Speaker 1: Cool Media.
Speaker 2: Hello sixteenth minute listeners, Happy holidays. This is Jamie. Do
Speaker 2: I have your attention? Please keep listening. Quick thing right
Speaker 2: at the top of this show, I am going on
Speaker 2: tour with my.
Speaker 3: Other weekly podcast, The Bechdel Cast.
Speaker 2: If you're a listener of the show, it's an intersectional
Speaker 2: feminist podcast that I co host with my friend Caitlin Durante,
Speaker 2: and we're going to be doing a few tour dates
Speaker 2: in January. So if you live in Los Angeles, San Francisco,
Speaker 2: or Portland, Oregon, we are going to be in your town,
Speaker 2: and even if you're not, there's going to be live
Speaker 2: stream tickets available.
Speaker 3: So if you're a.
Speaker 2: Fan of that show or you just want to be
Speaker 2: weird in parisocial, those are the places to do it.
Speaker 2: We're going to be in Los Angeles on January nineteenth
Speaker 2: at Dynasty Typewriter. That's going to be a variety show
Speaker 2: with some of our favorite past guests of the show
Speaker 2: and just a celebration of the show in general. You
Speaker 2: can get tickets live if you're in the area or
Speaker 2: live streamed.
Speaker 3: Then we will be in San.
Speaker 2: Francisco at San Francisco Sketch Fest on January twenty third
Speaker 2: covering Titanic. We did something called the Shrek Tannic Tour
Speaker 2: last year, which is I know, brilliant inspired, nothing better
Speaker 2: than that, where we will cover either Titanic or Shrek.
Speaker 2: There are no live stream tickets for that, so if
Speaker 2: you're in the San Francisco area, that's the only way
Speaker 2: to see that show. And finally, we're ending our mini
Speaker 2: tour in Portland, Oregon, home of Sophie Litterman, and we
Speaker 2: will be covering Shrek at the Curious Comedy Theater on
Speaker 2: January twenty sixth in Portland and there will be live
Speaker 2: stream tickets for that available. There may be some special guests,
Speaker 2: I mean, I don't know, come and see. So yes,
Speaker 2: if you've been listening to the Manuscare mini series, I
Speaker 2: really really appreciate it.
Speaker 3: And if you want to come and hang in chat
Speaker 3: Bachtel Cash shows are always super super fun.
Speaker 2: Hope to see their happy holidays.
Speaker 3: Here's the show. Joy stay you.
Speaker 2: Welcome back to sixteenth Minute, the podcast where we talk
Speaker 2: to the Internet's characters of the day to see what
Speaker 2: their moment was like for them and what it says
Speaker 2: about us and the Internet. Set not today one last time,
Speaker 2: because this is our final installment of our into the Manisphere,
Speaker 2: and folks, it's been a journey. We've checked out the
Speaker 2: origins of the Manisphere, mind you, not a history of
Speaker 2: misogyny or I would truly never sleep again, but rather
Speaker 2: the history of these organized male supremacist groups coming to
Speaker 2: prominence in response to gains of not just feminist movements,
Speaker 2: but virtually any progressive civil rights movement. Like Seasons one
Speaker 2: and two have lost, which are the only ones I've
Speaker 2: watched so far.
Speaker 3: It's all connected.
Speaker 2: We followed these male supremacist movements onto the Internet, where
Speaker 2: they split into subgroups performing their own version of freeform
Speaker 2: jazz misogyny. The in cells they pick up artists, the
Speaker 2: men's rights activists, the men going their own way, and
Speaker 2: all of the subvariants therein. We've followed them to forums,
Speaker 2: into radio, and eventually YouTube and podcasts. We've looked at
Speaker 2: the historical third and fourth wave feminist touchstones they've responded
Speaker 2: to in the crimes and harassment movements they've turned into
Speaker 2: news stories amplified by algorithms. The Manisphere is absolutely still recruiting,
Speaker 2: if reports from the last.
Speaker 3: Few years are to be believed.
Speaker 2: To kids as young as ten years old. The more
Speaker 2: I learned about it, the more I really do feel
Speaker 2: like it is an important space to talk about, and
Speaker 2: I think for parents and teachers especially a space to
Speaker 2: have a basic understanding of to as my guest FT
Speaker 2: signifier expanded on last week, to be able to recognize
Speaker 2: when young people are engaging with it. I'm not suggesting
Speaker 2: there should be a moral panic that means that nuking
Speaker 2: the Manisphere will solve the problem. The Manisphere is an
Speaker 2: extension of the problem that systemic failures have reached the
Speaker 2: point that grifters are able to take advantage of unregulated
Speaker 2: Internet spaces and a screen addicted population to spread ideas
Speaker 2: that are far more profitable than any progressive or leftist
Speaker 2: idea tends to be. The Manisphere is well funded, and
Speaker 2: so even if you don't engage with it directly, it's
Speaker 2: more likely than not that it's affected you at some point,
Speaker 2: whether we're talking inside or outside the Manisphere. The Overton
Speaker 2: window of how we talk about these systemic issues and
Speaker 2: ignore others has been reduced to phrases like the Internet
Speaker 2: isn't real life, which is interesting because there's no shortage
Speaker 2: of young people who have taken their own lives after
Speaker 2: being bullied online that clearly felt very differently, and it's
Speaker 2: no mistake that this often dismissed phenomenon is becoming increasingly
Speaker 2: prevalent in black youth, in girls, and in queer youth.
Speaker 2: More than one thing has to be true here. The
Speaker 2: Internet and the real world are very clearly not the
Speaker 2: same place. But to downplay the tremendous influence one has
Speaker 2: on the other dooms you to be an eternal boomer.
Speaker 2: It pushed away young people and it does not serve
Speaker 2: the young people in your life. But what I've really
Speaker 2: hoped to stress through this series isn't just the idea
Speaker 2: that the manisphere is a space that's boosted and further normalized,
Speaker 2: mask off hatred toward not just women, but queer people,
Speaker 2: trans people, poor people, and anyone who isn't white. It's
Speaker 2: a symptom of late capitalism. But when it comes down
Speaker 2: to it, the way that the manisphere affects you and
Speaker 2: to what degree it affects you, has everything to do
Speaker 2: with who you are as an individual. And so to
Speaker 2: close this series out, I wanted to share some of
Speaker 2: those perspectives, and thankfully many listeners reached out who have
Speaker 2: either interacted with or been fully pulled into this space.
Speaker 2: In the past, I've talked to people who have exited
Speaker 2: the manisphere over a period of three decades. I've talked
Speaker 2: to people who have studied and been kind of traumatized
Speaker 2: by it relatable, and I talked to a young teacher
Speaker 2: who's just trying to figure out how to speak to
Speaker 2: there's students about it without being shut out entirely. So
Speaker 2: for the rest of this episode, I'm going to let
Speaker 2: their stories take center, and because some names have been changed,
Speaker 2: let's get to know their voices.
