I think we could all really use a big hug right now. :hearts:

Good night.

The victims of thieves than the perpetrators of theft. The victims of violence and rape are deserving of more compassion then the perpetrators of violence and rape and the victims of online misogynistic abuse are deserving of more compassion than the perpetrators. — Baden

Of course the victims of crimes against persons deserve compassion--compassion in the form of concrete succor. No one has difficulty in expressing compassion for victims, nor should they. (Well, some people blame the victims and pile on blame.)

It is not the case that perpetrators of crimes deserve "more compassion" than victims and I didn't claim as much. Apparently you feel that they deserve no compassion at all. Quantifying compassion, mercy, and other such terms is difficult.

What does compassion mean when there are actually, physical offenders -- like murderers, rapists, wife beaters, child sexual exploiters who have actually done what incels talk about?

Compassion means

a) we avoid de-humanizing them.
b) we accord them protection under the law (fair criminal proceedings, etc.)
c) we don't grab the accused and lynch them--even if they do belong to the Klan or are verified incels.
d) we don't legally execute them (in most places, at least)
e) we don't lock them up for life without extenuating circumstances
f) we offer offenders (who carried out incel-type acts) therapy and rehabilitation (in many places)

There is no justice in locking an offender up for 20 years in a intensely anti-social institution (prison). until they are even crazier and less able to function in a normal citizen's role--and them discharge them, locked and loaded to be even more dangerous problem.

If we are not going to lock them up forever, then we had best either shoot them right away, or attempt to reform them through compassionate programs.

You don't get moral brownie points for a pseudo-Jesus act that pretends they are all the same. — Baden

Moral guidance from you? Hardly,

I also support the humane treatment of prisoners. That's a different issue. But the reason I claim compassion is the wrong orientation towards hate groups like incels is that it does nothing to discourage their growth and the more they grow the more harm they can do. So compassion ends up being self-serving for those who experience it (sure, it's nice to feel you're a nice person) and otherwise useless.

People tend to react strongly to social forces so I'm saying the best way to confront clear social evils that we can't jail people for is social opprobrium. And the message to Nazis, racists, incels etc should not be one that in any way facilitates them in claiming victimhood because that's always a large part of the propaganda machine by which they spread their ideologies. You don't fight neo-Nazis who claim to be victims of Jewish conspiracies by taking an orientation of compassion towards them and you don't fight misogynists who claim to be victims of women in that way either. That approach just aids them in turning reality on its head, whereas our focus should always be on trying to stop them and minimize their impact.

As a caveat, I concede that this doesn't mean that if we meet an individual incel, racist etc in real life, compassion is necessarily the wrong way to steer them in a better direction. That's completely context dependent. (I took that approach once with a student who was a homophobe). But to me, that's different to how we talk about the issue in general terms and I reject the idea that compassion is a good in itself. It may feel good to those that wield it but insofar as it aids and abets social evils / dangerous ideologies it's the wrong approach.

And... politically the whole incel bubble is particularly about demanding compassion and sympathy not because these men find it difficult to form romantic relationships (they're not interested in romance) but that society doesn't provide them with good-looking white women (Stacy's) to have sex with, which they think they have a moral right to. So much so they often claim denying them this is "reverse rape", making them the real rape victims and the ones truly deserving of compassion. We should not put ourselves in a position where we play into this.

I commend to you all the film, The Sessions. It is about a man paralysed from the neck down who wants to have sex. This is no more an incel than I am an involuntary non-climber of Everest. Allow your compassion free rein.

https://www.imdb.com/video/vi2836703001/?ref_=tt_vi_i_2

If what they want is some compassion and sympathy (for not getting what they really want), is the best strategy then denying them that too? Wouldn't that end up making them even more marginalized, frustrated and radicalized?

Why not play into this? Because we have set up this Manichean distinction, wherein they are purely victimizers, i.e. the enemy we should fight at all cost, VS the victims we should protect at all cost? Can't they be both victims and victimizers, as they appear to be?

Isn't this essentially the same mistake as the criminal system is making in focusing on retribution instead of rehabilitation?

Why not play into this? Because we have set up this Manichean distinction, wherein they are purely victimizers, i.e. the enemy we should fight at all cost, VS the victims we should protect at all cost? Can't they be both victims and victimizers, as they appear to be?

