The manosphere is a collection of websites, blogs, and online forums promoting

masculinity Masculinity (also called manhood or manliness) is a set of attributes, behaviors, and roles associated with men and boys. Masculinity can be theoretically understood as socially constructed, and there is also evidence that some behaviors ...

misogyny Misogyny () is hatred of, contempt for, or prejudice against women. It is a form of sexism that is used to keep women at a lower social status than men, thus maintaining the societal roles of patriarchy. Misogyny has been widely practice ...

, and

opposition to feminism Antifeminism, also spelled anti-feminism, is opposition to some or all forms of feminism. In the late 19th century and early 20th century, antifeminists opposed particular policy proposals for women's rights, such as the right to vote, educa ...

. Communities within the manosphere include men's rights activists,

incel An incel ( , an abbreviation of "involuntary celibate") is a member of an online subculture of people who define themselves as unable to get a romantic or sexual partner despite desiring one. Discussions in incel forums are often character ...

s (involuntary celibates),

Men Going Their Own Way Men Going Their Own Way (MGTOW ) is an anti-feminist, misogynistic, mostly- online community advocating for men to separate themselves from women and from a society which they believe has been corrupted by feminism. The community is a part ...

(MGTOW),

pick-up artist Pickup artists (PUA), self-identified as dating coaches, the seduction community or the pickup community, is a movement of men (or women) whose goal is seduction and sexual success. The community exists through Internet newsletters and blogs, ma ...

s (PUA), and

fathers' rights The fathers' rights movement is a social movement whose members are primarily interested in issues related to family law, including child custody and child support, that affect fathers and their children. Many of its members are fathers who desi ...

groups. The manosphere overlaps with the

far-right Far-right politics, also referred to as the extreme right or right-wing extremism, are political beliefs and actions further to the right of the left–right political spectrum than the standard political right, particularly in terms of being ...

and

alt-right The alt-right, an abbreviation of alternative right, is a far-right, white nationalist movement. A largely online phenomenon, the alt-right originated in the United States during the late 2000s before increasing in popularity during the mid-2 ...

communities. It has also been associated with

online harassment Cyberbullying or cyberharassment is a form of bullying or harassment using Electronic communication network, electronic means. Cyberbullying and cyberharassment are also known as online bullying. It has become increasingly common, especially ...

and has been implicated in radicalizing men into misogynist beliefs and the glorification of

violence against women Violence against women (VAW), also known as gender-based violence and sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV), are violent acts primarily or exclusively committed against women or girls, usually by men or boys. Such violence is often c ...

. Some sources have associated manosphere-based radicalization with

mass shootings There is a lack of consensus on how to define a mass shooting. Most terms define a minimum of three or four victims of gun violence (not including the shooter or in an inner city) in a short period of time, although an Australian study from 20 ...

motivated by misogyny.; ;

History

The manosphere grew out of social movements such as the men's liberation movement of the 1970s and 80s. Groups now considered to be a part of the manosphere, such as the

men's rights movement The men's rights movement (MRM) is a branch of the men's movement. The MRM in particular consists of a variety of groups and individuals (men's rights activists or MRAs) who focus on general social issues and specific government services whi ...

, predate the term "manosphere". The term, a play on the word "

blogosphere The blogosphere is made up of all blogs and their interconnections. The term implies that blogs exist together as a connected community (or as a collection of connected communities) or as a social networking service in which everyday authors can pu ...

", is believed to have first appeared on

Blogspot Blogger is an American online content management system founded in 1999 which enables multi-user blogs with time-stamped entries. Pyra Labs developed it before being acquired by Google in 2003. Google hosts the blogs, which can be accessed th ...

in 2009. It was subsequently popularized by Ian Ironwood, a pornography marketer who collected a variety of blogs and forums in book form as ''The Manosphere: A New Hope For Masculinity''. The term entered the popular lexicon when news media began to use it in stories about men who had committed acts of misogynist violence,

sexual assault Sexual assault is an act in which one intentionally sexually touches another person without that person's consent, or coerces or physically forces a person to engage in a sexual act against their will. It is a form of sexual violence, which ...