Speaker 3: First.
Speaker 2: A non binary person socialized as a man who entered
Speaker 2: the manisphere well over two decades ago.
Speaker 4: Tom, I'm forty five and yeah, I don't know. I
Speaker 4: have four kids. Part of what drew me into the
Speaker 4: father's rights bullshit was I kind of got pulled into
Speaker 4: that by my bitterness over my divorce and my anger
Speaker 4: around what I perceived was at my mistreatment by thesodial
Speaker 4: and child sport systems.
Speaker 2: This is Alyssa, a leading researcher on in cells.
Speaker 5: Hi, my name is Alissa Davis, and I am a
Speaker 5: third year PhD student in sociology at Vanderbilt University.
Speaker 2: This is Arna, a German Man in his late twenty
Speaker 2: who entered the Manisphere after a year abroad in the
Speaker 2: US in the early twenty tens.
Speaker 6: I'm Anna. I am twenty nine years old and from Germany.
Speaker 6: I am a massive student in psychology and I definitely
Speaker 6: was in the Manosphere for a while. And yeah, I
Speaker 6: got out of it. Now, am I seeing Flea or Casper?
Speaker 6: I know this might be?
Speaker 7: This is Caasler.
Speaker 2: Here's Isaiah, who's in their early twenties and grew up
Speaker 2: deeply entrenched in Christian Conservatism.
Speaker 8: My name is Isaiah, and I'm currently a student, and
Speaker 8: I identify as queer, neurodivergent, among other things. And yeah,
Speaker 8: I survived the Manisphere.
Speaker 2: And finally, Paige, who was a non binary former high
Speaker 2: school teacher in Texas.
Speaker 9: My name is Paige. I am a former high school
Speaker 9: science teacher. I started teaching it would have been twenty
Speaker 9: twenty two at that point, kind of a remedial physics
Speaker 9: chemistry class. So I had all nine through twelve.
Speaker 2: And when we come back, we talk to the survivors
Speaker 2: of the Manisphere. Welcome back to sixteenth minute. Has anyone
Speaker 2: else seen this incredible six hour long movie? I've been
Speaker 2: hearing about called Santa University. Let me know, I hear
Speaker 2: it's amazing and that the woman who wrote it is
Speaker 2: really beautiful. All right, let's get into it. These interviews
Speaker 2: have been edited for time and clarity, and here are
Speaker 2: the expats of the manisphere.
Speaker 7: And about when did you leave these spaces for good?
Speaker 4: Let's say around two thousand and eight, Okay, it was
Speaker 4: nine ish. I was in my twenties, and you know,
Speaker 4: I wasn't really you know, aware of the shifting window
Speaker 4: of politics going further to the right. I was a
Speaker 4: rock against Bush while also like accepting this like cesspool
Speaker 4: of monsters. So it was very much based around how
Speaker 4: father's rights was about, like fathers don't have access to
Speaker 4: as robust child support needs and they don't often qualify
Speaker 4: for public assistance stuff, and family court judges were biased
Speaker 4: against fathers and that sort of rhetoric. The problem that
Speaker 4: as I see, you know, as I eventually saw it,
Speaker 4: was that problem was coming from inside the house. You know.
Speaker 4: It wasn't that you know, women were poisoning the system
Speaker 4: against us. It was that the system as fucked up
Speaker 4: because of misogyny.
Speaker 5: As you said, it's been around for like a while,
Speaker 5: so I guess I'm more in like the modern era
Speaker 5: of in cells host reddit bands. I actually started my
Speaker 5: research for my master's thesis. I was originally going to
Speaker 5: use a subreddit that was called I think it was
Speaker 5: brain Cells, and in cels had gotten banned in twenty seventeen.
Speaker 5: This was twenty twenty one. Brain Cells was still around,
Speaker 5: but right as I was about to start collecting data
Speaker 5: for my thesis, brain Cells got banned, and so I
Speaker 5: was like, oh no, what am I going to do?
Speaker 5: And so then I found, in particular our slash in
Speaker 5: cell Exit, which mainly focuses on men who have I
Speaker 5: guess identified themselves as in cells in the past, expressing
Speaker 5: a desire to leave the group, which then led me
Speaker 5: to kind of these other spaces that since in cels
Speaker 5: have gotten pushed out of, I think the sites that
Speaker 5: they originally sprung up on, which is Reddit in four chan.
Speaker 5: Now they're going into different areas of the Internet and
Speaker 5: creating their own websites and forums that function very similarly
Speaker 5: to Reddit. In one of the papers that I published
Speaker 5: along with my co author had their Keechrie. There's kind
Speaker 5: of this idea of free spaces that has been studied
Speaker 5: among scholars who look at extremist groups, and these free
Speaker 5: spaces function as places where individuals who are members of
Speaker 5: extremist groups can can move into and are isolated from
Speaker 5: the mainstream while also having I guess, the opportunity to
Speaker 5: continue to foster these ideologies. So in that respect, they're
Speaker 5: really hard to get out of because you're insulated entirely
Speaker 5: and the only people you talk to are people who
Speaker 5: I think agree and support those ideological functions. The danger
Speaker 5: of having like such an insulated community is that it
Speaker 5: does become an echo chamber, and it does become I
Speaker 5: like what you said, like a death cult essentially, where
Speaker 5: they're simultaneously each other's only like support system. But then
Speaker 5: also that support system is so negative and so harmful.
Speaker 6: I think it is decent to mention here. I was
Speaker 6: undiagnosed ADHD autism. It's a STIL definitely had negative experiences
Speaker 6: as in bullying when I got to like, let's say,
Speaker 6: middle school, Germany system is a little different, but I
Speaker 6: still had some friends that I brought over from like
Speaker 6: elementary school when we went to the same class, but
Speaker 6: I definitely was no longer as outgoing as fun and
Speaker 6: I also struggled with just social interactions. If I am
Speaker 6: thinking back on it, I am still cringing hard on
Speaker 6: the things that I did. Yeah, so internet it was
Speaker 6: very German focused. Now, I did to say that, like
Speaker 6: the internet is ninety five percent in English. I don't
Speaker 6: know on the actual percentage, but five's wise. That sounds
Speaker 6: about right. Yeah, before getting into the minosphere, before really
Speaker 6: discovering the Internet came through my exchange here that I did,
Speaker 6: which would be junior year in the US to Florida.
Speaker 6: Actually I remember that I was told about Reddit, but
Speaker 6: I was back then still nine gag kid for like internet.
Speaker 6: Oh yeah, YouTube, like filter Franco. I think I discovered
Speaker 6: what are other people? Because I don't watch them anymore.
Speaker 6: They're kind of slipping my mind, PAUDYEPI was back then
Speaker 6: twenty eleven, twenty twelve.
Speaker 7: That sort of developed when you were in the US for.
Speaker 6: A year, Absolutely exactly, And so I kept that. And
Speaker 6: that's why I also kept by English, because I stayed
Speaker 6: connected and like kept developing my English online. Even though
Speaker 6: I didn't I was more of a lurker. I still
Speaker 6: got content because there's way more people who speak English
Speaker 6: and way more content in English, you will also the
Speaker 6: top notch things that the extream of the crop will
Speaker 6: still outrank what you would find in Germany.
Speaker 9: I am a creature of the Internet, unfortunately, and you know,
Speaker 9: I had seen like all of the TikTok's YouTube video essays, everybody,
Speaker 9: look at this nonsense, this is bad. Before I was teaching,
Speaker 9: I was a rock climbing coach and I had kids
Speaker 9: as young as fourth or fifth grade trying to tell
Speaker 9: me about Andrew Tate and that that was disturbing.
Speaker 2: So I think that there is a level of like,
Speaker 2: if you didn't grow up adjacent to understanding what these
Speaker 2: spaces are, it can kind of go over your head.
Speaker 9: And like, it was really interesting, honestly being in that
Speaker 9: position because I don't know that I was the youngest
Speaker 9: teacher at my school, but like, damn near it. Some
Speaker 9: of my kids understood that, you know, I'm not that
Speaker 9: much older than them. A lot of them did not.
Speaker 9: I felt like I was the only person that saw
Speaker 9: that the emperor had no clothes.
Speaker 8: So I was like born and raised in evangelical Christian household.
Speaker 8: It was like not a lot of exposure, and I
Speaker 8: remember kind of having this thing called the Internet or
Speaker 8: like I think YouTube in like early twenty ten and
Speaker 8: just being like not able to have any access to
Speaker 8: like internet and having very weird media access rules within
Speaker 8: my family, but then having my friends as actually going
Speaker 8: to like public school in Vancouver. It was interesting to
Speaker 8: see some of those, like I want to say, like
Speaker 8: cooler kids, but the kids who have access to the internet.
Speaker 2: You said, you you sort of the algorithm, was guy
Speaker 2: to give more towards the red pill pipeline.
Speaker 8: Yeah, some of that like red pill black pill type content.
Speaker 8: I do want to preface that, guy, you was never
Speaker 8: really deep in it. But what I will say is
Speaker 8: when you are surrounded by evangelical Christians and you're surrounded
Speaker 8: by the space that's very purity culture, and then it's
Speaker 8: reinforced with what content is being produced online and what
Speaker 8: your friends are watching and what they're suggesting, and how
Speaker 8: that media is affecting it. I really experienced like the
Speaker 8: manisphere from two different perspectives, and that was really vicarious.
Speaker 8: Lead through my friends and through my social interactions.
Speaker 9: The one that I remember this kid that was in
Speaker 9: one of the medial classes that I taught, and he
Speaker 9: was definitely a bit higher achieving than at least the
Speaker 9: other students in that class period, and I usually left
Speaker 9: him alone to his devices because he would turn his
Speaker 9: work in and I was like, whatever, you were the
Speaker 9: least of my worries. But at one point I started
Speaker 9: looking at his work and I could tell that he
Speaker 9: was just phoning it in whenever I was talking to
Speaker 9: him about it, and I was like, man, you just
Speaker 9: got to put in like a little more effort. I
Speaker 9: know you are better than this. His argument was that
Speaker 9: he didn't really care to put a whole lot of
Speaker 9: effort in as long as he could like play football
Speaker 9: like he wanted to and whatever, because he was going
Speaker 9: to graduate and then make a bunch of money with
Speaker 9: this thing that like Andrew Tait had been talking about
Speaker 9: bitcoin and stuff. It was like that kind of thinking
Speaker 9: where it's like I don't have to do the same
Speaker 9: things that ever everyone else here does and act the
Speaker 9: same because I have this cheak code that you know,
Speaker 9: this man on the internet gave me.
Speaker 6: I remember when I was in Florida, there was a
Speaker 6: moment where, even after I've thought that I redeveloped myself,
Speaker 6: that I'm now extroverted, why are girls not interested in me?
Speaker 6: And so I also were able to ask these questions
Speaker 6: down in English, I mentioned dread. I found our slash seduction,
Speaker 6: for example, and I think I discovered the simple pickup
Speaker 6: YouTube channel who are like, oh, you know, you just
Speaker 6: need to go out there and like talk to people
Speaker 6: and fake do you make it? And like have a
Speaker 6: thirty day challenge in which you need to just be
Speaker 6: extreme and like have no more, no shame and like
Speaker 6: that to just break that barrier that you're afraid of.
Speaker 6: And I was unable to do so. Like I was
Speaker 6: watching those videos, I'm like, yeah, that sounds great. I
Speaker 6: know I should do this for a month. And I
Speaker 6: never took the train into a hamper.
Speaker 2: Two.
Speaker 6: The seeds were planted for why don't girls like me?
Speaker 6: What is wrong with me? Something must be wrong with me?
Speaker 6: And I think that's interesting because later on, when I
Speaker 6: got closer into the manosphere, I changed from like it's
Speaker 6: wrong with me to like, oh, no, the reason are
Speaker 6: actually equitman, It's not you, it's clearly half of the population.
Speaker 6: Absolutely that must be it.
Speaker 5: If you're moving into a space that continues to kind
Speaker 5: of foster this echo chamber ideology, extremism becomes more and
Speaker 5: more rampant or apparent so my more recent research where
Speaker 5: I've actually gone on some of the more extreme insult sites,
Speaker 5: I was seeing things that were horrific for me to
Speaker 5: even view, like acts of violence that were being endorsed
Speaker 5: or committed, or videos or being shared, as well as
Speaker 5: advocating for the self harm of the insults themselves, so
Speaker 5: suicidal ideation, a lot of self hatred, and that kind
Speaker 5: of being endorsed and supported by members of the community,
Speaker 5: this overwhelming ideology of like, you cannot leave this group
Speaker 5: because this is who you are biologically.
Speaker 6: But really what got me into it was I started
Speaker 6: my university, struggled a little bit to make friends. Also,
Speaker 6: it's despite being neurodivergent, if you get a degree in math,
Speaker 6: you will meet more in your divertin people, while nowadays
Speaker 6: I vibe a lot with people who are in your divertu.
