Instead of addressing their problems they wallow in their misery and focus on getting back at the people they blame for their situation.
Namely women and I guess other men who are in relationships.
They're not looking for help so much as revenge.
-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
BBC News - Toronto van attack: Inside the dark world of 'incels'
- Thread starter CeeCee
- Start date
Instead of addressing their problems they wallow in their misery and focus on getting back at the people they blame for their situation.
Namely women and I guess other men who are in relationships.
They're not looking for help so much as revenge.
Exactly. Its radicalization, same as other forms like jihadism.
The Toronto van attack guy was a student with no history that would be flagged, though.
This ep covers a lot of those questions.
In the 90s, while working late at a university lab alone, a young woman was approached by a man who was crying. They then had a long conversation where he laid out his frustrations over being unable to find success dating. Afterward, she reflected on her own romantic problems. Being a full-time (doctoral?) student, and a closeted gay woman who hadn't yet come to terms with her sexuality, it was also difficult for her romantically.
She decided to create a support group. In naming it she didn't want to focus on virginity because of the social stigma, and also because she felt that people that lost their virginity at a young age may still experience social anxiety and identity issues in their 20s. The idea of being self-identified "celibate" made sense, but celibacy implied a lifestyle choice and had religious connotations. So she decided on the "involuntary" modifier.
The board had rules that you couldn't blame or attack people or groups, and that you had to take responsibility for yourself. Of course, being the internet, people went off and formed splinter groups. Or, once they sorted through their "INVCEL" issues, they would "graduate out" and leave the message board. So two problems. 1) If people didn't like the board's rules, they would move on, and 2) if they were helped by the board, they would move on.
She said that the community failed in part because there were no people to help or to give guidance to those who may have struggled with self-esteem like them at one point, and then adjusted. So the board's most prolific and identifiable participants were those people that were kinda stuck in the incel phase.
She eventually lost interest in the board and moved onto other things in her life, and didn't even hear about the "incel" splitoff of her "invcel" board until the Toronto van attack. She feels responsible, and is now attempting to become involved in online communities again, because she feels that her leaving invcel as a moderator created a vacuum for the wrong people to take over that community.
She decided to create a support group. In naming it she didn't want to focus on virginity because of the social stigma, and also because she felt that people that lost their virginity at a young age may still experience social anxiety and identity issues in their 20s. The idea of being self-identified "celibate" made sense, but celibacy implied a lifestyle choice and had religious connotations. So she decided on the "involuntary" modifier.
The board had rules that you couldn't blame or attack people or groups, and that you had to take responsibility for yourself. Of course, being the internet, people went off and formed splinter groups. Or, once they sorted through their "INVCEL" issues, they would "graduate out" and leave the message board. So two problems. 1) If people didn't like the board's rules, they would move on, and 2) if they were helped by the board, they would move on.
She said that the community failed in part because there were no people to help or to give guidance to those who may have struggled with self-esteem like them at one point, and then adjusted. So the board's most prolific and identifiable participants were those people that were kinda stuck in the incel phase.
She eventually lost interest in the board and moved onto other things in her life, and didn't even hear about the "incel" splitoff of her "invcel" board until the Toronto van attack. She feels responsible, and is now attempting to become involved in online communities again, because she feels that her leaving invcel as a moderator created a vacuum for the wrong people to take over that community.
i dont think they were talking about a criminal history but more their history with relationships and what they discuss online.
Going through people's internet history is...probably great for answering some of these questions (indeed a number of these 'crazed attackers' seem to enjoy using social media)... but that sounds morally dubious and difficult to enforce and maintain, which sorta just cycles right back to limiting these chat spaces because that's way easier and helps kill toxicity at its root.
Shocking? Without a tight moderation, and clear goals, this seems about par for the course.
Background checks can dig up relationship information. If an applicant has never had a history of a relationship i could see that being used as a red flag for hiring or to be put on a watch list. As for Ellen Paos comment on what companies can do now about incels that are currently employed its pretty much the same thing as an initial background check into relationship history and then going from there.
Again, personally i feel this is the wrong way to address the problem but there seems to be wide support for something like this.
It's not too hard to comprehend. These people feel as if there is absolutely no way for them to obtain sex despite the fact that they want it, so they are incel -- involuntarily celibate. If an incel has sex, yeah, they're out. I remember back when the owner of WizardChan got laid and the community went in on him until he eventually gave up control of the board to someone else.
For those of you who are interested inside the mind of incels, I highly recommend Elliot Rodger's "My Twisted World".
These people are sick, they refuse to get help, and are extremely dangerous. We gotta stop looking at them less like sad losers and more like potential killers.
These people are sick, they refuse to get help, and are extremely dangerous. We gotta stop looking at them less like sad losers and more like potential killers.
