By David Futrelle
The “Incel” cult not only encourages so-called “involuntarily celibate” men to hate and blame women; it also teaches these men to hate themselves, obsessing endlessly over alleged physical flaws and other imaginary impediments that they think make them undateable and fundamentally unlovable.
One of the most insidious ways in which the Incel cult harms those in it is by discouraging clearly depressed men from seeking the psychological and psychiatric help it is clear so many of them desperately need.
Some incels dismiss therapy and medication as frauds, convinced that nothing will work for them. This is self-defeating but at least understandable. Therapy is hard work, and meds. while generally effective in helping most people, aren’t a panacea, and when you’re deeply depressed it’s hard to believe anything will help.
But there are plenty of incels who reject therapy and meds not because they think they won’t work, but because they’re afraid they will. These deeply miserable men don’t want to be cured of their misery because they don’t believe they deserve to be happy. Or even to live.
In a recent post on the Incels subreddit, someone calling himself StarvedOfHumanTouch argues bluntly that “[t]reating incels for depression should be illegal.”
“Some anti depressants and anti psychotics are too fucking effective,” he writes.
They have the ability to turn even the most suicidally depressed men into tax contributing good goys.
So far, if we ignore the not-too-subtle hint of anti-Semitism at the end there, StarvedOfHumanTouch is rehashing an old and silly argument put forth by some social critics who wrongly think that antidepressants turn everyone into “shiny happy” conformists. But his argument quickly gets much darker.
Depression like all other state of minds has a purpose. It is meant to hurt, weaken, and ultimately kill you. Trimming the fat from society so to speak. It is in the benefit of all to let the weak and disabled die off.
He’s including himself in this group.
So why keep us around? Is it compassion? Sadism? Or are we just a buffer to keep around to take the blow when shit hits the fan in society every other decade?
As far as I can figure out the logic here, StarvedOfHumanTouch apparently think that “normies” conspire to keep incels and other alleged “undesirables” around as, I guess, designated sufferers when crises roll around. It doesn’t make much sense to me either.
But StarvedOfHumanTouch’s fellow incels seem to have little trouble understanding what he’s getting at.
“[W]e subhumans exist so chads and staceys can feel better about themselves that they arent subhuman like us,” writes PM_ME_STRIPPERS.
“Yes, and conning them into “therapy” should also be a stoneable offense,” adds Thizizwhyimincel,” whose flair for the subreddit suggests that his “[m]other deserves to be raped by ISIS.”
Any normie, or whore, who recommends therapy for an incel, is intentionally trying to steal money from an inferior man. They absolutely deserve the rope for even suggesting this.
3K-caloriespurple-pilled non-incel is of the opinion that”letting people suffer is [un]acceptable.” But instead of suggesting that sufferers get treatment to ease their suffering, he thinks that “euthanasia should be legalized for people with severe depression or mental issues.”
As someone who has struggled with depression for decades now, I can tell you that this sort of bullshit is the last thing any depressed person needs to hear. Treatment is available; meds help. Incel is, as I’ve said many times before, poison. It makes everyone it touches worse off. It’s suicide fuel.
On the one hand, I respect Pratchett’s wish. On the other hand, we only have some of Kafka’s work because his friend Max Brod disobeyed Kafka’s similar instruction. Should we be grateful to Brod for The Trial and The Castle, or condemn him for breaking the agreement?
@Moggie
I think the situation was slightly different; Kafka’s work was largely or wholly complete, wasn’t it? Pratchett’s complete stuff was already published, and he’d planned a big chunk of stuff (the long earth, etc) to be completed and published after he’d lost the ability to contribute to it, or died, whichever came first. I think that whatever was on those harddrives was unlikely to be at the levels of tolkien’s unpublished stuff, let alone kafka’s.
Similarly, Iain M. Banks had the beginnings of another culture novel underway when he died, but the people who saw what was there decided that there just wasn’t enough to complete and there’s no way anyone would have been able to do it justice, so that got zapped, too.
For every “The Trial” or “On War” the danger is you get a “Salmon of Doubt” or “Go set a watchman”.
