3mo ago

‘There were no warning signs’: what happens when your partner falls into the ‘manosphere’?

www.theguardian.com

With surveys reporting that an increasing number of young men are subscribing to these beliefs, the number of women finding that their partners share the misogynistic views espoused by the likes of Andrew Tate is also on the rise. Research from anti-fascism organisation Hope Not Hate, which polled about 2,000 people across the UK aged 16 to 24, discovered that 41% of young men support Tate versus just 12% of young women.

“Numbers are growing, with wives worried about their husbands and partners becoming radicalised,” says Nigel Bromage, a reformed neo-Nazi who is now the director of Exit Hate Trust, a charity that helps people who want to leave the far right.

“Wives or partners become really worried about the impact on their family, especially those with young children, as they fear they will be influenced by extremism and racism.”

Men's Liberation @lemmy.ca

HailSeitan @lemmy.world

3mo ago

‘There were no warning signs’: what happens when your partner falls into the ‘manosphere’?

www.theguardian.com /society/2025/apr/19/there-were-no-warning-signs-what-happens-when-your-partner-falls-into-the-manosphere

131 comments

"Do you regularly watch videos by Jordan Peterson?" kinda needs to become one of those before-first-date screening questions.
- either that or: ben shapiro, or joe roegan videos.
  
  Does UFC count as watching Joe Rogan videos even if his commentary annoys the shit out of you and you wish he had no part in it? Because he already pisses me off this would be the last straw.
  
  Weirdly, I know of more women who listen to joe rogan than men (okay, the numbers are 2 to 0, so not that mindblowing). I don't fucking get it.
  It was the same thing with friends who liked Elon Musk before he went fully mask off after buying Twitter. Who he was, and the function he provided, was so completely obvious to anyone who was paying attention. I don't get how anyone could miss it.
- Very direct. They could lie about it. Better to ask conceptually I think.
  
  Ask about Lex Fridman: at least for tech geeks it is the antichamber to Joe Rogan and the pandemonium thereafter.
- You needs to screen your partners SoMe algorithm
- Maybe they’re gay
  EDIT: and won’t admit it so they overcompensate
  
  Nuh uh, fuck that sweety, that's some straight boy shit for sure.
  
  The Patriarchy has always been homoerotic. Even society's choice of male sex symbols, the Hemsworth type, was made by men. Turns out what women actually like is scrawny Koreans.
- Back in my day when I was living on the street we called them volcels. And by back in my day I mean a few years ago, and by the street I mean discord.
12% of young women support Tate? That's way higher than what I expected :( I can't understand why would any woman support someone who makes a fortune out of exploiting and abusing women openly
- Tradwife content is on the rise for women as well, more and more young people are buying into this mythical simpler past as the world gets more complex, alienating and difficult.
  
  I can understand that but how come being a webcam girl and endure physical and psychological abuse fit in the "tradwife" narrative? It's particularly support for Tate what I can't understand
  
  mythical simple past but they wouldn't put down the fucking phone. anything but the phone!!
  (regardless of gender)
  
  Sorry if a dumb question but what is a “tradwife”? (Not a native speaker)
- Almost every survey will get 6-10% of people answering yes to the most extreme or batshit crazy option, no matter what.
  Probably the main reason is that people are pissed off that they are being approached by survey takers and punish the survey for revenge.
  And there are some batshit crazy people out there.
  
  The Lizardman Constant.
  
  And then there are elections.
- These would be the "pick me's" whether they realize it or not
  Women who are raised by misogynists but can't see past it. Women who have insecurities and can't see past it. They are latching on to the same order for security cuz it's all they know. Just a guess
- I once sat next to a couple on the plane and the young woman was showing her bf a video of Tate talking about how men should be stoic and never complain because no one wants to hear that pussy bullshit. She was saying things to him like “You know how you freak out and bitch at me? You should be like him.”
  So yeah… there are women out there who like him. They like hardcore traditional gender roles, is probably the base of it, and want a man doing cliche man shit like Tate preaches. Some women are dealt a great hand by traditional standards: big tits, blond hair, nice face, and they would rather settle into being provided for than fuss with all that feminism stuff. It’s idiotic but people believe whatever’s in their interests. And surprise surprise, these women don’t want men to have emotional needs.
  
