“My Ishmael” Author Says Discovery Gunman Had it Wrong

Written by Pat's Papers | Thursday, 2 September 2010 7:01 AM

For James J. Lee, the world was divided into good and bad says the Washington Post. The gunman, who was killed yesterday after taking three people hostage at the Discovery Channel headquarters, held a longstanding grudge against the network for disseminating ideas he thought were “environmentally destructive.” Police shot Lee after he pointed a gun at the head of one of his hostages; he was also apparently strapped with four makeshift bombs. The Discovery Channel was the only source of ire for Lee. The Post says his writings on the Internet reveal that he thought people were “bad”; babies, “parasitic”; and civilization was described as “filth.”

Read Lee’s demands for the Discovery Channel, which were self-published on his website. In the manifesto, Lee references the popular book, “My Ismael” which is about “a telepathic ape who tries to save humankind from problems such as overpopulation.” The Post called the book’s author who said Lee misinterpreted his famous work: “I’ve seen many people take off in odd directions from things they’ve seen in my books, but nothing so catastrophic as someone arming himself with bombs and guns. . . . I know this will have a big effect on my books themselves. Sales might zoom up, but that doesn’t mean approval of it will zoom up. It might zoom down.”

A Discovery worker describes what happened yesterday. Almost 2000 people work in the building: