(I don't know if this is really considered to be a political topic or not, but I'm placing it here to be safe.)

Just about all of you other people here on this message board are guys. Help me out here. I'm trying to understand something I can't relate to.

Of late, we here in North America have seen a raft of what I think can be justifiably labeled terrorist attacks by people who either call themselves "incels" or whom much of the "incel" community associates themselves with. The term is Internet shorthand for "involuntarily celibate". Anyway, the latest one took place in my state in the form of a school shooting that killed 10 people (mostly female). Another notable one took place in the form of a car attack in Toronto, Canada (10 dead: 8 female, 2 male). There has also reportedly been debate in the incel community as to whether the Parkland shooter whose actions provoked that 2-million strong march for gun control should be canonized as one of their own in some way. Anyway, the basic ideology of this particular section of men's rights activists is that sex is a right owed to men by women, and therefore rejection is unacceptable; that we have no right to refuse. No right to an autonomous will of our own.

I assume that most here will not agree with the ideology that I have just described. But I also think that maybe, being male, others here might at least understand this phenomenon better than I do. It's not as if there isn't plenty of loneliness among girls and women too. The symptoms of it are all over the place. Women are more likely to be religious (and more adamantly so at that), more likely to own pets, more likely to be interested in romance-themed media, etc. These, in my mind, are signs that many of us don't feel loved, or at least not adequately so; perhaps not even in a relationship. There are also the stats showing that women actually tend to have sex less often than men and average fewer lifetime partners both. And yet one just doesn't hear about women committing mass shootings or car attacks in protest. We just internalize it. We simply blame ourselves. We don't blame others.

If I can divulge something more about myself, I've not been any too successful either romantically or sexually myself all in all. I understand loneliness. But I also recognize that my loneliness, at the end of the day, is mostly my own fault. I'm not a financially successful person, I don't look great, I'm not very outgoing, I don't communicate well, I have lots of unusual opinions and beliefs, interests that not too many other women share to a similar degree (like video games, for instance), and I'm sure that people could find many other faults too. And yeah, I can also see that there are some external factors I can't control too, like the fact that I'm only interested in other women and find myself financially trapped in a community that's sufficiently repressive that almost no one is out (including me) and that really limits my options at the outset compared to your average straight guy. It's a combination of things, but I recognize mostly me. I could find partners through online avenues, no doubt, were I a more appealing person. Anyway, it's painful. I get it. I know that pain.

I also know the opposite pain though: being forced to have sex with someone against your will. That's what can happen when you consistently refuse the advances of men because you're a lesbian, especially when you don't feel like you can say that you're a lesbian in the community in which you live because it's not necessarily safe to. I don't have a car, so I walk to and from work every day and there's this guy who seems to patrol my route during the more reliable time windows to ask yet again if I need a ride. He doesn't seem like a horrible guy per se, but I don't need one, he is a guy I don't know, and I don't feel comfortable getting in his car. Does that really mean I'll be to blame if he one day responds by mowing me and a bunch of other random people down over it?

I guess what I'm really trying to ask here is: Why do guys so much more readily externalize the blame for rejection?

From the OP:

" There are also the stats showing that women actually tend to have sex less often than men and average fewer lifetime partners both."

Unless we are factoring here homosexual men we have the few scenarios;

a) Women are underrepresenting the amount of times they have sex
b) Men are overselling the amount of sex they have
c) A mix of both

There's really no other option. I tend to go with c) on this one tbh.


On the main point though, obviously anyone feeling they are "owed" sex should really get their heads examined. Porn is here for them (and everyone else really), so hopefully they are making good use of this escapism.

I think much of this is how dramatically society has changed in a hundred years. We use to have fixed defined roles. Woman has the home caretaker and mother, man was the breadwinner and provider. The roles became blurred, flipped, or removed leaving many people ill prepared to adjust. Now, as a woman I am thrilled with this because everything got better for me in general. Have my own life, own money, own job. Compare that to my grandmother who had none of these things.

