3) Homophobia -- the fear of homosexuality or homoeroticism -- either directed at others or at one's own inner drives, seems to have been a significant factor in Omar Mateen playing out his rage in a popular Orlando gay bar. Along with misogyny, elements of radical Islam certainly share this brand of fear and its concomitant hatred with Mateen. But fundamentalist, or radical, Christianity is quite homophobic as well. Following the Orlando massacre, two Baptist preachers publically announced they regretted more sodomites had not been killed in Orlando; in fact, they hoped more would be killed.
4) Access to assault rifles by someone like Omar Mateen is a long overdue no-brainer and the motivation for the historically unprecedented, spontaneous civil disobedience that just broke out among Democratic members of the US House of Representatives. Droning on about ISIS and radical Islam and calling for more bombing in Iraq does not alter the debacle of political gridlock in the US Congress driven by the NRA on the assault weapons issue.
The Omar Mateen massacre in Orlando is a matrix of all these things.
Omar Mateen, Frustrated Wanna-be-Cop
I'd like to add a fifth "explanation" to the Omar Mateen matrix. Based on what I've read, I see him as an insecure, macho wanna-be-cop or -warrior who ended up floundering about because he could not fit into a police or military institution under whose wing his hyper-masculine need to control others could be legitimized. Mateen was a frustrated male in need of a uniform and the accompanying regalia of masculine power provided by our police and military institutions in what is currently a highly militarized culture.
Mateen obtained an associates degree in Criminal Justice Technology. This suggests he knew what his interests were, and they led him to the world of law enforcement -- not into literature, social science or business management. His behavior suggests he liked to boss people around. He reportedly physically abused both his wives. With his degree, he got a job as a prison guard. He soon found a better job with G4S, a corporate security company operating in 100 countries with 610,000 employees. He worked for G4S since 2007; his last post was guarding a gated retirement community in Florida.
The most famous wanna-be-cop in recent history, of course, is George Zimmerman, the killer of Trayvon Martin, a homicide that occurred about 20 miles from the Orlando massacre. Zimmerman was self-patrolling an apartment complex when he ran into young Martin returning from a trip to the minute market. The man's need to cozy up to cops and to act as if he was a cop always fascinated me. What was this impulse to assume a personal, semi-official hunt for "badguys"? These badguys, of course, were often assumed to be poor and African American. How does this relate on an individual, personal level to the larger political idea expressed above: the vanity-based need for others to fear us as a nation? In other words, does a guy like Zimmerman find it important, maybe even erotically-charging, to instill fear in others by upping the ante and acting like a cop. Mateen certainly went way beyond this; but still, was he like Zimmerman in the sense both were men who felt the allure of cop-work but didn't quite have what it takes to be allowed to wear an official uniform in an officially designated department or unit? The lone wolf identification would seem to imply the failure to fit into a pack.
The Son of Sam killer in New York said he killed his six victims on the orders of a dog named Harvey. Does ISIS serve a similar purpose for our wanna-be-cop-without-a-home, Omar Mateen? If you accept the inner world of someone like Omar Mateen seriously as having its own logic, then where the voices come from that legitimize his actions -- be they a dog or some remote voice on the internet -- matters less than what's going on in the man's head. At least that's what the judge felt about David Berkowitz; he didn't buy the talking dog story.
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