(I know that last one wasn’t posthumous, but it was a similar thing of someone just publishing a draft work that might have been better left alone)
As someone who has dealt with depression, this is one of the more anger-inducing things I’ve read on this site (which says a lot). I think StarvedOfHumanTouch would probably be better for seeing a therapist and getting some help sorting out his issues, but I doubt he’ll ever will.
@Mike Smith: euthanasia is a complex topic, but I’m generally for it. However, I think (otherwise healthy) people with treatable conditions like depression should definitely not have access to euthanasia, especially since they are not in the right state of mind to make that choice.
@Mish et al, yes – I mourn for the books that might have been but that he was never able to complete 🙁
I especially wanted to read the idea he considered at one point, “Raising Taxes” (he did Raising Steam instead, I understand, but Moist von Lipwig and taxes would have been something really special).
Please, give therapy a try if you are able to! Heck, even if you don’t feel particularly depressed, therapy is a good thing. There’s a stigma around mental health that needs to be displaced. Don’t let it stop you.
Consider it a brain spa-day. It’s good for you. Sometimes there’s pain involved, and it can feel very awkward and uncomfortable if you’re unused to it or if something sensitive is being touched on, but it’s healthy to bring the bottled thoughts into the open.
I’m also terrible at taking my own advice, but i have the excuse of not having money for therapy, ha ha!
@Scildfreja Unnyðnes Open threads are sometime helpful. 😉
I hear you on the ‘lack of money for therapy’ thing. 😛
I’d love to talk more here, but, well. I already have a pretty rare job in a field that’s swarming with alt-right MRA dudebros. I really don’t want people to know who I actually am, so I am sorta walking a fine line. Wish I could, my peeps <3
This. Exactly this. Somebody who is earnestly looking to meet somebody else for a relationship of any kind has dozens of resources available to help. Dating sites. Tip sites. Coaches. Meetups. But these guys reject it all in favour of re-affirmation from each other that their anger towards women is justified.
Speaking of dating sites, there’s now a MAGA Match site for alt-righters to find each other. My guess is it’s 99% men and 1% Russian bots.
I won’t link to it, but it’s amusing to speculate what the profiles are like. “I enjoy long moonlit goosesteps along the beach.”
Every profile will say
Favorite color: White
Favorite number: 1488
Favorite book: Atlas Shrugged
Occupation: Reddit commenter
@Jives
Even if they tried all that and cant get anywhere, doesnt make their anger justified. Guys need to learn that just because they put themselves out there, doesnt make them entitled to a chance/date
Saw the link up on GamerGhazi and I was amused by this one comment expressing outrage that we’re not accepting mental health excuses for hideous incel behaviour (emphasis mine):
All I’ve got is my own depression to call upon, but I certainly didn’t join an online subculture that talked about other human being in such apocalyptic dehumanizing terms. And frankly, whatever issues they may or may not have, they certainly don’t warrant any empathy from me at that point. They’re bad people and should be treated as bad people.
@ dcfc
Didn’t say it did, just observing that if the desire for companionship was genuine, there’s resources to improve one’s chances of finding somebody compatible. But everything that incels say just screams that they’re not really interested in companionship, just the perceived validation of peers.
@Jives
Their interest is genuine I think., but its their reaction to rejection which is appalling. Yes finding a woman would validate them but they would love a girlfriend too that they can have a connection to. But its tough fucking shit, cant always get what you want in life. Man up, swallow it and make peace with the fact that girls dont find you attractive. Dont sit there and whine ffs
Can you love a person you see as validation and a status symbol?
Not saying that but finding a girl will increase your confidence and will validate you in the way that you are getting married or in a relationship as everyone else in society is.
The thing about getting treatment is that it may open up the most horrible thing possible for many drawn to the Incel community. They might actually get better! And in getting better they would have to confront the fact that while they may have not planted all the seeds of their discontent, they cultivated for them, cared for them, owned every single one of them until that garden of misery belonged to them alone and they don’t get to blame the “Chads” and “Stacies” and “Normies”. They get to utter some of the most terrifying words a person can say to themselves: “This is my fault.” That they aren’t the cosmic playthings of an uncaring god. They aren’t the child bringing prosperity to Omelas. That the most important person in their lives is the primary cause of their misery, and that most important person is…them.