Despite this radical and rapid change the sphere of courtship has not shifted to accommodate these new norms. Men are still expected to ask women out, I know many women who have never asked a man out. I've been asked out by men hundred times, rarely ever made the first move. Never had a woman ask me out, I always had to initiate. The issue is standards and power dynamics. Before a man could say "I offer stability and security" and that could be enough to look past other traits. Now, women largely already have that so they can ask for physical attractiveness, humor, kindness, similar interests, etc.

As to why men are more violent? It's nature and nurture. Boys are naturally more aggressive, they wrestle while girls talk. Then added to this is in society we mock sensitive men calling them "pansies" or recently "cucks". The main emotion we permit in men is anger. Media directed at men shows power is fulfilled through strength, aggression, and violence. Media for women with conflict tends to revolve around communication and romance.

Solution is hard to say, but I think helping men work through rage while also aiding them in developing other emotions will help give productive voice to their frustration of navigating the post modern world. From what I've read many of these self identified incels deal with a lot of self loathing and lack skills to address that in a non destructive way. The only way they see to regain control is through domination or violence. Obviously we cannot condone such actions, and they should be punished, but ignoring or mocking it isn't helping. Conversations should exist where men feel safe and can come to peaceful and productive conclusions.

Social pressure. While women have the stigma of being sluts if they have too many sexual partners, men have the reverse. Intense peer pressure to be the alpha male. That having a partner at all times is the natural default state and being single is considered a bad thing. If people see a single woman they will assume that she will have her reasons for being single as if she's completely in control over her situation. Single men will be instantly suspected that there must be something wrong with them, which is why they cannot find a mate.

Of course those males do not feel like it is their fault, so since having a mate is the natural state of things and them being not the problem it has to be something external. Of course these men also lack a good amount of self reflection, intelligence and human decency but social stigma is where it all comes from.

If there was no stigma, people, especially males, would feel a lot less awful about being single and look at things a bit more optimistically.

BTW I do not think Incels and terrorism have a causal connection. It's not like their terrorists because they're Incels. It's just similiar circumstances and character traits that made them both Incel and a terrorist.

d) Men and women (on average) might have differing views of what constitutes as "sex" (does a bj count? etc.)

c)+d) is my assumption.

As for incels, I only heard about them a couple days ago - they are crazy.

lol

I flag this d) option as part of a) b)

and yes, a bj counts :D (anal does too before some fundamentalist asks) 

Is this true or simply an exaggeration? Does it ever get annoying?

There are many social factors that push us into acting in ways that are detrimental to us as a person, and to society in general if you look at it on a macro level. That said though, I don't believe gender roles are the cause of the recent incel problem. Through social interactions and by looking at social media, I find that many people, both men and women aren't attaining their desires, nor are they getting their needs met, and the problem mostly seems to stem from lack of confidence.

Even to this day I still get friends complaining that they can't get the romantic partner they wish they had. I always ask them the same question. Have you asked them out? The answer is always a resounding "NO".These people are so afraid of the unknown, they(especially men) think that communicating with the opposite sex is something to be deciphered, and since they don't have the key to the puzzle they rather opt out of the game, without realizing the damage they are doing to themselves by unwillingly giving up such an integral part of human interaction.

Like I said before not attaining what you want, makes you have a bunch of negative emotions about yourself, these emotions get bottled up and eventually explode. The difference between men and women is in how those emotions are expressed, it is a well-known fact that men constantly get into fights and shoot up places, it is a well-known fact that women are more prone to depression. Men's emotions express outwardly, women's emotions express inwardly. That is how I believe incels are created, don't take this rant at face value though since this is a very complex problem. I am just giving my semi-informed opinion.

Incels aren't MRAs or political. They're essentially an online community of guys who can't have sex or get into relationships for a variety of reasons. I think most of them are normal virgins and the socially awkward. Just interacting with more women would fix those.

There is a segment of incels that are the opposite of the man hating feminist. Society shouldn't ostracize them or conflate regular virgins with them because it will only make them worse and turn them into some kind of movement.

Ok, it is a well-known fact that men are more aggressive than women, happy?