Speaker 6: I struggled to make friends there. So I went to
Speaker 6: like an orientation and then there was a woman of
Speaker 6: a few years my senior who was interested because I
Speaker 6: sat there with a chessboard and like not talking to people,
Speaker 6: and so she decided to sit down. We started playing chess,
Speaker 6: like kept talking throughout that evening and like kept contact
Speaker 6: for another week. It's a truism or a trope that
Speaker 6: men don't pick up on hints from women. Yeah, one
Speaker 6: hundred percent. In my case we started dating. But also
Speaker 6: she was very much interested in the red pill. She
Speaker 6: even sent me like I think and my first week
Speaker 6: APDF on a book that would translate to the praise
Speaker 6: of sexism. You know how there is benevolent sexism and
Speaker 6: hostile sexism. I forgot who the researchers are who developed
Speaker 6: that idea, but there's those two types, and it's much
Speaker 6: more in praise of like benevolent sexism and like, oh no, okay,
Speaker 6: women definitely won the trad wife lifestyle is having my
Speaker 6: first kiss at nineteen. If that is what my girlfriend believes,
Speaker 6: then obviously that must be true. That must be the reason. Also,
Speaker 6: it explains so much if I already struggled for like
Speaker 6: why don't let me? Oh, the answer is hypergrima. I
Speaker 6: just didn't present myself.
Speaker 2: Well.
Speaker 6: Now, does that already go into the face of how
Speaker 6: she approached me when I was a loner on a chessboard.
Speaker 6: Absolutely did I think about that?
Speaker 4: Nope?
Speaker 7: Do we know how she got there?
Speaker 6: Hard were her friends who probably discovered it, and she
Speaker 6: was much more tomboyish, so she had much more male
Speaker 6: friends and more like, oh, I'm different to other girls.
Speaker 6: I'm not like at the girls almost sure, right, which
Speaker 6: was like early twenty ten, I think was much more
Speaker 6: of a common you know, to bring out the site students.
Speaker 6: We all fall for confirmation bias. We are. If you're
Speaker 6: invested and you're doing that in a social thing, of
Speaker 6: course you're going to see it that way. To a
Speaker 6: certain extent, she already had a previous social circle that
Speaker 6: was interested in these things, and so I think that's
Speaker 6: probably how she got into it.
Speaker 7: I'm also curious how these spaces relate to masculinity and
Speaker 7: you navigating your own gender.
Speaker 6: Does that intersect at all?
Speaker 4: I have always been queer, you know, I've known I
Speaker 4: was bisexual since I was in college. My queerness of
Speaker 4: gender didn't come about till the pandemic. You know, obviously
Speaker 4: I'm very masculine presenting in retrospect and you mentioning that,
Speaker 4: you know it does it was probably pretty performative. There's
Speaker 4: a lot of aggression, performative rage, if that makes sense.
Speaker 4: I would feel this anger right about perceived slights against
Speaker 4: me in these you know, online spaces, you know, I
Speaker 4: would vent about this, but I would almost play it
Speaker 4: up to like get sympathy from these other angry men,
Speaker 4: the very like jocular, like virtual backslapping, like you know,
Speaker 4: it's okay, buddy. There's this like sort of like social
Speaker 4: incentive to exaggerate your anger and your feelings to get
Speaker 4: that false camaraderie. You know, men are socialized to be
Speaker 4: so lone wolfy and solitary, but like that's not how
Speaker 4: people are. We need community and we need people, and
Speaker 4: we need to have a place where we can feel things.
Speaker 4: And when the only feeling that's allowed is that rage,
Speaker 4: that you know, we kind of go all in and
Speaker 4: end up in this horrific display of anger, age and violence.
Speaker 2: I'm curious, like how you would approach talking to students
Speaker 2: who had clearly taken this in.
Speaker 9: That was really hard being a queer teacher in Texas, right,
Speaker 9: And I mean I wasn't even out, I didn't use
Speaker 9: like my proper pronouns or anything, but like I if
Speaker 9: you interact with me for more than a few minutes,
Speaker 9: like it's written on my face. I definitely had quite
Speaker 9: a few kids that I don't know for sure that
Speaker 9: they like, you know, specifically fell within that community space
Speaker 9: of the manosphere and everything, but they had a lot
Speaker 9: of the same attitudes. The way they would argue and stuff.
Speaker 9: They would definitely push the queer issue if the opportunity
Speaker 9: came up. I had a really big conversation with a
Speaker 9: couple of my classes about referring to women and girls
Speaker 9: as females. I don't know if it's just like being
Speaker 9: in the part of the South that I'm in that
Speaker 9: it's like super super common. It feels like a bit
Speaker 9: more than at least whenever I was in school, and
Speaker 9: it really bothers me. It feels a little dehumanizing. Obviously,
Speaker 9: I would always just provide a little bit of pushback.
Speaker 9: If I were to come down like super duper hard
Speaker 9: on them and be like, hey, you can't do this
Speaker 9: in my classroom, then they have the bad guy, you know,
Speaker 9: coming down on them and oppressing them, and that can
Speaker 9: reinforce I almost phrased it as like a the same
Speaker 9: like cheat code thing, like hey, this is going to
Speaker 9: take you far in life. Don't do that. Sometimes it works.
Speaker 9: It would be like why, and then other girls in
Speaker 9: my class would chime in and be like, well, it
Speaker 9: feels like a nature documentary thing. It feels like, you know,
Speaker 9: you're not actually acknowledging us as people like you're acknowledging
Speaker 9: us as specimens. I feel like providing that opportunity for
Speaker 9: them to hear how that is affecting the population that ostensibly,
Speaker 9: you know, most of these boys are interested in. You know,
Speaker 9: sometimes it works. Sometimes they were just like, nah, y'all
Speaker 9: don't know what you're talking about. You're just sensitive. But
Speaker 9: the conversation is worth it for a couple of kids
Speaker 9: that are gonna get it.
Speaker 7: Going deeper into these spaces. Was neurodivergen something that was
Speaker 7: discussed openly.
Speaker 6: I don't think so, not at all. I think it was.
Speaker 6: I mean, I will also say that I was much
Speaker 6: more of a lurker as well, So like from there,
Speaker 6: I went then to like r Slash the Red Pill
Speaker 6: and went to top of All and discovered that most
Speaker 6: posts are from twenty sixteen twenty seventeen, which is when
Speaker 6: I was online. So interestingly enough, I was there when
Speaker 6: it to a certain extent, I guess peaked. Now. That's
Speaker 6: probably because nowadays it's quarantine, so it's not going to
Speaker 6: be shown to the front page anymore. It is more
Speaker 6: restricted and I bet that that means there's less draw
Speaker 6: to it, or there used to be, at least in
Speaker 6: the red pull space, three main people and they were
Speaker 6: the three rs. That is Rolo, that is Roysy and Rashie.
Speaker 6: I think I think it's rashbe is how he was written.
Speaker 6: I'd have to look that up again. And they were
Speaker 6: very prolific and people were reading aspects of them.
Speaker 5: Now.
Speaker 6: Roolo Tamasi had books that came out and I remember
Speaker 6: buying them and listening to them through audible. That was
Speaker 6: the Rational Male, and I know there's a trology even well.
Speaker 6: Another cringing moment is I gifted my uncle that book
Speaker 6: like right around that time as well. That one's also
Speaker 6: talking about like you should spin plates, you should not
Speaker 6: be emotionally invested in women. So the idea is like
Speaker 6: spinning plates, you should always have at least too so
Speaker 6: you don't get too much invested in game and social
Speaker 6: swellness your wealth of course, and your physical looks as well.
