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Incels are becoming ‘more extreme’ online as the number of violent, misogynistic and dehumanising posts increases EIGHT-fold in just six years, study finds
- Experts analysed millions of posts across forums known as the ‘incelosphere’
- The movement is an online subculture that celebrates a misogynistic worldview
Incels are becoming ‘more extreme’ online as they ratchet up their violent and misogynistic rhetoric, a study has found.
Researchers analysed millions of posts across the network of forums known as the ‘incelosphere’ over the past six years.
As the biggest social media sites clamped down on incel activity, members moved away from them to more secretive platforms that were harder to shut down.
It was on these that the discussions became far more dehumanising and dangerous, with the levels of violent extremist language increasing fourfold.
The incel movement – short for ‘involuntary celibate’ – is an online subculture that celebrates a misogynistic worldview and is promoted by young men angry at women for their lack of sex.
According to a study of 38.4 million posts on message boards and subreddits, men’s rights advocates have grown more extreme and toxic in recent years
Plymouth shooter Jake Davison, who killed five people in 2021, shared his own hate-filled views on incel forums on social media platform Reddit.
Just weeks before the attack, the 22-year-old posted an ‘unscripted rant’ about his hatred for his mother, who was one of his victims, and his failure to get a girlfriend.
Reddit moved to ban its largest forum for incels in 2017 after it drifted from a support group for men struggling to find a relationship to far more misogynistic content including rape threats.
The study – which looked at the incelosphere between 2014 and 2022 – found users had begun migrating to other online spaces where they were using ‘more misogynistic and racist language’.
Professor Stephanie Baele from the University of Exeter said: ‘We have found clear evidence of a greater volume of incel discussion online over time, including an increasing use of dehumanising labels and words depicting violence.’
Similar research carried out last year found nearly 1,000 references to dehumanising misogyny or violent action are recorded each day in the ‘incelosphere’.
According to the team, newcomers to the ‘manosphere,’ a large network of different men’s rights-focused websites and subreddits, tend to be even more extreme than longtime posters
The analysis, also by the University of Exeter, found online references to inflicting violence and extremely degrading language on incel forums was eight times higher than in 2016.
While authorities have previously warned against the rise of incel-inspired violence, the recent Shawcross report concluded that it was ‘not a terrorist ideology’.
It concluded that those suspected of being an incel should not be referred to the government’s anti-radicalisation programme Prevent and instead class it as a form of hate crime.
Between 2021 and 2022, 77 people were referred to Prevent over concerns about their incel ideology.
Co-author Professor Debbie Ging from Dublin City University said: ‘In key online spaces of the incelosophere—where the main discussions’ are taking place—are indeed marked by increasing levels of violent extremism in language.
‘Behaviour in these online spaces is responsive to real-world, offline, events but an increase in daily posts does not necessary correlate with an increase in extremist discussions.’