The tragic events of August 12, 2021, when Jake Davison committed a mass shooting in Plymouth, UK, claiming five lives before taking his own, brought the term “incel” into sharper focus for many. Investigations revealed Davison’s active participation in online platforms like Reddit and YouTube, leaving behind a digital trail rife with misogynistic and anti-feminist sentiments, and explicit references to the incel subculture. Even though some of his later posts hinted at a desire to distance himself from the incel community due to its negative impact on his mental well-being, evidence suggests that this ideology significantly shaped his worldview.
The term “incel” gained widespread notoriety after Elliot Rodger’s 2014 mass killing in Isla Vista, California. Prior to his attack, Rodger released a video and a lengthy autobiographical manifesto detailing his “involuntary celibacy.” These incidents, alongside others like Alek Minassian’s 2018 Toronto van attack and subsequent events in Tallahassee, Toronto, and Arizona, initially painted incel-related violence as a predominantly North American issue, resulting in a combined death toll nearing 50. However, the emergence of cases like Gabrielle Friel and Anwar Driouich in the UK, culminating in Davison’s attack, indicates a growing global engagement with incel ideology.
Defining the Incel: Involuntary Celibacy Explained
So, What Is An Incel? The term “incel” is a portmanteau of “involuntary celibate.” At its core, the incel worldview is built upon the belief that physical attractiveness is genetically determined and that these inherited traits are the primary factor dictating women’s attraction to men (Baele et al., 2019; Ging 2019; Hoffman et al., 2020). Individuals who subscribe to this ideology believe themselves to be genetically inferior in terms of physical appearance, thus “doomed to a life of involuntary celibacy.”
Empirical studies suggest that this belief fosters feelings of isolation and loneliness, leading to heightened frustration and envy towards those perceived to be in fulfilling sexual relationships (Van Brunt & Taylor, 2021). This sense of exclusion and resentment forms the bedrock of the incel identity and ideology.
Incels often categorize society into a rigid, appearance-based hierarchy. At the top are “Chads” (extremely attractive, successful men) and “Stacys” (extremely attractive women). The middle tier consists of “Normies” or “Betas” (average-looking individuals), while incels position themselves at the very bottom of this social ladder. This hierarchical view reinforces their feelings of inadequacy and fuels their resentment towards those they perceive as being more fortunate in the dating and sexual marketplace.
The Incel Ideology: Extremism and Misogyny
The incel ideology originates from a loosely connected network of online anti-woman communities known as the “manosphere.” Over time, the manosphere has become increasingly characterized by violent and hostile attitudes towards women and other groups (Farrell et al., 2019). A migration pattern has been observed, with users moving from older, less extreme manosphere categories like Pick-Up Artists and Men’s Rights Activists to the more radical Incel category. This shift is marked by an escalation in hate speech and discussions advocating violence (Baele et al., 2019; Hoffman et al., 2020; Papadamou et al., 2020), with incel discourse exhibiting comparable levels of online “toxicity” to known far-right platforms like Gab (Ribeiro et al., 2020).
The incel ideology exhibits classic hallmarks of extremism, including distinct in-group/out-group dynamics and crisis/solution narratives (Berger, 2018ab), features common across various extremist ideologies from Salafi jihadism to white nationalism.
A central tenet of incel ideology is a deeply ingrained misogyny, viewing women as genetically inferior and driven solely by a sexual desire to reproduce with “genetically superior” men (“Chads”), inherently excluding unattractive men like themselves (Baele et al., 2019). This dehumanizing view of women is further reinforced through derogatory terms like “femoids” or “roasties.” Women are often portrayed as incapable of complex emotions beyond sexual desire and driven by antisocial values such as infidelity and manipulation for sex or financial gain (Baele et al., 2019). Ironically, despite positioning themselves at the bottom of their self-constructed hierarchy, incels maintain a belief in the inherent superiority of all men, including themselves, over women.
The concept of “pilling” is another crucial element of the incel worldview, borrowed from the film The Matrix and also found in some far-right circles. “Pilling” refers to a supposed awakening to the “true nature of the world.” In the incel context, the “black pill” is the dominant and most nihilistic view. While the “red pill” (from The Matrix) represents waking up to harsh realities, the “black pill” adds a layer of fatalism, asserting that the incel-defined social hierarchies are immutable and that nothing can be done to change their predetermined fate of involuntary celibacy. This sense of hopelessness and resignation is a defining characteristic of the black pill ideology.