Speaker 6: So there it very easily came. Like I was familiar
Speaker 6: with in cell communities and had I not had a girlfriend,
Speaker 6: I think I would have gotten much closer to in cel.
Speaker 7: You also mentioned that you got into Jordan Pearson.
Speaker 2: Could you tell me a little bit about that.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it sparked about him for you.
Speaker 6: I think that one was the algorithm with like YouTube
Speaker 6: And yeah, I will mention that I broke up with
Speaker 6: my girlfriend early twenty sixteen. I think at that point
Speaker 6: I no longer have like the social support for lack
Speaker 6: of a better term, to like reinforce my beliefs. But
Speaker 6: I definitely am kind of left there. And I'll mentioned this.
Speaker 6: I was raised by a single mother. I didn't really
Speaker 6: have I met my father for the first time when
Speaker 6: I was eleven, and she's actually a really chill dude,
Speaker 6: but we're bros. Like, he's not a father figure per se.
Speaker 6: When I was trying to figure out what is a man?
Speaker 6: The manner sphere obviously is also another point where that
Speaker 6: they give you answers. They're like, you know, oh, all
Speaker 6: these poor young guys who are raised by your mother
Speaker 6: and so they don't know how to treat a woman
Speaker 6: right now means about it, that's what's wrong.
Speaker 8: Yeah, I am like I am your prototypical saved, unsaved person.
Speaker 8: You know. It was definitely like there was no space
Speaker 8: where I felt like I could perform like Isaiah perform myself.
Speaker 8: It was always you go to church, you have to
Speaker 8: perform a certain way. You go to school, you got
Speaker 8: to perform a certain way around that. Yeah, that was
Speaker 8: just a really tough space to kind of look for.
Speaker 8: And I will say, like the hardest part about the
Speaker 8: manisphere and the masculinity that the manisphere sells you it's
Speaker 8: not necessarily the vision as much as it is a
Speaker 8: lack of imagination. I think that lack of imagination of
Speaker 8: who you could be and who you might be able
Speaker 8: to versus what you should be is what robs.
Speaker 6: A lot of people.
Speaker 8: And when I'm looking back on how the Manisphere and
Speaker 8: how this vision this corporatized product of what masculinity should be,
Speaker 8: ultimately I think about all the lost time of me
Speaker 8: trying to be something that wasn't rewarding and that wasn't
Speaker 8: helping me and wasn't helping others.
Speaker 5: The danger of it is they're becoming more extremist in
Speaker 5: their beliefs. I would say so Historically, insuls have kind
Speaker 5: of been There are acts of violence and mass violence
Speaker 5: that have been committed by them, such as is Silvista shooting,
Speaker 5: the Toronto van attack, more and more instances of these
Speaker 5: mass acts of violence are popping up, but holistically, the
Speaker 5: broader community of insult are nonviolent, and instead they're very
Speaker 5: self hating, self deprecating. I actually was talking to this
Speaker 5: co author of mine the other day and she mentioned
Speaker 5: I can't remember the name of the book, but a
Speaker 5: book that she was reading, and in this book there
Speaker 5: was a case of an in cell and I guess
Speaker 5: like his friend where they had met on one of
Speaker 5: these online spaces and they both had I guess, participated
Speaker 5: in sexual activity with a person. And after this instance occurred,
Speaker 5: one of the guys broke down, was like, I don't
Speaker 5: know who I am anymore. My life is over, my
Speaker 5: friends are gone, Like I can't say I'm an incell anymore.
Speaker 5: I'm like actually having a complete breakdown. And the other
Speaker 5: man and the woman that they engaged in this activity with,
Speaker 5: they were comforting him and saying like, no, no, we
Speaker 5: don't have to tell anyone, you don't have to tell anyone,
Speaker 5: Like we can keep this a secret. It's okay. And
Speaker 5: so there's this huge community element of it, and then
Speaker 5: also identity component that I think really keeps them like
Speaker 5: wrapped in this space. Ultimately, like profound loneliness and mental
Speaker 5: health issues.
Speaker 9: This school that I was at was very, very low income,
Speaker 9: and I was, you know, teaching remedial students, and that's
Speaker 9: just different. I mean, it felt like there was a
Speaker 9: lot more insecurity, at least, like from those kids that
Speaker 9: were really engaging in this you know, shitty rhetoric. The
Speaker 9: kids that kind of I guess had the most to
Speaker 9: prove and didn't have a whole lot to fall back on.
Speaker 9: These weren't my kids that were my super high achieving
Speaker 9: by the most part. They were my kids that were
Speaker 9: struggling and maybe didn't get a whole lot of help
Speaker 9: at home and didn't have a whole lot of guidance.
Speaker 9: All of these students that I've actually been thinking of
Speaker 9: the ones that I really tried to have the most
Speaker 9: conversations with and check in with the most, because I
Speaker 9: didn't want to sit here and just argue with them.
Speaker 9: I wanted to be constructive and to not feel like
Speaker 9: I was just sitting here criticizing, criticizing, Like that's not
Speaker 9: my job here as a teacher.
Speaker 6: You know, I got out of my previous social situation,
Speaker 6: and I think that's one of the things it is
Speaker 6: really important that the people that you're around. If you
Speaker 6: are able to change your environment, you as a person
Speaker 6: might change drastically. And that's really what happened to me
Speaker 6: during my exchange here during high school. I'm gaining a
Speaker 6: community again, I'm gaining a social support And what has
Speaker 6: drawn me into the record was being with my girlfriend
Speaker 6: and then being online not really talking with other people,
Speaker 6: potentially getting rejected for people who are like, I don't
Speaker 6: know about that. That seems a little iffy, And instead
Speaker 6: of being like, yeah, maybe you're right, I'm like, no, no,
Speaker 6: this is explicit. You know my worldview. Things are being
Speaker 6: explained to me so nicely, so clearly you're wrong. The
Speaker 6: algorithm is still there. Who's feeling me things? But I
Speaker 6: maybe even through proximity, they're realizing, oh, you're now at university.
Speaker 6: You're on a university and maybe ContraPoints is someone who
Speaker 6: you would find funny because you're coming from this edgy
Speaker 6: humor that we know. This person seems to resonate with
Speaker 6: people like you. One aspect that all THEO radicalized me
Speaker 6: is I am very lucky for my socioeconomic status. I
Speaker 6: was able to fail and get back up again. But
Speaker 6: like in that financial security, that that is not a
Speaker 6: major factor of ratalization. The radicalization came from why don't
Speaker 6: girls love me? Rather than why is my life complete shit?
Speaker 6: In every regard? You know, why am I being failed
Speaker 6: by the system?
Speaker 4: Yeah?
