MovieChat Forums > Joker (2019) Discussion > The incel phenomena

The incel phenomena

posted 5 years ago by h-oates (172)
101 replies | jump to latest

Good morning/evening/afternoon, ladies and gents. Roll up, roll up, roll up! Welcome to my thread on...you guessed it...the incel phenomena.

The word incel is a curious, painful word. It strips everything down and gets right to it. Involuntary celibacy. Sex can be wonderful, joyous and is a basic human need in order for our race to survive. The fact that someone is involuntary celibate sounds kind of sad... And yet now people fear this word. It doesn't invoke any kind of pity. The word incel causes people to panic. As you know, screenings for Joker are being watched and monitored closely in case of an incel attack... This, to my understanding, is all kinds of madness rolled into one.

First of all, the term itself is a myth. No one is involuntary celibate. People may have boxed themselves into a mental corner thinking that way. And believe me, I understand. I'm a 25 year old guy who's only ever being in one serious relationship and had only ever slept with a couple of women up to the age of 22. I know the pain of self loathing. I've been there and done that. But I've never believed I was cursed and shunned by society and women in general. I know that if I try hard enough, I will eventually get results with women. It may take several attempts and many knock backs, but so what? You see, half of everything is confidence. Since I learned that trick, my results improved. I have now evolved into someone who identifies as MGTOW (men going their own way), a much more tolerant way of thinking (if you cast aside the misogyny that's embedded within MGTOW, as I do). It's just a personal choice because after my first relationship ended just over a year ago, I realised that I'm simply not ready to take that step yet and have avoided pursuing relationships with women since.

Even if someone feels so under confident that they cannot approach several women, there is always the option of escorts (wherever you are in the world, legal or not, hookers are everywhere). And even if that fails you (or the idea irks you), there's always masturbation. Basically, what I'm saying is, I fail to see how the rise of inceldom has come about. It just makes no sense to me. It's a self defeating mindset. It's worrying because incels even have their own language (chads, etc) used to describe others. I do believe, also, that this narrative is being pushed by certain people in the media and with influence for some reason or other. I have my theories but am not willing to discuss them here.

So basically, I am inviting you all (incels and non-incels) to explain to me just what has happened, what has changed in the last few years that has seen the rise of incels to such a great degree. I welcome any and all opinions.

Thank you, ladies and gentlemen.

[–] [deleted] 5 years ago

I have to ask, apart from the scare mongering in the media, why is this film being linked to incels?
The character of Arthur Fleck has nothing in common whatsoever with these "incels". Please correct me if I'm wrong.
I understand the media pushing this idea that incels might be inspired by the film, but there's nothing presented in the film that incels could latch onto.

[–] BourbonKing (5655) 5 years ago

Thanks for the laughs, but there is no doubt that there's indeed a phenomena of INCEL culture permeating the United States and other parts of Westernized society. I think it's largely due to the toxicity of social media in general.

Social Media also brought on the Arab Spring and it's definitely fueled the the Hong Kong Protests because it enables mass communication in a heart beat. At no other time until now are we seeing the world shift gears based on something a lot of people read on their smartphones.

[–] Geff (453) 5 years ago

I'll try to explain. Although based on your text you might be too small brained to understand anything I say.

The amount of humans in the world is a novelty. In no other time throughout history has so many humans inhabited the planet simultaneously. Throughout history people were culled by disease and war. Due to improvements in healthcare and relative infrequency of high death count wars, the culling mechanism has failed. We are seeing more and more people parasitically reliant on the things that keep them alive and sane such as healthcare and mental health medication. In past times these people would have been culled naturally. So to answer the question "why now?", that is why.

But, go ahead and put your dick in a hole and imagine that you've solved something.

[–] h-oates (172) 5 years ago

Haha. I am a tad confused by your response (and my 140 IQ objects to me being referred to as 'small brained'). Overpopulation is a problem, I think many people would admit that. But what does this have to do with the rise of incels? More people just means more couples. Or are you suggesting that there's too many men and not enough women? That's statistically untrue.

[–] Geff (453) 5 years ago

In the past incels would have been culled due to selective pressures before reaching adulthood and therefore incelhood. I thought I made this clear, but apparently not.

I literally said: "In past times these people would have been culled naturally."

And then you criticize me fore calling you small brained...

[–] h-oates (172) 5 years ago

*for*

Ironic. And besides, it's a terrible theory. Incelhood is a myth. No one can truly be an incel. Here's the truth. Here's how the myth of inceldom has come about.

1. The modern world.
It's tougher for men these days to find a wife/girlfriend. Women years ago were outright pressured to get married. It was frowned upon for a woman to still be unmarried in her 30's. Also, women were expected to sit back and let men do the work while they kept house. There was a clear difference in power. Men held it all and women had to live off scraps in terms of having power of their own. Now that the balance of power is slowly but surely evening up, women are feeling more independent. They no longer need to settle for any man who will have them. Instead of being looked upon as an old maid once they hit late 30's, they are instead being looked upon as unmarried men are viewed. Eligible bachelors. So there's reason number one. The modern world in which women no longer need and rely upon men.