Incel crisis/solution narratives are deeply rooted in a “politics of profound nostalgia” (Menzies, 2007), mirroring the broader men’s rights movement’s idealized vision of a patriarchal golden age (Baele et al., 2019; O’Malley et al. 2020). This mythical past is characterized by traditional gender roles, where women married young, monogamy was the norm, and all men were supposedly entitled to sexual access to women. In this imagined past, romantic gestures and traditional practices supposedly negated the importance of physical appearance and mutual pleasure (Baele et al., 2019).
The concept of “female hypergamy” is central to incel discussions, a form of biological determinism claiming that women are inherently driven to seek out “Chad” partners to secure “good genes” for their offspring. Incels believe that this natural inclination was suppressed during their imagined golden age through laws and social norms that ensured a “fair” distribution of relationships (Baele et al., 2019). They argue that contemporary society, marked by “lookism,” feminism, liberalism, and technological progress, has dismantled these structures, leading to their current predicament (see Baele, Brace & Coan 2019; Ging 2019; O’Malley 2020; Papadamou et al. 2020; Scaptura & Boyle 2020), all of which they perceive as oppressive to men like themselves.
As Miller-Idriss (2020) notes, the incel ideology, much like white supremacy, is fundamentally a supremacist ideology. Both dehumanize an “other” group while simultaneously claiming victimhood and blaming that group for their own suffering.
Are Incels Terrorists? Examining the Link to Violence
The extremist characteristics outlined above are often precursors to violence in various ideological movements. While incel ideology can be associated with increased aggression among its adherents, their views on violence are somewhat unique compared to other extremist movements.
While discussions exist within incel communities about inciting an “incel rebellion” following attacks like those by Rodger and Minassian, with hopes of changing societal attitudes towards feminism or forcing women into sexual relationships (Baele et al., 2019), the prevailing sentiment is often one of nihilistic resignation. Influenced by the “black pill” philosophy, many incels believe that acts of violence are ultimately futile in changing the established social order. Consequently, incel violence is frequently framed within the community as individual acts of revenge or “liberation” rather than strategic actions aimed at broader social or political transformation.
This distinction is crucial when analyzing the nature of the incel movement. While a universally accepted definition of terrorism remains elusive, a key element in most definitions is the intent to advance an ideological cause and achieve social or political change. In the cases of Rodger and Minassian, their manifestos and statements indicating a desire to inspire rebellion could arguably classify their actions as terrorism.
However, many instances of incel-related violence lack such explicit ideological aims. Perpetrators’ actions often appear driven by a sense of personal “release,” intertwined with elements of incel ideology and various social or mental health issues. Jonathan Hall, the UK’s independent reviewer of terrorism legislation, highlights the challenge for prosecutors in terrorism cases: proving “beyond reasonable doubt that the action was done to advance an ideological cause rather than for some purely personal or emotional reason” (Hall, 2021:31). Despite this challenge, Hall (2021) and a growing consensus among researchers argue that personal motivations do not automatically disqualify an act from being considered terrorism. Even when mental health issues are present, ideology can still play a significant role (Berger, 2018b). Acts committed by individuals in the more extreme segments of the incel community, driven by their supremacist narratives and in-group/out-group worldview, are increasingly being recognized as potential acts of terrorism (Hoffman & Ware, 2020; Hoffman et al., 2020).
Canada’s Security Intelligence Service, a nation significantly impacted by incel violence, classified inceldom as a form of “violent misogynistic ideological extremism” in 2019, signaling a growing recognition of the threat posed by this ideology. Whether incidents like the Plymouth shooting will be reclassified as terrorism and if gender-based extremism will be officially designated as a terrorist threat in the UK remains to be seen.
Incels and the Far-Right: Overlapping Ideologies?
The relationship between the incel movement and the broader far-right is complex and still under empirical investigation. However, several points of connection suggest a degree of overlap. Firstly, ideological parallels exist, particularly in the use of hateful language (Hoffman & Ware 2020). Elliot Rodger’s manifesto, for instance, incorporated racially charged language, and the perpetrator of the 2020 Hanau attack, linked to far-right ideologies, left behind misogynistic messages (Baele et al., 2020). Secondly, shared online sensibilities are evident in the use of memes, the concept of “pilling,” and similar online cultural references. Thirdly, some researchers suggest that elements within the far-right actively exploit the insecurities of young men within incel communities, using anti-feminist and misogynistic views as a gateway to recruit them into white supremacist ideologies (Romano, 2018; Hoffman & Ware 2019), although further empirical research is needed to validate this link.