, and online harassment. Emma A. Jane identifies the late 2000s–early 2010s as a "tipping point" when manosphere communities moved from the fringes of the Internet towards the mainstream. She hypothesizes this was related to the advent of

Web 2.0 Web 2.0 (also known as participative (or participatory) web and social web) refers to websites that emphasize user-generated content, ease of use, participatory culture and interoperability (i.e., compatibility with other products, systems, and ...

and the rise of

social media Social media are interactive media technologies that facilitate the creation and sharing of information, ideas, interests, and other forms of expression through virtual communities and networks. While challenges to the definition of ''social me ...

, in combination with ongoing systemic misogyny within a

patriarchal Patriarchy is a social system in which positions of dominance and privilege are primarily held by men. It is used, both as a technical anthropological term for families or clans controlled by the father or eldest male or group of males ...

culture. Jane writes that the manosphere was well established by the time of the

GamerGate Gamergate may refer to: * Gamergate (ant), a worker ant that can store sperm and reproduce sexually * Gamergate (harassment campaign), targeting women in the video game industry * Lt. Gamergate, a character in the ''Adventure Time'' episode "Dent ...

controversy in 2014, and misogynistic language such as graphic

rape threat A rape threat is a threat made against another person of rape or sexual assault. Rape threats may often be made anonymously or online through the use of social media, and especially against social media influencers. These threats are often made ag ...

s against women had entered mainstream discourse, being deployed by men not necessarily identified with any specific manosphere group.

Ideology and content

The manosphere is a heterogeneous group of online communities that includes

men's-rights activist The men's rights movement (MRM) is a branch of the men's movement. The MRM in particular consists of a variety of groups and individuals (men's rights activists or MRAs) who focus on general social issues and specific government services which ...

s (MRAs),; ; ; ; ;

s (involuntary celibates),; ; ;

(MGTOW),; ; ; ;

s (PUAs),; ; ; ; ; ; and

groups.; ; ; ; Some groups within the manosphere have adversarial relationships with one another. According to media scholar

Debbie Ging Debbie (or Debby or Deb) is a feminine given name, commonly but not always short for Deborah (or Debra and related variants). Notable people *Debbie Allen, American actress, choreographer and film director * Debbie Armstrong, American athlete * ...

, subgroups such as MRAs and PUAs "exaggerate their differences in displays of infight posturing, in spite of the fact that their philosophies are almost identical". While the specifics of each group's ideology sometimes conflict, the general ideology of manosphere groups centers on the promotion of masculinity, strong opposition to feminism, and misogyny. In particular, feminists are portrayed as ignoring male victims of sexual assault and encouraging false rape accusations against men. Journalist Caitlin Dewey argues that the main tenets of the manosphere can be reduced to (1) the corruption of modern society by feminism, in violation of inherent sex differences between men and women; and (2) the ability of men to save society or achieve sexual prowess by adopting a

hyper-masculine Hypermasculinity is a psychological term for the exaggeration of male stereotypical behavior, such as an emphasis on physical strength, aggression, and sexuality. This term has been used ever since the research conducted by Donald L. Mosher an ...

role and forcing women to submit to them. Criminologist Lisa Sugiura writes that disparate groups within the manosphere are "united by the central belief that feminine values, propelled by feminism, dominate society and promote a 'misandrist' ideology that needs to be overthrown". Tracie Farrell of

Open University The Open University (OU) is a British Public university, public research university and the largest university in the United Kingdom by List of universities in the United Kingdom by enrolment, number of students. The majority of the OU's underg ...

and colleagues write that in addition to the "

angry white men ''Angry White Men: American Masculinity at the End of an Era'' is a sociological critique of the angry white male phenomenon in America by Michael Kimmel, first published in 2013. The book was re-published in April 2017 with a new preface by Kimm ...

" associated with the

, the manosphere also contains " men of colour, struggling with systemic racism that extends to beauty ideals and status".

