A growing network of online communities known collectively as the “manosphere” is emerging as a serious threat to gender equality, as toxic digital spaces increasingly influence real-world attitudes, behaviours, and policies, the UN agency dedicated to ending gender discrimination has warned.
I read the article and followed the thread. And yeah, online misogyny is a real problem. But here’s what no one wants to talk about. We’ve failed young men. Full stop.
About ten years ago, a friend of mine who’s gone now pointed me toward this thing called MGTOW. “Men Going Their Own Way.” I had just come out of a toxic divorce, so the idea of stepping back from dating and learning to enjoy life on my own terms seemed kind of healthy. At first glance, it looked like a decent idea. Just guys doing their own thing, not hassling anyone.
But once I started digging, I realized something else was going on. Beneath the surface, it wasn’t about peace or self-sufficiency. It was this boiling cauldron of resentment and hatred, mostly aimed at women. What looked like a community of self-reliant men turned out to be a recruiting ground for bitterness and blame. I didn’t buy into it, because I wasn’t angry at the world. But I could see how someone who felt isolated and ignored might get sucked in.
That’s what a lot of this comes down to. Loneliness. Disconnection. No sense of value or direction. And then someone online tells you it’s not your fault, it’s women’s fault, or society’s fault, or anyone but you. That stuff spreads fast because it gives people something to belong to.
I’m not saying you excuse the hate. But we better understand where it’s coming from if we want to stop it. You don’t fix this by lecturing young men. You fix it by giving them a sense of purpose and identity that doesn’t rely on putting someone else down.
And no, masculinity itself is not the enemy. We need better models of it. Mr. Rogers comes to mind. He was kind, decent, and strong in a quiet way. He didn’t need to bully or dominate anyone to be respected. That’s the kind of example we ought to be lifting up.
I can see that parents failed young men and the education system failed young men. But these men aren’t entitled to a woman or a high paying job. And quite frankly they probably aren’t capable of those things or they would be solving their own problems instead of blaming women for them
Manosphere men fall pray to the XY problem: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/XY_problem?wprov=sfla1.
They demand the X which is a girlfriend and money in order to solve problem Y which is a lack of social connectedness and decreasing standards of living.
They believe themselves entitled to X because of that. Actually, everyone (including Manosphere men) is entitled to a solution to Y which affects everyone appart from the bourgois (who still lack social connectedness) but the solution to that is Z which is a wholesale restructuring of our society and economy to one that is maximally democratic and socialist.
The problem with this is that it cedes all conversations about personal responsibility to the bad actors. I have a very similar story to you in terms of being an ideal candidate for manoshpere recruitment but understanding that it is bullshit. So why didn’t we fall into the trap? All these men have the same access to information. Many of them are actually quite privileged as well. What other area of society to we see an adult throwing a childlike tantrum and immediately turn to “well obviously society has failed them.” Do we say that about “Karens” making a scene? Do we say that about athletes who get DUIs?
Honestly I don’t feel like society has failed me at all. I think that’s a very fragile cop out for very fragile assholes. To me it evokes the idea that men should be coddled as society reconciles the consequences of centuries of patriarchal injury. The same people who will be all “we’ve failed men” will turn right around and say that the homeless person is clearly there because they are lazy, or that black neighborhoods have higher crime because black people are naturally violent.
It’s called emotional intelligence. It helps you not fly off the handle when minor bad things happen. Having the same reaction to a franchise movie being bad as someone totalling your car is not good, yet it’s all too common
To be fair, ghostbusters 3 was really bad.
Or the new star wars “movies”
I like how both of you knew what I was referring to :)
Men are often failed, that’s totally true. They’re also harmed by patriarchy eg being told to “man up” leading to them not seeing a doctor, work on themselves etc.
Ive read up on this and I’m a DA outreach worker so I have experience. A common theme with the Manosphere is blame shifting, and refusing to take action on their issues. Their mindset is wrong, and they don’t help themselves.
Interesting you should mention this because other than more suicides, this is the #1 reason why the average lifespan of men is less - procrastination of serious symptoms which are initial warning signs that become fatal illnesses.
Yep exactly and men’s health matters
Sounds like they need the shit slapped out of them.
Maybe they should just take the advice that we’ve been giving to women and minorities for the last 100 years and tell them that if they want to succeed they should just fucking work harder at it.
Succeed at capitalism? That’s a fool’s errand. Better to point them to the real enemy which is the bourgeoisie and the real solution which is for the working class to form democratic organizations aimed at overthrowing the ruling class and form worker led democratic ways of organizing society.
If a dam is leaking, smacking it and tell it to be more ‘dam-like’ will only break the dam eventually. For the people drowning, “the dam should have held, because that’s what dams do”
For people who want to improve our world, the goal needs to be defined as reducing gender conflict by increasing mutual gender respect. These words you’ve shared do not invite respect, but conflict. It is a phrase of someone who does not offer support, but demands submission.
Now it’s easy to reply “yes, I am demanding that men to stop killing women, and if that’s “submission”, so be it”. It’s of course a correct position.
But it would not be what you said. And there are a thousand ways to twist that phrase to deepen the conflict, out of context, or even subverting that context. And the conflict then only depends.
Resentment is a knife. It’s a tool of division, not unity. We should not use it to divide people by gender.
Problems is also that you can’t help people that don’t want to be helped. Since accepting help means for these young men that they have to accept that they themselves are partially to blame for their situation. Yes society has failed them but they have failed themselves as well. They have to own up to their own failures and not just put all the blame on the rest of the world.
I know some young men that haven’t gone full mgtow manosphere yet. And even at that point it’s hard to help them. When you reach out they basically reject it. You can basically see in their eyes that they rather want to stay in the bubble and gaslight themselves than to accept the truth and get help. It’s much easier to blame everyone else than to take responsibility.
Yep, and this is how marginalised communities are formed. Same with the text below.
And is why both POV are bad and should be removed from Lemmy. The owners of such communities get off on having their own army, not that they think they’re helping the cause.