The Secret Lives of Boys & Men
In the United States 73% of boys and men have been victims of male on male (homosocial) violence. Yet, as a nation, we don’t intervene until our profits are at risk. Male violence prevention is the economic and social intervention needed for world peace.
It’s no secret that the social construct of “traditional masculinity” is being challenged by marginalized groups. As more and more minority communities and young feminists challenge the patriarchal definition of masculinity that indoctrinated boys and men in the “manosphere communities.” There’s a realization that these communities are instilling hate and brainwashing boys and men to hate women; which is a widely accepted and supported ideology in the United States. It’s why women and girls are mostly to die from intimate partner and/or domestic violence. Yet, as a nation we tolerate hateful discourse against women and girls especially on social media. When girls and women speak out against these injustices, we are often labeled as, “evil feminists.”
Behind the curtain of the secret lives of boys and men lies the answers to why American society is riddled with exponential amounts of violence. I often discuss the radicalization process that leads to domestic terrorism; I even coined the radicalization process, “The Seven Stages towards Domestic Terrorism.” A 3-min educational tiktok mini-video that many young feminists saved as a reference tool to identify these behaviors. Stages 1 thru 4 are the most telling.
These first four stages are known as the “manosphere communities.” The initial steps to radicalization is the use of gender binary norms as a foundation for the more extreme ideologies to come. The more radical ideologies of supremacy begin with the gender binary construct. The gender binary construct is used to help explain to boys and men why they have “bad luck” with women. Boys and men enter these communities in Stage 2. In stage 1, men and boys feel insecure about their “manhood.” Feelings surrounding involuntary celibacy often create feelings of discomfort and inadequacy in boys and men. They begin to ponder if the reason they don’t attract women and girls is because they aren’t “masculine enough.” It is in this moment of vulnerability that targeted social media ads land on their timelines offering solutions by hyper-masculine men who seem to have wealth, power, and women.
This is exactly why Andrew Tate became an internet sensation with teenage boys. According to new research, in the next five to seven years rates of involuntary celibate men ages 18 thru 30 will reach roughly 50%. Ignoring men’s insecurities and vulnerabilities are leading to a rapid surge in mass violence & domestic terrorism; with the largest threat coming from within; the U.S. Pentagon.
As the largest employer of men and teenage boys, it’s no surprise the U.S. military is the breeding ground for radicalization. Most branches have less than 30% women and girls and branches like the U.S. Marine Corps. have less than 10% women and girls serving on active duty. This un-natural dynamic inadvertently creates intense competition against young men. The U.S. Military’s hyper-masculine and misogynistic culture only add to young men’s pathology. Many of these young men and boys escaped dysfunctional households while hoping to make something of themselves. They had ambitions of defending American Rights, maybe attending college with the GI bill, perhaps buying a house with a VA Loan, medical benefits at the VHA, and finding someone to love them to build a family with.
Instead, they find themselves constantly being belittled and talked down to in many cases far worse than the toxicity they grew up with in their homes that they tried to escape. Only to find themselves in a more toxic and even more hyper-masculine environment riddled with misogyny and sexism. The worst comparison a male service members can be is a female or have any feminine characteristics. Any displays of femininity can be met with humiliation, embarrassment, harassment, hazing, violence, torture, and in some cases death. This is why feminists like myself are very critical of the all male leadership at the top of the Pentagon. These cultural failures remain the stronghold that destroys a young man’s self worth so early on and creates the environment that consistently triggers his vulnerabilities. Instead of being able to develop trust and discuss his feelings of inferiority with his Chain of Command (CoC), he is often ostracized and has no where to turn to; that’s where he enters stage 2.