Speaker 6: I say, show me less on YouTube, and it keeps
Speaker 6: showing me the same amount. It's ignoring my desires, and
Speaker 6: I'm getting more and more frustrated with that, to the
Speaker 6: point where I then decide, okay, so clearly my account
Speaker 6: is tainted. That that is also part of where I
Speaker 6: then started to move out of that sphere. I'm making friends.
Speaker 6: I have my social sort problemand building where I have
Speaker 6: people that I look up to. I meet my now
Speaker 6: wife at university where we're starting to talk about it,
Speaker 6: and she points out to me, like how it's watching
Speaker 6: a study, and the study itself, if you look into it,
Speaker 6: is the exact opposite. She's she's way smarter than me,
Speaker 6: clever and intelligent, and I love her so much, of course,
Speaker 6: but also like she is taking the effort and time.
Speaker 6: I got lucky that I had friends with my doctoral student,
Speaker 6: with my now wife who took the time to like, hey,
Speaker 6: I think this isn't really right.
Speaker 9: My girls were angry, Like there were like a couple
Speaker 9: of instances that like, some dudes in the corner would
Speaker 9: be talking really really poorly about I don't know, one
Speaker 9: of their friends that posted whatever on Instagram. Oh and no,
Speaker 9: she looked so slutty whatever. This one instance is that
Speaker 9: I'm thinking about. This girl got really really upset because
Speaker 9: that was one of her friends, and she was like,
Speaker 9: you cannot talk about us this way, like this just
Speaker 9: is not okay, and frankly got pretty aggressive about it
Speaker 9: and became a behavioral incident. But I normally in something
Speaker 9: like that, I would have referred off. It would have
Speaker 9: been disciplinary action and whatever. But I didn't want to
Speaker 9: do that because she was right, which kind of ended
Speaker 9: up being the conversation I had with her. And I mean,
Speaker 9: I didn't have another issue with her about it, Like
Speaker 9: she would say what she needed to say and then
Speaker 9: be done. And I hope that that rubbed off on
Speaker 9: the rest of the girls in that class. But I
Speaker 9: also had at one point in time another queer student
Speaker 9: that was in one of my classes that did have
Speaker 9: a couple of kids that had specifically talked about Andrew
Speaker 9: Tate at a couple of points and interrupted my class
Speaker 9: to do, so they ended up actually transferring out of
Speaker 9: my class. They felt like they were being kind of
Speaker 9: targeted in a lot of the speech about it, and
Speaker 9: you know, didn't feel comfortable there, which I don't blame them,
Speaker 9: and it made me really, really sad. It's hard for
Speaker 9: me to say, you know how that affected a lot
Speaker 9: of my other queer students because being in Texas and
Speaker 9: you know, in the public education system as a teacher,
Speaker 9: I could have lost my job. I could have there
Speaker 9: there was a whole lot of shit associated in my
Speaker 9: particular district with being out at the time. But for students,
Speaker 9: it really wasn't that safe either. I mean a lot
Speaker 9: of the teachers, you know, were very we were all
Speaker 9: very protective over our queer students, but it was more
Speaker 9: worry about parents, honestly. I mean, that's just what it
Speaker 9: made it hard. In general, they're not going to say
Speaker 9: anything about it because they don't want to target on
Speaker 9: their backs, and I can't really necessarily ask them about
Speaker 9: it because then I'm overstepping and now there's targets on
Speaker 9: both of our backs.
Speaker 5: Increasingly, we're finding out that there is a hugely intersexual
Speaker 5: component to this, where there's older men in it, there's
Speaker 5: men of all different races. They have horrible names for
Speaker 5: men of different races, and they structure them on their
Speaker 5: own hierarchy. My research kind of focuses on is like,
Speaker 5: how is masculinity constructed in society? How is masculinity displayed
Speaker 5: in society? What's considered to be the masculine ideal, because
Speaker 5: these men feel as though they're not meeting that, whatever
Speaker 5: that is. And it's been established that this is like
Speaker 5: the possession of what's called hegemonic masculinity, where it's a
Speaker 5: particular type of masculinity that includes like wealth, that includes
Speaker 5: racial components, that includes access to women, and all of
Speaker 5: these different things that make up what is considered to
Speaker 5: be the ideal man. These men feel as though they're
Speaker 5: not fitting. So I think a lot of it is
Speaker 5: wrapped up in intersectional identities, and then also just how
Speaker 5: our society constructs understandings of ideal masculine performance, what it
Speaker 5: means to be a man.
Speaker 2: Having been in that space and now reflecting on it,
Speaker 2: what do you make of how these spaces are being
Speaker 2: presented to us and what they mean right now?
Speaker 4: I think there is an unfortunate amount of like apology
Speaker 4: for them. You know, I feel like too often people
Speaker 4: will try to couch it in this like, well, dudes
Speaker 4: need a space to be dudes, and dudes will be dudes,
Speaker 4: and the society bends over backwards even more for you know,
Speaker 4: an empowered group, and you know, they see queer people
Speaker 4: getting fraction about fraction more power, and then they freak
Speaker 4: out and everything has to go twelve steps backwards, Like
Speaker 4: it is possible to fucking get out of that shit.
Speaker 4: It's cheesy to say, but you know, there's hope as
Speaker 4: long as people are willing to actually communicate, which is yeah,
Speaker 4: I think the biggest challenge there is to actually be
Speaker 4: introspective and be thoughtful and you know, actually talk about shit.
Speaker 8: I think we often frame men as the were men,
Speaker 8: identifying individuals as the victims of men sphere content and masculinity,
Speaker 8: but it completely underplays the fact that like, at the
Speaker 8: end of the day, the manisphere is informing people who
Speaker 8: are performing masculinity and that's impacting women, that's impacting people
Speaker 8: who are queer. And in some ways, I've heard people
Speaker 8: talk about like the manisphere and they almost placate the
Speaker 8: massive amounts of impact that's had on women, right, Like
Speaker 8: first dating partners and you're having You're having this like
Speaker 8: boyfriend or partner who is trying to perform what the
Speaker 8: manisphere is telling them dating or being a boyfriend should
Speaker 8: be like, and it's disastrous. But I can't imagine how
Speaker 8: harmful that might be or how kind of difficult it
Speaker 8: must be to not only have a partner who is
Speaker 8: subscribing to this idea of masculinity, but also perform what
Speaker 8: is expected of them from like a femininity standpoint of
Speaker 8: the manisphere. Right one of my own personal I guess,
Speaker 8: like talking about like my queer identity a little bit more,
Speaker 8: taking on more of like a non binary identity has
Speaker 8: been like really a reaction to how little I want
Speaker 8: to associate with like masculinity. At this point, I'm actively
Speaker 8: sad by like the impact I might have had or
Speaker 8: still have by my actions just unknowingly right, like unlearning
Speaker 8: masculinity is so difficult, but I think it's it's so necessary.