Jargon

The manosphere has its own distinct jargon. The idea of ''

misandry Misandry () is the hatred of, contempt for, or prejudice against men. Men's rights activists and other masculinist groups have criticized modern laws concerning divorce, domestic violence, the draft, circumcision (known as genital mutilation ...

'' (hatred of or prejudice against men) is commonly invoked, both as an equivalent to

and a way to deny the existence of institutionalized sexism. A central tenet is the concept of the ''

red pill The terms "red pill" and "blue pill" refer to a choice between the willingness to learn a potentially unsettling or life-changing truth by taking the red pill or remaining in contented ignorance with the blue pill. The terms are associated with ...

'', a metaphor borrowed from the film ''

The Matrix ''The Matrix'' is a 1999 science fiction action film written and directed by the Wachowskis. It is the first installment in ''The Matrix'' film series, starring Keanu Reeves, Laurence Fishburne, Carrie-Anne Moss, Hugo Weaving, and Joe Pantolia ...

''. It concerns awakening men to the supposed reality that society is dominated by feminism and biased against men. Manospherians believe that feminists and

political correctness ''Political correctness'' (adjectivally: ''politically correct''; commonly abbreviated ''PC'') is a term used to describe language, policies, or measures that are intended to avoid offense or disadvantage to members of particular groups in socie ...

obscure this reality, and that men are victims who must fight to protect themselves. Accepting the manosphere's ideology is equated with "taking the red pill", and those who do not are seen as "blue pilled" or as having "taken the blue pill". Such terminology originated on the antifeminist subreddit /r/TheRedPill and was later taken up by men's rights and MGTOW sites.

Donna Zuckerberg Donna Zuckerberg is an American classicist, feminist, and writer. She is author of the book ''Not All Dead White Men'' (2018), about the appropriation of classics by misogynist groups on the Internet. She was editor-in-chief of ''Eidolon'', a ...

writes, "The Red Pill represents a new phase in online misogyny. Its members not only mock and belittle women; they also believe that in our society, men are oppressed by women." Men are commonly divided into "

alpha Alpha (uppercase , lowercase ; grc, ἄλφα, ''álpha'', or ell, άλφα, álfa) is the first letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of one. Alpha is derived from the Phoenician letter aleph , whi ...

" and "

beta Beta (, ; uppercase , lowercase , or cursive ; grc, βῆτα, bē̂ta or ell, βήτα, víta) is the second letter of the Greek alphabet. In the system of Greek numerals, it has a value of 2. In Modern Greek, it represents the voiced labiod ...

" males within an evolutionary-psychology framework, where "alphas" are seen as sexually dominant and attractive to women, who are hardwired to want sex with alphas but will pair with "beta" males for financial benefits. Among MRAs and PUAs this argument is known as "alpha fux beta bux".

Associated movements

The manosphere overlaps with

white-supremacist White supremacy or white supremacism is the belief that white people are superior to those of other races and thus should dominate them. The belief favors the maintenance and defense of any power and privilege held by white people. White s ...

and far-right ideologies, including the

neoreactionary The Dark Enlightenment, also called the neo-reactionary movement (sometimes abbreviated to NRx), is an anti-democratic, anti-egalitarian, reactionary philosophical and political movement. In 2007 and 2008, software engineer Curtis Yarvin, writin ...

, white-nationalist alt-right movement.; ; Zuckerberg writes that many alt-right members are either pick-up artists or MGTOW, and "the policing of white female sexuality is a major concern" of the alt-right. The severity of the antifeminism espoused within these communities varies, with some espousing fairly mild sexism and others glorifying extreme misogyny.

Racism Racism is the belief that groups of humans possess different behavioral traits corresponding to inherited attributes and can be divided based on the superiority of one race over another. It may also mean prejudice, discrimination, or antagoni ...

and

xenophobia Xenophobia () is the fear or dislike of anything which is perceived as being foreign or strange. It is an expression of perceived conflict between an in-group and out-group and may manifest in suspicion by the one of the other's activities, a ...

are also common among groups in the manosphere, and perceived threats against Western civilization are a popular topic.