2. The internet.
This could have been lumped in with point number one, as the internet is very much a part of the modern world. But I think it's worthy of it's own point. You see, years ago, dark, destructive thoughts were usually kept to oneself. The idea of any frustrated man ever coming out in public and saying to his friends that he felt inferior and was an incel is just laughable. No man would ever state something like that. However, the internet provides anonymity. This is crucial in the development of any self described incel. Childishly resenting women for reaching independence away from men, they find solace with other like minded, ill individuals. Communication between them reinforces their negative thinking. Before you know it, it spreads like wildfire. What would have once been an ordinary, shy, 20 something year old man who has bad luck in finding a girlfriend suddenly believes himself to be doomed to inceldom for all eternity. Because just like fire spreads and destroys, destructive, negative thoughts will spread and infect otherwise healthy individuals, if given the chance... I have stared at the pit of despair. I very nearly became a victim to my own mind. I very nearly committed suicide. You have to be aware of the fact that your mind will work against you if it gets a sniff of a chance. It was only this knowledge and all around enlightenment that allowed me to overcome my darker, inner self. If I had failed, I very much doubt that I would still be here today... Finally, to point number three.

3. It suits the narrative for potential incel terrorists to exist.
We do no truly live in a free society. The powers that be like to influence our thoughts. In fact, they have to do in order to remain in power. This is a highly controversial matter that I am not willing to talk of here. But trust me when I say that none of us are free. If we are not slaves to them, we are still always slaves to ourselves. For their is no greater warden than ourselves. The powers that be learnt that a long time ago.

Confession time. This whole thread is not about me seeking answers. I already have the answers to the questions I asked. This is merely an exercise to see just how many other people are enlightened on this matter. This may be an appeal to authority, but I am on the road to becoming a psychotherapist, and consider myself to be an expert on the workings of the human mind. So please, in future, before rashly referring to someone as 'small brained', just remember to save such accusations until you have 100% proof that the individual you're communicating with truly is small brained.

Thank you for your time.
Take care.

[–] Geff (453) 5 years ago

I am a psychotherapist, and consider myself to be an expert on the workings of the human mind.

No, you are not an expert on the workings of the human mind. A neurobiologist might be an expert, but certainly not you. You just read a manual that was arbitrarily constructed by some authoritarian social engineers, based on normative tendencies.

You seem to have an extremely shallow analysis on the matter. It's not the case that everything is a consequence of female empowerment. The world population in 1960 was 3,039,451,023, the current world population is 7,700,000,000+. As much as you'd like to think that this is not a variable, it is.

Have you ever considered that maybe, just maybe it's GOOD that there are incels. That maybe just maybe increasing suicide rates is a good thing. No, no cannot think this. Your brain has constructed artificial unbreakable barriers against these thoughts. Infact, your profession encourages these barriers. You have immutable axioms: X bad, Y good.

You and people like you simply wouldn't understand.

And before you have false suspicions, it's not a matter of caring about the planet and caring about carbon emissions. It is deeper than that. It is a matter of questioning the morality of the continued existence of living organisms. Organisms that are slaves to their DNA and destined to continue a futile DNA recycling. To what end? This are not question that enter your mind. You, a slave, cannot see your chains and you reproach others for not being obedient enough slaves, this is your profession.

Sometimes the conditions are ripe for discovery of the absurd and sometimes the conditions are ripe for being obedient materialist slaves who have desperate hallucinations about order and disorder, morality and immorality, truth and lies.

[–] h-oates (172) 5 years ago

Clearly, your problem lies much deeper than misunderstanding my point. I'm not attacking your intelligence, but there's clearly something that's making your thinking unbalanced. Without morality, without compassion, we have nothing.

And for the last time, there are no incels (not permanent ones, anyway).

[–] Geff (453) 5 years ago

your thinking unbalanced. Without morality, without compassion, we have nothing.

"Unbalanced" with respect to what? Whose "morality"? What is "compassion"? "We" who?

"Your head is haunted; you have wheels in your head! You imagine great things, and depict to yourself a whole world of gods that has an existence for you, a spirit-realm to which you suppose yourself to be called, an ideal that beckons to you. You have a fixed idea! Do not think that I am jesting or speaking figuratively when I regard those persons who cling to the Higher, and (because the vast majority belongs under this head) almost the whole world of men, as veritable fools, fools in a madhouse. What is it, then, that is called a "fixed idea"? An idea that has subjected the man to itself." -Max Stirner

You won't understand Joker until you understand the spooks that haunt your mind.

[–] h-oates (172) 5 years ago

"We" is humanity. To have compassion is to have empathy. To feel the pain of others even if we are not experiencing pain ourselves. The whole way you speak is though you are lacking of all feeling completely. Allow me to explain what I mean in regards to compassion and morality.