One can be a socially inept virgin without being one of these incel fuckwads though.
i agree but when it comes to safety and peace people are looking at it like "not all socially inept virgins are incels but all incels are socially inept virgins." People that are demanding background checks and monitoring are going to have to use some kind of criteria for screening and for incels that is going to be mens relationship status with women (or lack).
Yep - incels are a militant form of the 'forever alone' population. Most virgins (even long-term ones) understand their flaws and either work to improve them or accept their virginity. These are the people who have a chance to eventually get laid. Incels spend their time blaming everyone else for their problems, and their anti-woman hate radiates so strongly that it almost instinctively keeps women away. The former are fine, but the latter are dangerous.
I think these posts really get at some key parts of what makes the community what it is. Too many commenters here and elsewhere view the movement and community through too simple of a lens, but there's a weird history to the culture that started with the disabled and LGBTQ where there were huge physical or cultural barriers to partnering in any real capacity. There are as many women that aren't getting laid as there are men, or perhaps even more. So, why has only the male side gone batshit? There's a whole bunch of reasons why, but toxic masculinity is absolutely a big part of it. Women aren't shamed constantly for not having sex, so the male side of failed relationships focuses on and amplifies that one issue, when there is a lot more going on.
There really are a whole bunch of physically and emotionally disabled people or people that are wildly ostracized or secluded by their local communities out there that have massive barriers to forming relationships, but the modern incel movement has grown out of that like a cancer.
Yes, if they'll ever accept it. Which is something that they deny they need.
Those are the hardest to help, the ones that think everyone else is in the wrong, and they're an extreme version of that.
Yeah, it is going to be really hard to pierce their bubble world. But they should be a sample case in how and why we should push for and encourage professional help.
...I hope you're joking
So if you do this, and they come up via that screening, how is your only course of action not just firing them. And if you do that, how does that help things at all? How does that do anything but further radicalize people who are already super unsteady?
No they feel there's no way to obtain sex with perfect 10 obedient subservient chaste pure wifemother.
There are two parallel problems here.
Incels, as a self identified hate group are creating home grown socio-political violent extremists (who are definitely not terrorists according to the mainstream media) leading to harm and deaths of innocents.
Toxic masculinity including seemingly "benign" forms like virgin shaming contribute to the atmosphere of resentment for men who, without sufficient emotional support, turn to incel communities, the alt right, MGTOW, etc. for validation, even if those communities are harmful to already fragile men in the long run.
Incels, as a self identified hate group are creating home grown socio-political violent extremists (who are definitely not terrorists according to the mainstream media) leading to harm and deaths of innocents.
Toxic masculinity including seemingly "benign" forms like virgin shaming contribute to the atmosphere of resentment for men who, without sufficient emotional support, turn to incel communities, the alt right, MGTOW, etc. for validation, even if those communities are harmful to already fragile men in the long run.
Last edited:
Indeed. One fueling the other is the real problem here and, unfortunately, disassociating with either in full simply makes the problem worse. Violence caused by self proclaimed INCEL's is simply the result of ignoring negative mental health issues by just proclaiming it to be "boy stuff". The real solution is therapy and discussion with people who can't provide a destructive echo chamber.
Sorta true. They feel like those are the women who would have sex with them, but also that those women do not exist.
User Banned (1 Week): Arguing in bad faith, comparing a hate movement to minority groups.
The intrusive invasion of privacy and insertion of the state into peoples lives being suggested is unacceptable to me.
Switch out incels with a minority group and this forum would absolutely not be ok with it. Especially the suggestion that people socially inept with the opposite gender are guilty until proven otherwise. I'm not sure if people are aware this covers a lot of people in this forum. People did not think this through
Switch out incels with a minority group and this forum would absolutely not be ok with it. Especially the suggestion that people socially inept with the opposite gender are guilty until proven otherwise. I'm not sure if people are aware this covers a lot of people in this forum. People did not think this through
Point is they aren't involuntarily celibate they're just misogynists
Edit: Sorry, I responded without regarding the post as about self-identified Incels.
Last edited:
I used to be a mod on a shyness forum a decade ago and we would kick out the woman haters whenever they decended on the forum, don't know if incel was a term they used then but some did come across as very militant in blaming women for everything. They often came from a newsgroup that was a complete cess pool that I was unlucky enough to encounter on my early searches for support. Even then I worried about minds more impressionable then mine being warped by thier extream views. I would very much be in favour of shutting down these kinds of communites as much as possible.
Really don't like the sound of some suggested solutions in this thread though. You'd be throwing a lot of decent people who struggle with relationships under the bus if your using relationship history to root out incels. I didn't get my first girlfriend until I was 26 and yet I was able to get to that age without becoming a bitter asshole about it.