I agree that the Manichean distinction is counter productive, but I don't think supporting incels in seeing themselves as victims as likely to be more productive. In fact seeing oneself as a 'victim' and commiseration with other 'victims' seems to me to be at the core of incelism.

Life isn't fair, but life being unfair doesn't equate to there being a victimizer. To "play into this" notion that incels are victims doesn't seem likely to get incels out of the victim mentality that is a big part of the problem they have. Acknowledging to an incel that life isn't fair and perhaps they did get the short stick in some regards I'd go along with. However, what seems likely to me to be most beneficial for the incel (and society at large) is for the incel to stop obsessing about being a victim, and start learning whatever they need to learn to improve their social competence.

As an aside, does anyone want to venture a guess as to what percentage of members of this forum believe in libertarian free will, determinism, and anything in between?

Life isn't fair, but life being unfair doesn't equate to there being a victimizer. To "play into this" notion that incels are victims doesn't seem likely to get incels out of the victim mentality that is a big part of the problem they have. Acknowledging to an incel that life isn't fair and perhaps they did get the short stick in some regards I'd go along with. However, what seems likely to me to be most beneficial for the incel (and society at large) is for the incel to stop obsessing about being a victim, and start learning whatever they need to learn to improve their social competence. — wonderer1

Yeah I mostly agree with this, I do wonder (in light of you question about determinism) how relevant the distinction really is that we seem to be making between unfairness caused by non-human factors and unfairness caused by human actors.

As an aside, does anyone want to venture a guess as to what percentage of members of this forum believe in libertarian free will, determinism, and anything in between? — wonderer1

I think a small majority maybe theoretically is some kind of compatibilist determinist, but in practice, in their moral views, most are more on the side of libertarian free will it seems. I mean, I would also call it a useful or even necessary illusion probably, if I was pushed on it.

I think the problem with a tough non-compassionate approach to these problems is that there are others with worse world views than us ready to extend a hand to these groups. So if you or I or mainstream society don't reach out with compassion, these groups will turn to the Andrew Tate's of the world.

Yeah I mostly agree with this, I do wonder (in light of you question about determinism) how relevant the distinction is that we seem to be making between unfairness caused by non-human factors and unfairness cause by human actors.

Good wondering. :wink:

Perhaps it makes sense to see incels as people whose recognition that there is unfairness is valid, but who fail to see the unfairness as being the result of the nature and nurture that resulted in them being an incel, and mistakenly attribute the unfairness to women?

I think a small majority maybe theoretically is some kind of compatibilist determinist, but in practice, in their moral views, most are more on the side of libertarian free will it seems. I mean, I would also call it a useful or even necessary illusion probably, if I was pushed on it.

Yeah. I'm a determinist, but that doesn't mean I can prevent my brain's tendency to view people simplistically as free willed agents, or that there isn't a socially pragmatic necessity for viewing ourselves and others as free willed agent to at least some extent.

Perhaps it makes sense to see incels as people whose recognition that there is unfairness is valid, but who fail to see the unfairness as being the result of the nature and nurture that resulted in them being an incel, and mistakenly attribute the unfairness to women? — wonderer1

Yes, I would add to that, they probably originally started from the equally false notion that they themselves were entirely to blame for their failure... and then, to feel better about themselves, invented other stories that shifts the blame from themselves to women or society at large maybe. Blaming the physical world, or acknowledging it as a cause, doesn't quite seem to cut it in our psychology, or maybe that's just the way we are taught to think as a result of being raised in a moralizing culture.

Yes, I would add to that, they probably originally started from the equally false notion that they themselves were entirely to blame for their failure... and then, to feel better about themselves, invented other stories that shifts the blame from themselves to women or society at large maybe. Blaming the physical world, or acknowledging it as a cause, doesn't quite seem to cut it in our psychology, or maybe that's just the way we are taught to think as a result of being raised in a moralizing culture.

Right. Undoubtedly, for at least some percentage of incels, blaming the physical world would amount to blaming God, and they aren't able to go there.

I'm wondering why the topic of incels, this legion of unattractive toads, is so popular a thread on TPF. — BC

It's popular because it exemplifies common human fears: ugliness, unlovability, failure to thrive/prosper, social excommunication/pariahism, depression, inequality and failure to successfully bear children/propagate ones lineage.

This is human nature. No, not even human nature, just nature. "Survival of the fittest" and all it's catastrophic possibilities/implications for the supposedly "unfit".

Many other topics or subjects are also popular for the same reason: "if a good god exists why do children die of cancer?" or "antinatalism" or "the wealth gap" or "should euthanasia be a human right?" or "what do we owe eachother?" and of course "incelship".

All pertain to the innate inequality in "right to life" and "ability to survive and thrive" that we as humans face being biological and under the reign of nature.

All in all they come down to human morality. Do we simply look out for ourselves and our immediate people, let nature do it's thing and obey natural selection, or do we go against the grain/tide of nature and try to take control of our human fates. To establish a means to overcome the hurdles of living so we can be proud or free from shame/guilt that comes with being able to empathise with others of our species.

I think civilisation; tech, medicine, law and philosophy are symbolic that we as a species have opted to maximise knowledge, control and ownership of our collective trajectory, rather than let natural selection do our bidding for us as other animals do.

I guess secular liberals are at fault for having "abolished Christmas" by removing the nativity scenes from government buildings and "persecuting Christians" by teaching evolution in science class. Then we went on a rampage of "obliterating history" by removing the triumphant statues of defeated Confederate generals and renaming schools that commemorated the civic benevolence of slave traders. Any group that's lost its former power can be a victim; any group that presents itself as marginalized and stigmatized for demanding back its lost dominion can become toxic.
The one constant is: you can't tell people anything they're determined not to know.

The one constant is: you can't tell people anything they're determined not to know. — Vera Mont

Knowledge/wisdom falling on deaf ears is considered "ignorance."

For me society/social cohesion is born of and propagated by a permanent state of autocorrection. Re-evaluation and implementation of corrective measures to bring things back to balance.

On the other side, anti-social barbarianism is just a collection of myriad self-affirmed, self righteous and self interested groups at odds with one another. Where "others downfall is their success."

I for one prefer the idea of a united society based on compromise. It may not be perfect. And for sure it has made grave mistakes in the past. But any sign of actual progress is in acknowledging those mistakes, some apologies, some forgiveness, and ensuring as best we can that they don't occur again.

We live and we (hopefully) learn.
That is a society I'm content to participate in.

I can and have condemned racists, sexists, nazis, fascists, terrorists, greedy capitalists, etc here and elsewhere. Honestly, I haven't given incels much thought till this thread came along, and everything everyone says about them (or that they say) qualifies them for my condemnation too.

When the object of social opprobrium cares about others' opinions, that approach may work. I can cite zero (or very very few) results from my condemnations. The Philosophy Forum, or left wing radical papers are something of an echo chamber themselves, in that the appeal is to a very narrow (and small) group. Hard core racists, christian nationalists, abusive sexists, incels, nazis, fascists, terrorists--the whole cart load of mixed nuts--are not reading you, me, us. They have their own echo chambers.

If condemnation has no significant effect, what does? I wish I knew. Don't we all?

Racism may have been lessened by laws limiting its expression. The same can be said for sexism, in a very qualified way. It seems to take decades of very gradual changing social norms to see major change. Material shifts tend to drive these gradual social changes.

Got to go.

It's ironic you should say that. I think the same can be said for feminism.

Well I'd say looking at things simplistically and assigning blame on the basis of our simplistic 'understanding' of things is just something all of us social primates do, at least from time to time.

Whether it is incels, feminists, or anyone else wallowing in such a state of mind, it is unfortunate.

Well I'd say looking at things simplistically and assigning blame on the basis of our simplistic 'understanding' of things is just something all of us social primates do, at least from time to time. — wonderer1

Agreed.

Knowledge/wisdom falling on deaf ears is considered "ignorance." — Benj96

You might want to add an intensifier to that, what the Jesuits call "invincible ignorance".

others downfall is their success — Benj96

"It's not enough that dogs succeed; cats must fail!"

For me society/social cohesion is born of and propagated by a permanent state of autocorrection. Re-evaluation and implementation of corrective measures to bring things back to balance. — Benj96

Yours is a healthy "philosophical" approach. Carry on.

Close to right-wing nut job territory? I don’t think so. — Jamal

I know, it depends. If you sound like Adorno and you make a point like: "public speech in favour of marginalised identities is often a means of garnering social capital, which appropriates the struggle for minority rights" is spicy, but probably okay. But it's largely the same as: "woke liberals virtue signal just to look good in the culture war".