@CleverForAGirl
I’m gonna say no.
If you’re wrapping your ego up in a person, you don’t love them.
I really hope you’re a teenager, otherwise it’s creepy as fuck that you keep referring to women as “girls.”
Anyway, as I pointed out to you earlier, women are people.
We’re not interchangeable female shaped things that exist to validate men. We’re not achievements and not prizes.
It’s great that you’re not as full of rage as the incels David covers are, but this entire thread you’ve been speaking of women in really objectifying ways and that’s not cool either.
@ dcfcfan1
And antiseptic cream might clean up acne, but that’s not a reason to marry it.
Women are not there to be applied to your ego like ointment.
If you think everyone else in society is getting married or in a relationship, your horizons must be very limited. Have you never heard of the people who are getting divorced? Or single? Or celibate? Are they not members of society too?
And – other people (women or not) are not in the world to become your ticket to some imaginary club.
I certainly didnt mean to objectify women and I apologise if I came across this way. I was just talking about the people I know and my family when I was talking about getting married. If I havent got in a relationship by the age of lets say 27 -ish , I know that people around me will think that there is something wrong with me. Thats probably where my horizon comes from.
And I never once mentioned ego. And I get that women are people and they arent there to validate women. As for women being “prizes to be won”, well I have left the game , so there certainly wont be no “prize” for me 🙂
On a serious note, I tried talking to INCELS and get them to realise that there is so much more to life than getting laid or finding a girlfriend but it was just impossible. Absolutely draining. Tried suggesting them books, gyms they can go to, new hobbies,… no use.
(Codependence + Depression)Right-Wing Beliefs = Incel
At least that is what I get from the subreddit. I can sort of empathize with them though. Before I was on anti-depressants I was also really angry and nihilistic. The few times since I have gone off of them due to not being able to afford them it always goes the same way: start out okay, become more pessimistic, eventually the self hating voice overpowers all the other internal voices, and eventually I react to the build up of self hate in the way my gender role has taught me: turning it outwards. It is like being the subordinate member of a gang run by a monster who gets bored and violent. You wind up trying to find exterior targets for him to bully so he doesn’t bully of you.
When off meds I also slowly gravitate towards right wing beliefs, I find. It shouldn’t be shocking. Right wing beliefs, whether political or religious, are inherently eugenic in nature. The weak and the strong, the alpha and the beta, the saved and the damned. Everything is a game with winners and losers.
Never understood this alpha and beta shit, just a way for men to put other men down. Not healthy at all.
Isaac Newton apparently never got laid or even managed a kiss, does he suddenly become beta?
@Christina Nordlander
Again, not always treatable. It also does not completely override your ability to make decisions.
@Virgin Mary
Many games have an actual story, featuring positive interaction between male and female characters, though (with female characters having varied personalities, too. Even if they’re still intended to be appealing to female-attracted male players, it’s more than ‘insta-compliant sex trophy’). Even a series like Mario, while decidedly not ideal, at least presents Mario as actually doing something to earn Princess Peaches’ affection, and he’s not the most conventionally attractive, either. The Zelda series presents at least some positive interaction, and to an extent Zelda does her own thing, too. However reductive the relationship presented was (eg. give this character gifts so they’ll like you – which often still has specific types of gifts for a specific character, so personality is taken into account), I’ve not really played a game where my character got awarded a woman just like that. Media portrayals have an impact, but choosing to go quite this absurdly far is really these guys’ own fault.
And they’re the type who complain that/act like women are totally different from men, but who then try to drive away any women who enjoy hobbies like gaming, too. They really seem to dislike it when I say something like ‘Hey, I’m a woman, I’m a gamer! And my sister and her partner aren’t really gamers as such, but they play videogames together sometimes. He’s a skinny physics nerd, btw’. I think it’s just this typical patriarchal thing where men try to shove women into a very narrow gender role, then complain they have nothing in common (no duh, because you wouldn’t let them do anything associated with your role) while still refusing to let the women move beyond that role. It’s about power over women, nothing else.
@Scildfreja Unnyðnes
That’s a good an interesting way of putting it, and indeed describes them very well. It seems far more like manipulative behaviour, abuser mindset, than that of someone with depression.