Really don't like the sound of some suggested solutions in this thread though. You'd be throwing a lot of decent people who struggle with relationships under the bus if your using relationship history to root out incels. I didn't get my first girlfriend until I was 26 and yet I was able to get to that age without becoming a bitter asshole about it.
Gotta monitor those Black Identity Extremists.
Last edited:
Excuse me?
We're talking specifically about incels here. Incels are absolutely misogynists.
Yup. Can't agree more. Those who need the most help, are never the ones to quickly accept it. This is true across the board.
I read this shortly after his attack and death and it's an incredible insight into how people like him think.
You can see him repeat the same thoughts and the same views over and over and over and basically add his own twisted context to very normal actions.
At the same time, if you take his portrayal of certain actions by his parents and other people as facts and not his twisted fiction of reality, you can see where he was steered bit by bit into subscribing to this horribly messed up world view.
This is a tough issue. If these people had been greeted with empathy and had a valid place to turn to at a certain point they probably could have been diverted from going down a path of complete contempt. I think that's the problem with radicalized groups of people. At some point they needed an intervention, before they were radicalized, because dealing with it afterwards is so much more difficult. At the same time offering empathy instead of outright rejection to people that are radicalized is revolting. It's a tricky line to walk to get to people before they've been indoctrinated without excusing people who have been.
Incels are not an oppressed minority, they're violent misogynists
I love playing the game of pretending some of the posts in here are about about ISIS.
It is amazing how terrorists with a mostly white male face become people were asked to emphasize with and not condemn as misogynists...
It is amazing how terrorists with a mostly white male face become people were asked to emphasize with and not condemn as misogynists...
There's a lot to be said about the same mechanisms and channels being used to radicalize young men by ISIS, the Alt Right, and Incels. People aren't born misogynists, bigots, or fanatics.
I'm surprised the mods here let this thread exist, considering they took my comment personally. I would not be surprised if the likes of these people were lurking on this forum.
Ain't no one talking about how plenty of ISIS men are on the spectrum so we shouldn't label them all misogynists
There are almost certainly loads here. There's too much of a "forever alone" presence for there to not be a huge thread of misogyny as well.
Our all-or-nothing culture is part of the problem as well. The notion that 15-year-olds are thinking, on any level, that they're "failures" before they've even had a chance to enter the real world is mind-boggling.
Elliot Rodger was a good looking guy, wealthy, and a fairly strong (if melodramatic) writer. He probably would have done quite well in life if he had gotten some treatment for his languishing mental health.
Elliot Rodger was a good looking guy, wealthy, and a fairly strong (if melodramatic) writer. He probably would have done quite well in life if he had gotten some treatment for his languishing mental health.
Even the main guy in the article that is the topic of this thread is a good looking guy. Like, how the fuck did he get radicalized that young? It's nice that he seems to be on the right path now, but there's obviously a lot wrong that he could get convinced he was one of the hopeless.
User Banned (1 Week): Sympathetic apologia for a misogynistic hate movement.
Maybe if ISIS recruits came from the socially inept rejects that we all saw in school there might be a point. Incels dont appear to be a movement with leadership but a gathering of misfits hostile to a world that has rejected them their entire lives. Calling them misogynists might be a correct label but it does nothing towards fixing the problem.
They need professional help, that's for sure. Radicalization in online communities preys upon the mentally ill and people that meed counseling or therapy and aren't getting it.
I think it is a thin line between the regular pity party of "forever alone" and Incels, and between the OG concept of incel (The Sessions and isolated LGBTQ) and the modern community.
You do a massive disservice to those with poor social skills by lumping them.in with the same pool as incels.
God these terrorists are not victims of rejection
i disagree. Just because most can move on from the teasing, bullying, and shaming doesnt mean that there isnt a root problem with out society at a fundamental level. i myself not only saw it in school but took part in helping shape monsters. People will just sigh and lament that "kids are cruel" but there is no real concern with fixing this problem.
Unlike people that commit violence for their religion there is no belief in an eternal reward granted by God for an incel harming people. Their motivation is different. They are lashing out because they feel there is no hope and without social bonds they have no stake in the future of their society. People like you think that shaming is going to be the answer. i think its the main reason we are here to begin with.
Because they're not that. They are dangerous and even violent misogynists.
This.
Plenty of men suffer from rejection and are unsuccessful at dating. Plenty of women too. Incels don't describe these people, they describe a specific group of people who think they are owed sex by women and blame them for their failures.
And while I can appreciate trying to come up with strategies to prevent radicalization (the same way I would support trying to reduce radicalization from the likes of Isis), they deserve no sympathy and I tire of this idea that we should feel sorry for them or support them.
Ahh yes it is mt fault incels hate me and want to murder me
"Shocking" because I can't recall any other support groups that started off with such good intentions straying so far from the original goal. Not shocking in terms of how it happened.