I find it a difficult thing to think about in general. I'd be very suspicious of the latter on principle. I'd be suspicious of the former if it was used in defence of the latter. But I'm more inclined to think of the former as being... reasonable? Said by a non-ideologue? So I'm positively predisposed to it

That said, there's a decent argument that sometimes not being an ideologue doesn't matter. EG, a good faith poster saying the former as part of a twitter dog pile.

@Benj96 @fdrake

This open access paper, published last month, is quite interesting:

The Rage of Lonely Men: Loneliness and Misogyny in the Online Movement of “Involuntary Celibates” (Incels)

Four things about it:

1. Incels or proto-incels feel loneliness in three ways: in terms of intimacy, friends, and social status.

2. Their loneliness is transformed into misogyny by means of ressentiment.

3. Joining the incel community exacerbates this loneliness, fostering or producing ressentiment, even while providing some degree of social acceptance. This is because it does not provide the kind of social acceptance that they need, i.e., it does not provide intimacy, real friends, or respectability/status in wider society.

4. Joining the incel community means joining a movement with a doctrine. Thus new members undergo indoctrination.

EDIT: Sorry everyone, I forgot to say: incels are really bad! Grrr! :wink:

2. Their loneliness is transformed into misogyny by means of ressentiment — Jamal

Ah yes from Nietzsche. Sublimation of loneliness or envy into contempt.

Thank you for the link I shall have a read through

1. Incels or proto-incels feel loneliness in three ways: in terms of intimacy, friends, and social status. — Jamal

I also interpreted it like this. But I believe there's an additional element; those three deficiencies get internalised and seen as universal/essential to the proto-incel. Universal in the sense that reality will always treat them that way; they can give up or adapt. Essential in the sense that reality will treat them that way due to their own personal deficiencies relative to perceived norms.

Incel culture is associated with Jordan Peterson's views about reinvigorating patriarchal perspectives, supposedly for the mental health of both men and women. It's reactionary.

On the other hand, it probably is a symptom of the stress of the social change that's taken place over the last 100 years.

I also interpreted it like this. But I believe there's an additional element; those three deficiencies get internalised and seen as universal/essential to the proto-incel. Universal in the sense that reality will always treat them that way; they can give up or adapt. Essential in the sense that reality will treat them that way due to their own personal deficiencies relative to perceived norms. — fdrake

Yes, that makes sense, although I doubt this is always present before joining up. Intuitively I’d expect some of them to join while still thinking they’re just going through a bad patch, only universalizing and essentializing it during their indoctrination.

Yes, that makes sense, although I doubt this is always present before joining up. Intuitively I’d expect some of them to join while still thinking they’re just going through a bad patch, only universalizing and essentializing it during their indoctrination. — Jamal

Agreed. So, that's a candidate answer to:

Maybe such thoughts turn to misogyny when the intrusive thoughts become egosyntonic. When anger becomes justice.
— fdrake

A scary thought. But then … how and when does that happen? — Jamal

Yes.

However, I’m wary of answers that go something like this: lonely young men are being turned into misogynists by reactionary patriarchal ideology, to which they’re being exposed because of the internet. I mean, I think that’s true, but (a) it might deflect the sociological questions, and (b) it might fail to appreciate the ideology as itself something new.

If condemnation has no significant effect, what does? I wish I knew. Don't we all? — BC

Daryl Davis, a black musician, appears to have an approach that works for him. I've read that he convinced 200 KKK members to disrobe, one by one, through befriending them. I wonder how much of that is due to the power of music.

However, I’m wary of answers that go something like this: lonely young men are being turned into misogynists by reactionary patriarchal ideology — Jamal

It's not a very instrumental statement. Reactionary patriarchal ideology's been largely the same for decades, right. The same themes and attitudes, different forms of expression. "Why now?" is the question. Just like "Why now?" is the question for the rice of fascism from reactionary sentiment.

to which they’re being exposed because of the internet. I mean, I think that’s true, but (a) it might deflect the sociological questions, and (b) it might fail to appreciate the ideology as itself something new.

I agree. I'm discomforted by the statement because it's quite individualising. Everyone is exposed to reactionary patriarchal ideology, why do some men react by by becoming incels and others react by joining feminist causes? If you can stop the explanation at individual personality traits, it's no longer structural. There has to be some societal signal in the noise of our bodies.

It's kinda just moralism otherwise. And that can be useful as a weapon.