It’s PLEDGE DRIVE time again! WHTM is now ad free and entirely dependent on folks like you for its continued existence. If you’ve donated already, THANKS! If you haven’t, and you can afford it, please DONATE HERE NOW! Thanks again!
By David Futrelle
Sullen teenagers have been yelling “I didn’t ask to be born” at their parents for, well, probably for millennia now. But leave it to the “involuntary celibates” of Incels.me to come up with a new twist on this ancient theme. In a recent post on the Incel,me forums — highlighted by the excellent Just Incel Things Twitter account — one bitter young man made this dramatic announcement:
Setting aside the fact that genetics is a complicated thing — conventionally attractive parents can have ugly kids and vice versa — one has to wonder how exactly Mr. Wizardcel managed to apportion the blame for his alleged bad looks between his parents — each of whom contributed equally to his genetic makeup.
Is his mother notably uglier than his dad, or does he just think she’s somehow more responsible for his looks because he lived in her womb? Or maybe his father is the ugly one — and Mr. Wizardcel blames her for marrying him? (Men’s Rights Activists and other reactionaries have made similar arguments blaming the mothers of violent men for existence of male violence in the world.) These guys are ingenious at figuring out ways to blame women for things over which they have no control.
So how did other incels react to Wizardcel’s announcement? Several called him out for taking out his frustrations with life on his mother and her genes. But others agreed with him wholeheartedly — and some went on to suggest that his existence was even more meaningless than he already assumed.
“There is no meaning of an incels existence,” wrote someone called Justshavebruh, because life is defined by “the ability to procreate and we’re not able to. We are not even alive per definition.”
Someone called Platypus took this weird evo-psych “argument” and ran with it, arguing that
for a biological being to fully express its life, it must make full use of its entire array of biological features. The less features you use, the closer to death you are. It’s self-evident looking at how old people become less and less physically able, until they die.
Not being able to procreate, is a deathlike existence.
Justshavebruh responded by declaring that
A virus is more alive than an incel. We also need an host to procreate. But we simply are not able to. Which means:
omae wa mou shindeiru
NANI?!
Just a word of advice, fellas: If you think of yourself as a virus (or something worse) and women as “hosts,” well, you aren’t going to get a lot of dates. And you shouldn’t get a lot of dates. Or any.
(That last little bit in the quote is a reference to an anime; according to Urban Dictionary the phrase “omae wa mou shindeiru” roughly translates to “you are already dead.”)
I don’t know what more to say to this line of argument than this:
I’ve heard people argue, in all seriousness, that we should be willing to overlook the violent misogyny that permeates incel culture because, well, that’s just a form of male bonding, and these communities provide support for depressed young men.
But that’s wrong, in every respect. We can’t dismiss the violent misogyny; not only is it awful and dangerous in itself, but, as the discussion above about viruses and hosts makes pretty clear, it’s also inextricably linked to the incels’ particular brand of self-hatred.
Incel communities like Incels.me aren’t “support groups.” They’re “kick-out-the-supports” groups. They lead already angry and depressed men to hate their lives even more — and to blame women for everything they think is wrong with them. This isn’t just a bunch of angry young men venting on the internet. Because nothing gets vented; the pressure just builds and builds. These communities are incubating future Elliot Rodgers and Alec Minassians.
As absurd as incel discussions often look — with their cracked anti-logic, their memes and jokes and anime references — this is what radicalization looks like, and it’s happening every hour of every day on the online venues where incels congregate.
PS sorry for the double post. Don’t know why it happened just now
@Hexum, my duck, I say this out of kindness and in the spirit of conciliation;
I believe your intentions were good, but you unintentionally hurt people in turning those intentions into words. This happens, and every time it does happen, it’s an opportunity to learn about the world. Please take it.
No apology should be qualified with a but or a please reread.
stop pointing to your intent after the fact,
start thinking of consequence before it.
Scilfreja
Yes, yes, yes. Absolutely.
I tried to clarify what i wrote in the hopes that sime who were hurt would not feel attacked. I know it came off as overly defensive, and furtherly insensitive and I apologize to all for that
I certainly will be more attentive to how I say things in the future. And I thank you for critiquing in a way that was understanding and kind.
Any time, my duck. Please forgive me as I dig into your reply a bit – I think it could be enlightening for people reading. It’s not an attack on you, just sort of self-reflection on my own reply to you.
My first reply was a lot more sharp-toothed. I don’t want an argument, and my first reaction would have more likely made one – it was more curt and abrupt. It was just the two lines at the end, a bit of a verbal slap. I added the top bit to give you an opportunity to brace for it and see it coming.
This sort of self-moderation is very typical of – well, I won’t say women, but it’s more typical of the feminine role. Community caretaking, self-moderation for the sake of reducing conflict, consideration of the viewpoint and feelings that others might have. I could just use the term emotional labour, but sometimes you gotta gut the fish.
I do this sort of thing instinctively, so don’t feel like I was giving you special consideration or that I think you’re especially fragile or sensitive – it’s just what I do. Even this reply has undergone three revisions by the time I’ve made it to the sentence I’m typing right now. Little modifications to sharpen the edge, to make sure that my words have the effect I intend. If you look back you can probably even see where I’ve changed my writing, and could possibly even glean what I’ve removed or added.
I think this habit, and the fact that our society codes it as being feminine, is what’s needed to actually reduce sexism, racism, etc. Empathy as a positive instinct and not a denigrated, enforced rule.
