Trigger warning: Extreme misogyny, queerphobia, and Islamophobia
On September 1, 2024, self-proclaimed incel spicy_since_99* sent me a direct message on X. It was a warning, that if I kept “coping” for The News Minute, Wire, and “other leftist” websites, the “mullah” will come to my door, put a sword to my neck, and tell me to “convert or get [raped].”
If you have read part one of our series on the troubling world of the Indian manosphere and its grip on teenage boys, you may remember spicy_since_99. He first contacted me after I posted on X in 2024, looking for young men who were drawn into the misogynistic online world shaped by influencers like Andrew Tate.
Both via our messages and public posts, he claimed that women make bad decisions because they think with their “lizard brains,” that they should be treated like “spiritual toddlers,” and that their “only real agency is their sexuality.” All this, while insisting that incels like him do not want to subjugate women and only wanted “true love.”
Incels, short for “involuntarily celibate,” are men who blame feminism, women, and modern society for their lack of sexual or romantic success.
The online world spicy_since_99 inhabits is referred to as the manosphere — a loose online ecosystem of influencers, forums, and channels that frames feminism and gender equality as threats to men.
Though we hadn’t spoken since August 2024, he sent that direct message out of the blue — perhaps provoked by one of my posts. This time, the misogyny was combined with religious bigotry.
To some, all of this might sound like fringe internet angst. But the incel ideology has increasingly been linked to acts of real-world extremist violence, including mass shootings and targeted attacks.
Its fragile, yet persistent ideology also connects seemingly contradictory worlds.
spicy_since_99, who once warned me about the so-called “Islamic takeover of Kerala,” is by his own admission a follower of Andrew Tate.
This story was originally published in thenewsminute.com. Read the full story here.