If you, a complete stranger, told me that something tragic had happened to you and your loved ones (friend killed themselves, husband/wife had cancer, parent had just died, etc), I would feel upset for you. I would feel bad for you and extend my sympathises. Not just because I think it's the right thing to do, I would genuine feel upset because of it. Most people would, as most people feel empathy. That's why I was so deeply upset when the Manchester terrorist attack happened a few years back, as I was staying in Manchester at the time and witnessed the devastation firsthand.

You, however, seem as though you are so lacking in feeling that you simply wouldn't care about such things. You even suggest that you would think it was a good thing that people were dying in their droves.

This, is a clear sign of an ill/unbalanced mind (not dissimilar to Joker's line of thinking). Perhaps you suffer from NPD (narcissistic personality disorder), maybe you're a full blown sociopath or maybe, just maybe you're putting on an image. I don't know. All I'm saying is that there's clearly something wrong with your thinking.

[–] Geff (453) 5 years ago

"We" is humanity. To have compassion is to have empathy. To feel the pain of others even if we are not experiencing pain ourselves.

As a psychotherapist you should know that emapthy is simply a generalization of our own subjective experience. Children are not born with empathy they develop empathy during a critical period. Intersubjectivity only works assuming we are slaves to our DNA and we have no freedom to oppose our natural tendencies.

If I derive pleasure from watching people get tortured or killed, does that mean that I should generalize this experience and say that everyone derives such pleasure from this stimulus? no, it would be inaccurate. You recognize that this is inaccurate, yet at the same time you fail to recognize that your perception of "tragedy" is only that, your subjective perception.

You say that you would feel upset if you heard that I experienced a supposed "tragedy" such as loss of a loved one. But, You are making a generalization. In reality you would experience this as a tragedy and you are imagining, or making an empathic deduction, that I would experience it as a tragedy. You may be wrong. You may be wrong only because I'm not a prisoner to my DNA. While my DNA has granted me certain predispositions, the same DNA has granted me the ability to have agency and change my perceptions. The link between you and me are entirely illusory. I may not have the same perceptions as you do and you may not have the same perceptions as me and both of our empathic deductions in regard to eachother may be false.

Then you manifest a nonsense tribe and call it "humanity", and say that I may only be in said tribe if I behave in X, Y and Z manners. I refuse to let this invented tribe be a barrier to my freedoms. If you regard me as unhuman, then so be it, I refuse to be "human".

[–] Geff (453) 5 years ago

This, is a clear sign of an ill/unbalanced mind (not dissimilar to Joker's line of thinking). Perhaps you suffer from NPD (narcissistic personality disorder), maybe you're a full blown sociopath or maybe, just maybe you're putting on an image. I don't know. All I'm saying is that there's clearly something wrong with your thinking.

You are lost in the religion that you have created. There is no "balanced" and "unbalanced". Balanced and unbalanced with respect to what? With respect to some normative standard that you've invented. Why would I want to measure myself using your invented measurement device? Your measurement device bears to credence, to me.

What is "wrong" thinking and what is "right" thinking? Maybe from my perspective you are the one who is "wrong".

[–] kuku (3510) 5 years ago

One detail, considering about all that you're gonna be a psychotherapist: be careful with the definition of 'empathy'.

From my experience, the term 'empathy' can refer either to the ability to understand how other people think and feel, or the the ability to feel bad for them. The same term is used for both (which I think it's a bad idea). Both are different abilities and don't necessarily correlate. I'd probably score very high in the first one while quite low in the second one. Indeed, I think there's often a inverse correlation among them.

[–] HAL9000 (935) 5 years ago

this "psychotherapist" is completely locked in his creation of the world. the worst illness of mind. completely insured by his echo chamber that he is right.

[–] elcamino (15540) 5 years ago

Its not a good idea to promote the movie as that if you want more than just white people in the seats.

[–] AdamS (336) 5 years ago

Only heard this term "incel" a couple days ago...
Is that what it means?... Involuntary celibacy?

Monks and such have done this for centuries.... hardly a valid "made him crazy" argument.

Also, the movie didn't, almost at all, focus on sex.
Even in his imagination, when he walked into her apartment and embraced... there was never any focus on sexuality or even loneliness.

People (some) will find something where nothing is there.

[–] actionkamen (23176) 5 years ago

Monks do celibacy voluntarily. Or at least, they're supposed to.

[–] AdamS (336) 5 years ago

Even if so, the movie barely even touched on sexuality, so why is this an issue?

[–] actionkamen (23176) 5 years ago

Nothing. It was just the media that wanted to create controversies out of thin air. You know, controversy sells. Well, I don't blame 'em, they just need some money like everyone does.

[–] AdamS (336) 5 years ago

I blame them.
If doing your legitimate job means trashing those unwarranted, that job is scum.

[–] actionkamen (23176) 5 years ago

They're not breaking the law...

[–] TheArgentinian (6484) 5 years ago

Incel says what?

[–] johnmarti59 (2356) 5 years ago

You're welcome, yah chimp.