Comments by "Alan Friesen" (@alanfriesen9837) on "I'm An Incel. Ask Me Anything." video.
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@Americansikkunt Except that the whole concept of "Incel" is that you are hurt, that you're claiming that you're suffering because you're being treated like a pariah (or at least ignored) by desirable women. And while that can be very painful, it's also very normal (love bites), and it is not legitimate grounds for attacking women, individually or as a group, the way many incels do.
Feminism is also born out of suffering. And while there is a perception, rightly or wrongly, that women who have a hard time attracting male attention gravitate towards feminism, you rarely see the hatefulness and the advocacy towards violence within feminist circles that you see in the incel movement. Also, for the most part feminism is a progressive empowerment movement based on ambition while the incel movement is very regressive and based on self-pity. While I wouldn't say that there are no instances of individual feminists taking it too far, it's more the exception than the rule. For these reasons I think equivalence is inappropriate.
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@Americansikkunt Not everybody who can't get laid is an Incel. It's a term that's been embraced by a particular social circle of men whose most vocal members are avowed antifeminists, some of whom have suggested and/or advocated violence towards individual women or, in some instances, against women in general, either in jest or not. The extent to which these particularly angry young men represent the entire Incel community is admittedly beyond my knowledge, but they are definitely the recognized face of the group. It's good that the man in the video is trying to engage without violent or hateful rhetoric, even if some of his statements are pretty chauvinistic. I hope that he's encouraging his fellow incels to cool down, to embrace their humanity, and to break away from the vicious commentary that at least a portion of the community spews forth.
Being involuntarily celibate is a temporary state that most of us have been in. It sucks, and if you have no experience of affection it can appear to be permanent, but for the vast majority it's not. I don't see the subject of this video being permanently involuntarily celibate. He's got some issues, but he's not vile—at least not as he appears here. He'll escape it a lot faster though if he can get away from the misogynistic worldview that he's expressing. If he wants women to love him, he has to learn first how to love women.
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