Speaker 8: I think men's rights, like the whole men's rights movement
Speaker 8: is like a way of lacating men's responsibility to realize
Speaker 8: that they their actions have massive consequences on other people.
Speaker 9: I honestly think that the bigger thing that scares me
Speaker 9: is the thought patterns behind it and the way that
Speaker 9: information is presented. I think that that is also a
Speaker 9: lot more contagious. My kid that I had talking about
Speaker 9: their get Rich Quick scheme they got from Andrew Tatan friends,
Speaker 9: that line of thought is going to be able to
Speaker 9: spread to a lot more kids, And that way of
Speaker 9: thinking is going to spread to a lot more kids
Speaker 9: than say, you know, women should do X y Z.
Speaker 9: That I think is like entirely my job as a teacher,
Speaker 9: especially a science teacher, is critical thinking and being able
Speaker 9: to point out bullshit arguments and when something is not credible.
Speaker 9: I think if kids and people are equipped to be
Speaker 9: able to look at the way that these are constructive,
Speaker 9: to tell that this is predatory, be able to be
Speaker 9: told to see that they're being sold a product, then
Speaker 9: it's less likely to spread. People aren't going to fall
Speaker 9: for it.
Speaker 3: Is this an important space to be aware of?
Speaker 7: How is it effective to talk about it?
Speaker 9: I mean, I definitely do think that it is something
Speaker 9: that should be talked about a lot more like the
Speaker 9: big thing that is making its rounds in professional development
Speaker 9: stuff is you know, how do we deal with AI
Speaker 9: and all of that and I'm not saying that's not important,
Speaker 9: but this doesn't affect you know, how our kids are
Speaker 9: writing their essays in all of that, but it affects
Speaker 9: how they operate as people. And I really really wish
Speaker 9: that it was a bigger conversation. I really think the
Speaker 9: biggest thing is just talking to your kids and like
Speaker 9: really investing in like, Okay, this kid needs like some guidance.
Speaker 9: But that doesn't mean that I'm going to grab their
Speaker 9: hand and yank them into what they need to think.
Speaker 9: It's building the relationship and being the role model that
Speaker 9: probably inspired you to teach right. Kids need that, especially
Speaker 9: if they are at risk like this.
Speaker 6: You know, it's the shaming that exists is something that
Speaker 6: people struggle with. But I do hope that they find better,
Speaker 6: healthier resources, like, for examplement to look like round table,
Speaker 6: where you're working towards something proactive, something positive, rather than
Speaker 6: trying to find an explanation that feels good but that
Speaker 6: leaves you still disconnected and frustrated and somebody else. I
Speaker 6: think if you're getting frustrated somebody else, that is very
Speaker 6: profitable for algorithms, and that is something a memory. I
Speaker 6: think it's scary for the nearer generation. It really is
Speaker 6: not something that the loneliness will be talked about, but
Speaker 6: the reasons for that and this idea of like something
Speaker 6: is wrong with you, Here are ways to find that out,
Speaker 6: Like going to a therapist is something that is if
Speaker 6: you feel lonely, there is no shame in trying to
Speaker 6: tell that to someone and trying to find a solution
Speaker 6: for that. I think that's extremely important.
Speaker 5: I about asked before if while I'm researching, if I
Speaker 5: feel empathy towards this group, and at times yes and
Speaker 5: at times no. At times I feel like profoundly disgusted
Speaker 5: and angry. And also there's been moments where I've had
Speaker 5: to shut my laptop, go in my room and like
Speaker 5: cry for a minute because I've seen things that are
Speaker 5: so horrific. When I hear something like the male loneliness epidemic,
Speaker 5: I'm like WHOA, Like why is that our responsibility? Like
Speaker 5: figure out? And I think that men have been socialized
Speaker 5: in a way to not value to repress their emotions.
Speaker 5: I guess I would say therapy and understanding that perhaps
Speaker 5: you have a mental illness can be constructed as weak
Speaker 5: or not believed by certain people, And so that's like
Speaker 5: a social construction that people who have been socialized as
Speaker 5: men have to battle, I think to a degree, which
Speaker 5: then I think does breed this. But then also there
Speaker 5: is a sociological theory that's called like the concept of
Speaker 5: aggrieved entitlement, which is the idea that we've socialized men
Speaker 5: in society in a way to believe that they're owed
Speaker 5: certain things for just being men. Access to women's bodies
Speaker 5: is one of that, and so then when they don't
Speaker 5: receive that, sometimes these groups pop up and they're angry
Speaker 5: about it. I think it's like the steps of harm
Speaker 5: reduction and the steps of creating community. It's like almost there,
Speaker 5: but then they like blame it on women at some point,
Speaker 5: and you're like, wait, you were so close. What's going on?
Speaker 8: I think it's really men have to come up with
Speaker 8: the self realization that they're hurting others and that their
Speaker 8: identity and their idea of masculinity has impacts on others.
Speaker 8: It has been marginalized communities. It's been the mothers, it's
Speaker 8: been the sisters. It's been the partners who have had
Speaker 8: to do the leg work sitting their spouse, their partner,
Speaker 8: their brother down and saying, hey, these attitudes are not there.
Speaker 8: I think it's really on men to realize that, and
Speaker 8: I think we have to keep the respect onsibility on men.
Speaker 8: The moral panic that's going on right now about the
Speaker 8: manusphere almost stops conversation on like what are people getting
Speaker 8: and like, really how systemic manisphere content is because I
Speaker 8: think people like it's so hard to generalize, like what
Speaker 8: are we talking Andrew Tait? Are we talking about Joe Rogan.
Speaker 8: If we label people as manasphere content and dismissive of
Speaker 8: their like potential audiences and their potential communities, I think
Speaker 8: that could really alienate people. And I think it's the
Speaker 8: alienation that is really going to be causing people to
Speaker 8: act with prejudice and act with stereotypes. I think it's
Speaker 8: trying not to put people in a situation where they
Speaker 8: feel like the victim, but more so understanding their actions
Speaker 8: from potentially victimizing others.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much to everyone I spoke with in
Speaker 2: the process of reporting on the Manisphere. I am so
Speaker 2: so so grateful, and not just to the folks I
Speaker 2: talk to today, but to everyone I've spoken to for
Speaker 2: this show. Obviously this wasn't a quantitative study, but I
Speaker 2: think it's telling that the first three people who reached
Speaker 2: out to me when I put a call out who
Speaker 2: had been in the Manisphere were either closeted queer folks
Speaker 2: or neurodivergent and lacked a support system that understood them
Speaker 2: while they were being pulled.
Speaker 3: Into these spaces.
Speaker 2: And of course I'm not saying that everyone in the
Speaker 2: manisphere is either queer or neurodivergent. That's obviously far from
Speaker 2: the truth. But to me, this demonstrates how the manisphere
Speaker 2: praise on those who do not meet the stereotypical masculine
Speaker 2: idea and encourage them to turn on others even more
Speaker 2: disenfranchised than themselves instead of just rejecting that image of masculinity.
