In his suicide note, he blamed feminists for ruining his life. The note contained a list of 19 “radical feminists” who he said would have been killed had he not run out of time. It included the names of well-known women in Quebec, including journalists, television personalities and union leaders. Fourteen women lost their lives that day. Their names were Geneviève Bergeron; Hélène Colgan; Nathalie Croteau; Barbara Daigneault; Anne-Marie Edward; Maud Haviernick; Barbara Klucznik-Widajewicz; Maryse Laganière; Maryse Leclair; Anne-Marie Lemay; Sonia Pelletier; Michèle Richard; Annie St-Arneault ; Annie Turcotte.
The event, which became known as the “Montreal Massacre,” sent shock waves through Quebec and the rest of Canada. In the days and weeks that followed, there was widespread public debate focused on the cause of, and motive for, the attack. For some, the actions of the shooter, Marc Lépine, were an isolated incident without any social significance. For others, it revealed a profound malaise about the place of women in society. Many suggested that the tragedy was indicative of deep-rooted and widespread anti-feminist sentiment.
The event led to larger debates about violence against women and stricter gun control laws in Canada. After the events of 6 December, the Coalition for Gun Control was formed. Their efforts contributed to the November 1995 adoption of Bill C-68, the federal firearm control legislation. Its stipulations included mandatory registration of all firearms and licensing for firearm owners; a national registry for all weapons; background checks; and verification processes and controls on ammunition sales.
In 1991, the Parliament of Canada declared 6 December to be a National Day of Remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women. It is also known as White Ribbon Day.
. . . .
https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/polytechnique-tragedy
Demonstrators hold portraits of victims of the Montreal massacre during the national day of remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women rally on Parliament Hill in Ottawa 2011.
Demonstrators hold portraits of victims of the Montreal massacre during the national day of remembrance and Action on Violence Against Women rally on Parliament Hill in Ottawa 2011. Photograph: Chris Wattie/Reuters
Canada
‘Hate is infectious’: how the 1989 mass shooting of 14 women echoes today
The massacre at Montreal’s Polytechnique school, fueled by misogyny, is not a horrifying memory confined to a bygone era – rather it seems like a foretelling of things to come
Tracey Lindeman in Montreal
Wed 4 Dec 2019 05.30 EST
Last modified on Wed 4 Dec 2019 08.20 EST
Late in the afternoon on 6 December 1989, a young man walked into Montreal’s Polytechnique engineering school with a semi-automatic rifle and killed 14 women, injured 14 others (including four men), then killed himself.
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Marc Lépine’s page-long suicide note, written in French, made his motivations clear: “Feminists have always enraged me,” he wrote. “I have decided to send the feminists, who have always ruined my life, to their Maker.” In Canada, 6 December is now a national day of remembrance and action on violence against women. But the events of three decades ago are not a horrifying memory safely confined to a bygone era. From the viewpoint of 2019, the Polytechnique shooting now seems like an unfortunate foretelling of things to come.
Two weeks ago, a young woman in Chicago was killed by a man after she ignored his catcalls. Last November, a man whose hatred of women was well-documented online shot six women at a hot yoga studio, killing two. And seven months earlier, a man named Alek Minassian drove a van on to a Toronto sidewalk and killed 10 people, eight of them women. The sexually frustrated young man behind the van’s wheel – a self-described incel, or “involuntary celibate” – saw his act as retribution against women who had starved him of the affection he felt he was rightfully owed. Minassian said he was inspired by Elliot Rodger, an incel and wannabe pickup artist who shot 20 people in 2014. “I think the link between Polytechnique and the van attack is so clear, so direct, so obvious,” said Julie Lalonde, a Canadian educator focused on violence against women. The link is more than a virulent hatred of women – it is also the ability for misogynists and antifeminists to find support for that hatred in both fringe groups and in mainstream culture. Finding that support is easier now than it’s ever been.
The pseudonymous “Liz” (a volunteer researcher on hate groups in Canada who “outs” extremists – and who uses a fake name because of the volume of violent threats her alter ego receives) says misogyny is a powerful undercurrent in all alt-right and white supremacist online groups. “Where do you really start to discuss the intersection between misogyny and hate groups, when they are really one and the same?” asked Liz, adding that hatred of women often serves as a base upon which to build other forms of hate. “The fact that [misogyny] acts as such a pipeline makes the incel movement exceptionally dangerous,” Liz continued. “I think that’s actually an aspect that people overlook; people look at it as kind of insular, like it’s in a vacuum – ‘Oh, they just hate women.’ But hate is infectious. When you learn to hate, you learn to hate more, and more, and more. It’s a drug.”
When Lépine began composing his ideology back in the 1980s, he didn’t have an internet commiseration machine; in his suicide note, he said it took him seven years to form his extremist views. Those views ultimately ended in a mass shooting and a meticulously assembled hitlist of 19 accomplished women he would have killed if not for a “lack of time”. Lépine targeted Polytechnique specifically because the women there were pursuing careers in engineering – a discipline he believed should be reserved for men.
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A service at Notre Dame Basilica for some of the 14 women killed by Marc Lépine in Montreal’s École Polytechnique. Photograph: Christopher Morris - Corbis/Corbis via Getty Images
. . .
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/dec/04/mass-shooting-1989-montreal-14-women-killed
Montreal marking 34-years since Polytechnique massacre