It is crucial to understand that the contemporary far-right is not a monolithic entity but rather a collection of diverse and sometimes overlapping ideologies. A useful analogy is a series of Venn diagrams, where each circle represents a specific far-right category – white nationalists, neo-Nazis, militia groups, alt-right, etc. Each category shares certain aspects of far-right ideology, but not all.
The incel ideology can be considered one of these overlapping sets within the broader far-right landscape, sharing common ground in areas like misogyny and online radicalization, but also possessing its own distinct characteristics and motivations.
References
- Baele, S., Brace, L. & Coan, T. (2019). From “Incel” to “Saint”: Analyzing the violent worldview behind the 2018 Toronto attack. Terrorism and Political Violence DOI: 10.1080/09546553.2019.1638256
- Baele, S., Brace, L. & Coan, T. (2020). Uncovering the Far-Right Online Ecosystem: An Analytical framework and Research Agenda. Studies in Conflict & terrorism https://doi.org/10.1080/1057610X.2020.1862895
- Berger, J. (2018a). Extremism. Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press
- Berger, J. (2018b). The Difference between a Killer and a Terrorist. The Atlantic available via: https://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2018/04/the-difference-between-killer-and-terrorist/558998/
- Farrell, T., Fernandez, M., Novotny, J. & Alani, H. (2019). Exploring Misogyny Across the Manosphere in Reddit. WebSci 19: Proceedings of the 10th ACM Conference on Web Science, 87–96
- Ging, D. (2019). Alphas, Betas, and Incels: Theorizing the Masculinities of the Manosphere. Men and Masculinities,22(4), 638–657
- Hall, J. (2021). The Terrorism Acts in 2019: report of the Independent Reviewer of Terrorism Legislation on the Operation of the Terrorisms Acts 2000 and 2006 available via: https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/government/uploads/system/uploads/attachment_data/file/972261/THE_TERRORISM_ACTS_IN_2019_REPORT_Accessible.pdf#page23
- Hoffman, B. & Ware, J. (2019). Are We Entering a New Era of far-Right Terrorism? War on the Rocks available via https://warontherocks.com/2019/11/are-we-entering-a-new-era-of-far-right-terrorism/
- Hoffman, B., Ware, J. & Shapiro, E. (2020). Assessing the Threat of Incel Violence. Studies in Conflict & Terrorism, 43(7), 565–587
- Hoffman, B. & Ware, J. (2020). Incels: America’s Newest Domestic Terrorism Threat. Lawfare Blog available via https://www.lawfareblog.com/incels-americas-newest-domestic-terrorism-threat
- Menzies, R. (2007). Virtual Backlash: representations of Men’s ‘Rights’ and Feminists ‘Wrongs’ in Cyberspace in Chunn, D., Boyd, S. & Lessard, H. (eds.) Reaction and Resistance: Feminism, Law, and Social Change Vancouver: UBC Press
- Miller-Idriss, C. (2020) Hate in the Homeland: the New Global Far Right Woodstock: Princeton University Press
- O’Malley, R., Holt, K., & Holt, T. (2020). An Exploration of the Involuntary Celibate (Incel) Subculture Online. Journal of Interpersonal Violence, 1–28
- Papadamou, K., Zannettou, S., Blackburn, J., De Cristofaro, E., Stringhini, G. & Sirivianos, M. (2020). Understanding the Incel Community on YouTube. Arxiv [available online: https://arxiv.org/pdf/2001.08293v1.pdf] accessed 22/03/2021
- Ribeiro, M., Blackburn, J., Bradlyn, B., De Cristofaro, E., Stringhini, G., Long, S., Greenburg, S. & Zannettou, S. (2020) Arxiv [available via https://arxiv.org/abs/2001.07600]
- Romano, A. (2018). How the Alt-Right’s Sexism Lures men into White Supremacy. Vox available via https://www.vox.com/culture/2016/12/14/13576192/alt-right-sexism-recruitment
- Scaptura, M. & Boyle, K. (2020). Masculinity Threat, “Incel” Traits, and Violent Fantasies Among Heterosexual Men in the United States. Feminist Criminology,15(3), 278–298
- Van brunt, B. & Taylor, C. (2021). Understanding and treating incels: Case Studies, Guidance, and Treatment of Violence Risk in the Involuntary Celibate Community Abingdon: Routledge