Speaker 3: So my conclusion with this series.
Speaker 2: Honestly, I don't love it, because what's obvious from everyone
Speaker 2: I've spoken to is that the clearest solution is a
Speaker 2: healthier community. Tom and Arna both detailed how finding more
Speaker 2: empathetic and purposeful groups of friends made them feel better
Speaker 2: and more purposeful themselves, making it somewhat easier to get
Speaker 2: out of the Manisphere altogether. And of course the ability
Speaker 2: to do that will always intersect with class, and Isaiah
Speaker 2: was able to keep their distance from the Manisphere because
Speaker 2: of queer, anti capitalist role models that they found on YouTube.
Speaker 2: And that's wonderful, but there is still this kick in
Speaker 2: the back of my mind, the kick that tells me
Speaker 2: that the centrist men behind laptops are still going to
Speaker 2: turn around and say the Manisphere will go away if
Speaker 2: women and non binary folks can just be nice to
Speaker 2: men who are still in these spaces. Page experienced that
Speaker 2: as a teacher, Alyssa experienced that as a researcher, and
Speaker 2: still there is this pattern if you keep track of
Speaker 2: places like r in cell Exit. Something that Laura Bates
Speaker 2: mentions in men who hate women that one of the
Speaker 2: more common experiences that that extracts young men from this
Speaker 2: space is just a woman being nice to them. Here's
Speaker 2: a little clip I wanted to save for the end
Speaker 2: from Alyssa.
Speaker 5: There's one post that it sticks with me where it
Speaker 5: was literally titled let women prove You Wrong, And it
Speaker 5: was this whole story about how this person had had
Speaker 5: a really positive interaction with a woman and was like
Speaker 5: women are human, and like that's amazing, and like you
Speaker 5: really should talk to women and let them prove you wrong.
Speaker 5: They're not evil. People think like interesting from multiple levels.
Speaker 5: One because I think it's I guess profoundly sad that
Speaker 5: he had been socialized to believe that women were so
Speaker 5: evil that it was surprising he had a positive interaction,
Speaker 5: or perhaps he'd never had a positive interaction with a
Speaker 5: woman and that was truly his first one.
Speaker 2: I mean, come on, and if you are someone who
Speaker 2: has that patience and that willingness, then that's incredible. I'm
Speaker 2: not discouraging it at all, and there have been times
Speaker 2: where I've had that patience myself, and I also know
Speaker 2: plenty of wonderful people who are way better at.
Speaker 3: It than I am.
Speaker 2: But it's the expectation that this will happen in order
Speaker 2: to dismantle this space that I still find really frustrating.
Speaker 2: I want to echo what Isaiah said earlier. It's on
Speaker 2: other men. I would rather a man be embarrassed while
Speaker 2: trying to talk a friend down from the manisphere than
Speaker 2: ten women get doxed. We've talked a lot about how
Speaker 2: there is a gradient for how misogynists these spaces can get,
Speaker 2: but there's also a gradient of consequences for its targets,
Speaker 2: ranging from a fundamental diurth of respect for our personhood
Speaker 2: to being a literally lethal space. And this isn't a
Speaker 2: consequence of the manisphere specifically, it's just what the manisphere
Speaker 2: is upholding. I'll remind you that domestic violence against women
Speaker 2: has the statistics to support one of the leading causes
Speaker 2: of domestic terrorism, but no one ever says that. Because
Speaker 2: domestic violence against women is so normal, the media that
Speaker 2: covers these spaces will always prioritize the perpetrators and rarely
Speaker 2: interrogate the cause. It's a digital manifestation of misogyny that
Speaker 2: skews into every marginalized community therein misogy, nore transphobia, you
Speaker 2: name it, and these are equally under discussed and can
Speaker 2: be even more lethal. To conclude, the manisphere is a
Speaker 2: response to expectations under capitalism. You hate to hear it,
Speaker 2: but it's simply true. There are so many men out
Speaker 2: there who feel that they are failing to meet an ideal,
Speaker 2: most often because the system is failing them. We heard
Speaker 2: today from people who were not meeting theseis hetero successful
Speaker 2: male ideal because they were queer or because they were neurodivergent.
Speaker 2: But there's so many sources of this feeling of not
Speaker 2: measuring up because of how White's embassy and capitalism makes
Speaker 2: everyone feel to be anything. Butt white isn't measuring up
Speaker 2: to be anything, butt rich isn't measuring up. And we're
Speaker 2: living in an increasingly diverse society where we're being pummeled
Speaker 2: with wealth inequality, so you would either have to be
Speaker 2: tremendously lucky to measure up to these standards, or more often,
Speaker 2: just become a fucking grifter or yourself.
Speaker 3: The manisphere doesn't.
Speaker 2: Really interrogate any system at all, instead encouraging men to
Speaker 2: push their rightful anger at targets who have always been
Speaker 2: considered fair game women, or to be more specific, anyone
Speaker 2: who is not a snisman. Doing so will continue to
Speaker 2: thwart progress. It will accomplish nothing in changing these men's
Speaker 2: feelings of insecurity and failure, and it will mean that
Speaker 2: there's a generation of girls and non binary kids that
Speaker 2: will internalize this space, regardless of whether they take action
Speaker 2: for or a gain it. So sorry I had to
Speaker 2: tell you all that, and that's it for this mini series.
Speaker 2: Thank you so much to everyone who has been listening.
Speaker 2: This was a very challenging series to put together with
Speaker 2: a show that is on a weekly schedule, so I
Speaker 2: really hope you've gotten something out of it, and if
Speaker 2: you did, please subscribe to the show. Engagement talk like comment, subscribe,
Speaker 2: tell your friends, or I haven't slept in three weeks
Speaker 2: for no reason. You can also join our reddit board
Speaker 2: at our slash sixteenth minute. It is the rare, wholesome
Speaker 2: reddit board. You can follow me on Instagram at Jamie
Speaker 2: christ Superstar or at Blue Sky just under my name,
Speaker 2: and you can come back next week for our final
Speaker 2: episode of the year to hear who I have declared
Speaker 2: the Internet's main character of the year. My answer is
Speaker 2: not surprising. It is Hawked toa Bye.
Speaker 1: Sixteenth minute as a production of Cool Zone Media and iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: It is written, hosted, and produced by me Jamie Loftus.
Speaker 1: Our executive producers are Sophie Leick Derman and Robert Evans.
Speaker 1: He Amazing Ian Johnson is our supervising producer and our editor.
Speaker 3: Our theme song is by Sad thirteen. Voice acting is
Speaker 3: from Grant Crater and Pet.
Speaker 2: Shout outs to our dog producer Anderson, my Kat's Flea
Speaker 2: and Casper, and my pet Rockbird, who will outlive us all.
Speaker 3: Bye