Stage two, is when he begins to engage with targeted ads that present themselves as men’s self help courses where he can purchase life-changing information to help him be more “manly” for the low cost of $49.99 a month. Sound familiar? Hustlers University was designed to target insecure teenage boys with the intent to move these boys from stage two to stage four. Stage two is when men and boys join pick up communities to learn how to get women and girls by being more “masculine”, going to the gym, buying supplements, discussing pick up strategies via manipulation. It is in these communities where men bond with other men because homosociality which is more commonly known as the bromance or brotherhood is considered the most value relationship structure in men and boys lives because the desires for power and dominance rely on patriarchal structures. This is why men value men’s opinions more than women’s despite our ability to manage risks and have more consistent and successful outcomes in business and family life. In these communities men are taught to target a certain type of woman known as the “traditional or trad woman.” She’s described as a woman who cooks, cleans, relinquishes independence, is submissive, and put the needs and wants of men before herself. In other words, toxic femininity is the total subservience to men by upholding outdated patriarchal structures. In stage two, these men and boys are taught that feminists or the modern woman is the cause of their involuntary celibacy. They are indoctrinated to believe that the traditional woman is living in her biological congruence. This is propaganda that has long been upheld throughout white-revisionist history. Women and women leaders have been erased from most of human history. As a result; men have taken credit for much of the work and inventions of women. Women can not be biologically subservient when in the animal kingdom reproduction requires female animals to be extremely protective and aggressive when they have young offspring. The lengths that women have gone to protect offspring over the millennia of humanity shows that women warriors, activists, and leaders offspring is more likely to survive.
There is no place in the animal kingdom where a female animal is seen as less lethal. If there is a pack of female lionesses who want to attack a human; no reasonable human would believe they will survive on the basis of being a man. It’s just obnoxious and life-threatening to believe that. The departure from reality begins with the gender binary lie that “women are weaker, submissive care takers.” Once this ideology is embedded into a boy or man who is an involuntary celibate; he now believes women and girls are beneath him and that because he is a man, he has the God-given right to dominate and control women. We begin to see incels talk about women who have casual sex as Stacies, black men who have sex with white women as Tyrone’s and the men they want to be like as Chads. Once the ideology of male supremacy is embedded, now more radical content becomes of interest. Stages 3 and 4 of the manosphere are also known as the Alternative-Lite communities. Researchers call these stages the mid-level extremist spectrum.
Stage 3 is known as the Intellectual Dark Web or IDW. This is where high-profile right-wing commentators tow the line of acceptable discourse and often use dog whistles to compare women and minorities to objects when making references regarding traditional masculinity. In the IDW communities men and boys are taught that white privilege is a “myth” concocted by the left for “identity politics.” Despite the fact that all politics including right wing politics is based on identity. These communities affirm the gender binary construct and take it a step further by denouncing the LGBTQIA communities by spreading false and harmful ideologies that they (LGBT+) don’t exist because gender is binary and traditional gender roles mean men must be straight and pursue women as “God intended.” In this stage the focus is on the dehumanization of others. These communities coin themselves as “men’s rights communities” but they don’t advocate for men’s issues like suicide or male violence. Instead they place blame on women and minorities as the roots of their problems. The issues plaguing men and boys are male violence, male suicide, male insecurity, and ideological constructs about masculinity are all reasons why men are struggling. These issues require introspection and self-awareness within men to solve these issues. Both of these normal human emotional skills are classified as feminine traits by these manosphere communities so they end up radicalizing men and boys further; instead of helping them to heal.
Instead of working on themselves in order to become better partners, fathers, brothers, friends, and humans, to increase their self-worth; they take a toxic approach by devaluing the humanity of others. Their low self-worth is inflated when they dehumanize others. They feel a false sense of empowerment. Now, their identities are tied to misogyny and sexism: the hatred of women. As a society we accept, tolerate, condone, and promote this behavior. Long before Kanye West became a billionaire and married Kim Kardashian, he was open about being a misogynist. Lyrics in his song “Gold Digger” were an early telling sign. Yet, no one intervened and brands continued to elevate his fame. We continued to see no accountability as he radicalized during his marriage to Kardashian. He moved from the manosphere to the Christian nationalist community as many did under the Trump Administration.
By stage 4 indoctrination into misogynistic identity has fully taken over. While this is still considered the alt-lite community; the line of discourse is usually no longer acceptable. Podcasts featuring Andrew Tate and his discriptions of sex trafficking teenage girls and women across country lines to avoid federal investigations, videos of him beating women and telling them they are garbage and his property, along with his “advice” to teen boys to sexually assault their girlfriends because she’s property is the full dehumanization of women. At this point boys and men begin to believe that women and girls are their property. They no longer believe women and girls should have body autonomy or even human rights. Many within this stage believe females are slaves to be used for men’s satisfaction and pleasure. As his property she must obey him even when his abusive behavior can lead to her death. This rhetoric ties into conservativism’s “traditional” values. That women need to be stay at home wives with no autonomy or independence; in other wards there is a vested hatred for women and taking away women’s rights is the political ideology that the right-wing clings to. We’ve witnessed this occur with Roe v. Wade being overturned. The first four stages of radicalization are known as the manosphere communities. These communities lay down the foundational societal constructs of hatred. Hatred against women is widely accepted in the United States.