Anyways, that’s my ramble. I’m sorry if that felt like it was directed at you, Hexum – it wasn’t! I’ve been thinking a lot of things about the way empathy and sympathy work over the past months, and it’s good to write it out sometimes.
You laid it out very well, and it did not feel like an attack on me in any way. You certainly gave me an insight that eluded me in my intitial reactions-
And speaking of water fowl , I know I need to practice letting such feelings slide off my back as water to a duck- while still enjoying the lake.
It’s been a rough past few days- criticisms of my words certainly was just an easier thing to vent about.
I think there is a conversation that needs to be had- about when benign intent and poor word choice become toxic and hurtful, more so at times than outright hostility. Abd also about how men and women react to things differently, , but now is not that time, I realize. And I don’t want to make this the hexum7 show, so……
Translation: ‘Thank you for doing that emotional labour for me.’
Dude, the last time someone critisized you, you had a meltdown, she wasn’t being “understanding and kind”, she was walking on eggshells so you wouldn’t explode.
We’re all having a difficult time right now…the news from Washington, the nation, and the world is so horrible, so depressing, and so hopeless, I despair of our survival as a nation, society, of democracy, and even a species.
That’s why I try to avoid news on weekends. I just watch baseball.
Imagine how rough it’s been for the women you’re lashing out against.
kupo
Point taken
kupo
Point taken.
I actually had an experience almost exactly parallel to Doctir Fird’s in high school- a Catholic prep all-boys school, so kavanough’s being supported, even his disgusting facial expressions and obvious lies have taken a toll on me.
The one time I told anyone about it, years later, they made a joke about his I wanted it. Needless to say, I never told another soul except my therapist
I can’t fully emphasize with how women are treated like garbage everyday, but I know how I feel listening to this shitstorm and it’s sick and rotten in my stomach.
<3 Hex. I understand; far too many of us understand. Let's hope we've got traction on it this time and can see some positive change.
Positive change as in tearing down the whole rotten edifice with a bulldozer, of course. I think that’s pretty positive.
Thanks, @kupo, @Jes.
scildfrja
<3
I don’t often find myself wondering “how does this happen” because it’s usually pretty clear, but when I see something like this that forces me to see it from the mother’s point of view I can’t help but wonder that.
It’s so easy to think that I am teaching my son respect for himself and others and these parents didn’t do that, but it’s too easy. It’s probably not even correct. It’s an easy way to make myself think my son won’t end up like that by putting the blame where it doesn’t belong.
Which leads me right back to thinking “how does this happen.” It’s hard, especially as a woman who didn’t have sex until her late twenties but never thought once it was anyone’s fault, to imagine the turns someone would have to take in their life to end up quite that twisted.
okay this is not fair. no one is piling you – because we are all saying different things. you are using the comments policy to make sure you can have the final word. that’s not what it is for. if you apologise properly and behave humbly then it is different, but your apology always comes with “but” so it is only fair that people continue to reply to you, because it’s not a proper apology and you continue to try to be the “winner”.
i never thought this was about winning or losing. i
am. not gracious or a humble person. i was raised badly. i take responsibility for my words though
you can have the last word
No, I think you should have the last word.
I insist.
Stares at the last word just sitting there on the plate and wonders if it’s socially acceptable to take it.
Oy
Wow, passive-aggressive much?
If this douche is going to refer to his mother as a “foid,” his mother has every right to kick his douche ass to the curb. I’m the sort of person who tends to be very forgiving of foibles in my child, but being an incel is not a foible, it is a flaw. I think I would give him the choice to go to counseling for his hateful ideals, or GTFO.
@Kupo: The traditional solution is to cut the last word in half, take half of it, and then carry on staring passive-aggressively at the other party.
Considering how much they hate women I was already wondering what the incels thought about their immediate family members, especially their mothers, and I unpleasantly got the answer.
Maybe I should stop wondering about the details of an incel’s life, nothing good seems to ever come out of this community.
@Cat Mara their so-called Black Pill could be considered to be more nihilistic than most misanthropist ideologies, and even more nihilistic than Nietzsche, all because of obsession with looks and uncontrolled mysogyny. Some incels, I’ve found, turn out to be misanthropes and may share similar ideas to that ideology you mentioned.
“wow passive-aggressive much.”
Sorry.
You know what gets me about this whole rant? That not only does this dude blame his mom for “being ugly” (and he accuses her of lying to him when she tells him flat-out there’s nothing wrong with his looks because he is so fucking convinced that he’s ugly and that’s the cause of all his problems), he assumes his dad’s silence is somehow complicit agreement and understanding of his self-inflicted woes.
He solely blames his mother for his issues, and assumes his dad is 100 percent on his side because he said nothing (likely because he was fucking dumbfounded by this and had no idea how to respond).
And this is the reason that men need to speak up when they see this kind of shit. Because the men who do this garbage take silence as agreement and support.
Once again, I stand by my statement that inceldom is a destructive cult and needs to be dealt with as such. Anyone can be sucked into a cult. Anyone can fall victim to hearing what they want to hear when they are at a low point in life. It’s not solely a “mental health” issue (though that can contribute to it), so much as it’s cult programming.
Twenty bucks says this dude is perfectly normal in the looks department and his parents are stricken at what their son thinks of himself: his father standing dumbfounded and his mother trying to reassure him. He’s just convinced himself so thoroughly that he’s ugly that he can’t see it.