Radicalization and violence

The manosphere has been associated with

, radicalizing men into misogynist beliefs and the glorification of

.; ; ; ; Some sources have associated manosphere-based radicalization with

motivated by misogyny. Robin Mamié of

École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne École may refer to: * an elementary school in the French educational stages normally followed by secondary education establishments (collège and lycée) * École (river), a tributary of the Seine flowing in région Île-de-France * École, Savoi ...

and colleagues associate radicalization into far-right ideologies via the manosphere with the idea of the alt-right pipeline.

Websites

The manosphere comprises various websites, blogs, and online forums. Noted sites include /r/TheRedPill, '' Return of Kings'', and ''

A Voice for Men A Voice for Men, also known as AVfM, AVFM or AV4M, is a United States-based for-profit limited liability company and online publication founded in 2009 by Paul Elam. A proponent of the men's rights movement, or "Men's Human Rights Activism", it ...

'', as well as (the now-defunct) ''PUAHate'' and ''SlutHate''.; ; ;

Reddit Reddit (; stylized in all lowercase as reddit) is an American social news aggregation, content rating, and discussion website. Registered users (commonly referred to as "Redditors") submit content to the site such as links, text posts, imag ...

has been a popular gathering place for manosphere supporters, and several forums on the site are geared toward its ideas. However, in the late 2010s and 2020s Reddit began to take steps to discourage more extreme manosphere subreddits. Some were banned, such as /r/incels (banned in 2017), its successor /r/braincels (banned in 2018), and /r/MGTOW (banned in August 2021); other subreddits such as /r/TheRedPill have been "quarantined", meaning that a warning is displayed to users about the content of the subreddit and users must sign in before they're allowed to enter. As a result, some of these communities have found new homes on websites that are more welcoming of extreme content, such as Gab.

Public perception

The manosphere has received significant coverage in the media from its association with high-profile violent attacks including the

2014 Isla Vista killings The 2014 Isla Vista killings were a series of misogynistic terror attacks in Isla Vista, California. On the evening of May 23, 22-year-old Elliot Rodger killed six people and injured fourteen others—by gunshot, stabbing and vehicle rammi ...

in California, the 2015 Umpqua Community College shooting in Oregon, and the 2018 Toronto van attack, as well as phenomena such as the sustained online abuse towards female members of the video game community that came to be known as

. Following the Isla Vista shooting, the killer Elliot Rodger was found to have been an active participant on the ''PUAHate'' manosphere forum.; Following the attack, Dewey wrote that, while the manosphere was not to blame for Rodger's attack, "Rodger's misogynistic rhetoric seems undeniably influenced by the manosphere". The sociologist Michael Kimmel argued "it would be facile to argue the manosphere ... urged odgerto do this. I think those places are kind of a solace ... They provide a kind of locker room, a place where guys can gripe about all the bad things that are being done to them by women". Arthur Goldwag described the manosphere in the Spring 2012 edition of the Southern Poverty Law Center's '' Intelligence Report'' as an "underworld of misogynists, woman-haters whose fury goes well beyond criticism of the family court system, domestic violence laws, and false rape accusations...

ho are Ho (or the transliterations He or Heo) may refer to: People Language and ethnicity * Ho people, an ethnic group of India ** Ho language, a tribal language in India * Hani people, or Ho people, an ethnic group in China, Laos and Vietnam * Hiri ...

devoted to attacking virtually all women (or, at least, Westernized ones)." He added a caveat later that year, saying, "It should be mentioned that the SPLC did not label MRAs as members of a hate movement; nor did our article claim that the grievances they air on their websites – false rape accusations, ruinous divorce settlements and the like – are all without merit. But we ''did'' call out specific examples of misogyny and the threat, overt or implicit, of violence." In 2018, the SPLC added male supremacy as a category they track on their list of

hate group A hate group is a social group that advocates and practices hatred, hostility, or violence towards members of a race, ethnicity, nation, religion, gender, gender identity, sexual orientation, or any other designated sector of society. Acc ...

s. The British anti-extremism group Hope not Hate included the manosphere in its 2019 ''State of Hate'' report.

Notes

References

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