By stage 5 thru 7 extremist indoctrination has already taken place. Stage 5 is known as White Christian Nationalism also known as the Alt-Right. The Trump Presidency spent most of its time leading within this stage. During Kanye’s marriage to Kim, we saw his increasing flirtation with Christian nationalism; specifically in the way he desired to control her wardrobe, body, and public image. He also demanded modesty, began building a Christian school, set up a church and started interviewing that as a man he was the “head of the household.” When his divorce emerged; his anger and hatred for women; especially Kim Kardashian spiraled out of control in the public eye. He demonized her for leaving him. He embarrassed her, disrespected her, and even tried to incite violence on her then-boyfriend Pete. Yet, brands and celebrities still sided with and supported Ye. If a woman as high profile as Kim Kardashian could experience that level of misogyny in front of the world and there were zero consequences for Kanye. It was only expected that he believed he was untouchable. Many men and boys exit the manosphere with a false sense of an inflated ego. Everyone around them has been dehumanized. The earliest sign of this was when he was at TMZ defending his inhumane comments regarding that “slavery was a choice.” He dehumanized and minimized the BIPOC struggle where Latin, Caribbean, Native Americans and Africans were forced into slavery or endured genocide and torture for their resistance.
By stage 6, men and boys identify as white supremacists who are defenders of the patriarchy and they believe they are ordained by white Republican Jesus Christ to uphold white male superiority at all cost. By this point rhetoric about women and minorities has long been accepted and tolerated. Now, they target religious and political minorities for example the Jewish community. Kanye recently went on a media tirade blaming the Jewish community for his troubled life. His insecurities about his manhood reached an all time new height because Kim Kardashian moved on with a white man; his billions of dollars and rap career could not prevent the dissolution of his marriage and family. Due to the fact that he refused to get help and view his marital problems from a place of introspection, his self-hate and feelings of inadequacy cost him his billions when he started inciting hate and violence through anti-semitism and began openly supporting white supremacist rhetoric and ideologies earlier this month at Vogue’s fashion week in Paris when he forced models to wear, “White Lives Matter” shirts. A dog whistle designed by white supremacists. Major brands could no longer work with him because the incitement of violence leads to stage 7.
Brands like Adidas, Gap, J.P.Morgan, Vogue, and many more could no longer support Ye because now he pushed his radicalization to the incitement of violence against the Jewish community as a group of neo-nazis (name white supremacists call themselves) posed over a bridge saluting over a banner saying Kanye West was “right about the Jews.” This is how far American society and American brands are willing to tolerate before severing ties. Americans are willing to flirt with violence before pulling the plug.
If Kanye West could be radicalized towards domestic extremism any one of our boys and men can be too. We have to learn the signs, confront male insecurity, and promote the prevention of violence. We can do this by outreach to boys and men who feel lonely and insecure. When boys and men confide in us for help; as a community and as leaders our responsibilities are to show compassion for their vulnerabilities and ensure they get help from medical professionals who can help them develop the skills they need to manage their emotions in a healthy and productive manner.
To date, we are going to lose a generation of men and boys to violence. In turn we will be unable to end gender violence and hate crimes as a result. How many more victims do we need? Male combat veterans and their sons are responsible 73% of all serial killings in the United States. There’s a 140% increase in mass violence, serial killings and serial rapes in communities that combat veterans return to. The Pentagon plays a huge role in American violence and is the cause of a generation of lost boys and men. The direction we are headed in currently is one of disaster and destruction. We must focus on male insecurity at stage one and address men and boys issues at stage one. Our money and resources must go into the prevention of violence and radicalization. This is the only way we can then develop the pathway toward world peace. We have to begin the process of healing across the Americas.