  Please tell me that was before it was well known that he was a criminal
Occasionally my partner does or says some things that remind me of the “manosphere” aka 4chan neckbeards.
And when it happens, we talk about it. I don’t pretend or let it go as “he doesn’t mean it” or “he doesn’t know what he’s saying”. I don’t get mad and he doesn’t get mad. We have an adult discussion and I’m careful not to talk down to him.
A perfect example was that he sometimes says “females” when he means “women”. I explain that it’s not a swear word but it’s still derogatory. I explain why. Once I did, he understood and stopped doing it.
It doesn’t have to be a big deal! Communication is key!
- I laughed at this and now I’m going to do that in my head whenever I see that word
- i don't know how could anyone watch Star Trek DS9 and still call women "females" like a Ferengi
  
  Funny you say that! He doesn’t do it anymore but I just sent him this meme from !tenforward@lemmy.world!
  
  serious answer: by consistently running and reading experiments that refer to male and female patients.
  I try my best, but if I've read three-four papers in a day about a topic and all of them use male and female, probably gonna accidentally say female.
- Communication is key
  Sure, but honestly it sounds tiring if this kind of discussion is a recurring thing.
  
  Agreed! But for me it’s not all that often, luckily.
- Good luck with that. A red flag is a red flag.
  
  I appreciate that he is willing to learn and grow. We all make mistakes. If you understand why it’s offensive and keep doing it, yeah red flag.
  I think the ability to change with new information is admirable.
  
  I'm sure this person really appreciates this warning about a person that they know and you don't
  
  I think it depends on how often they're coming up with dubious takes, and how often there are repeats.
  Like if you have to explain that gay people are just trying to live life, and that's fixing misinformation they got as a youth, fine. Good, even. But if you have that talk and then have to have to again a month later because they "forgot" or picked up more bad ideas? Concerning.
  Friend of a friend was always getting talks to patch up his dicey world view, but then he'd go back to the same YouTube or shitty friends and come back two weeks later with a fresh batch of bad ideas. Really have to get to the root of the problem
- No. Stop treating people like livestock.
Spoilers: there were signs
- Yeah, they just didn’t pay attention to their partner. Which, not making excuses, is a good part of how they slip there.
- Sometimes it's easier to stay with the devil you know than chance the devil you don't.
  
  You don't need to stay with a devil at all.
  Some women are apparently terrified of being single. I've known some who have never been single for more than a few days since they turned 15 or something. I know it can sometimes be more complicated than that, but it's a contributing factor.
- Yeah I don't really understand this claim.
  My partner and I disagree on a lot of things, but I can predict with near certainty where she stands on things because she my partner, we have shared a life together, and I know her.
It's surprising to me that married people are falling for this shit. I thought it was just incels desperate for anything that might give them a chance or an excuse.
- it isn't about being single, its about the modern hell world instilling extreme helplessness in vulnerable people, and they seek any answers whatsoever. the manosphere happily provides 'answers' in exchange for money
  
  It has also seeped into every aspect of male culture. You want to watch a YouTube show about cars? Sure. The first couple episodes are normal and then they start sliding in dumb shit.
  You listen to a podcast about working out? Same thing goes. It’s little stuff here and there. Sometimes it starts as a reoccurring joke, but it keeps happening until they actually believe.
  I also find there are a lot of young people who aren’t comfortable on computers and basically believe whatever they see on the internet, much like an older generation.
- There are actors building influence who benefit by more males being this way. They target ladies too, but in different ways. They are determined and focused.
Just based on what I see women doing around me all the time, there were probably some warning signs. Looking for a dude that's "traditional" or whatever is asking for a dude that's going to see you like a form of livestock. It's partly a politics thing, but largely an assholes thing.
41% of young men support Tate versus just 12% of young women.
WTF those are both shockingly high.
- I support Tate...
  ...Being locked in prison for the rest of his life.
  
  But first I would really like him to receive a serious public ass-beating, recorded for posterity. I feel like that would be worse for him than the prison time.
- There isn't anything wrong with a traditional worldview but it certainly doesn't fit most modern relationships. Either way I think all young men go through an idiot phase where it's easier to complain about the systems in place then to be introspective and improve yourself. I'm saying most people usually go through a redpill phase and if they are able to sympathize then it's usually a short phase. The bigger worry for me is that it seems a larger and larger amount of men are unable to sympathize with others.
  
  Depends what you mean by "traditional worldview". I'll go ahead and say young earth creationism shows a lack of openness to objective reality when it's not personally convenient.
  In the context I mean, what gets justified with tradition is behavior like putting on a fake persona when dating, pushing boundaries, disregarding the rights of strangers around them and generally being an entitled, eventually controlling dickwad. They'll say that's what men have always done, and boys will be boys or whatever, but I'm certain nobody had to "twist their arm".
  When I see one of those dudes dragging a girl around, I have to wonder if she's chasing a kink. That's not how you go about it, if so. 50 Shades of Grey was fiction.
  
  The bigger worry for me is that it seems a larger and larger amount of men are unable to sympathize with others.
  Not unable, unwilling. It requires them to be 'weak' and concede that they may be part of the problem. I say this as a man that had to work through some of this shit when I was young.
- There's green-tea smelling book clubs too if that's more their speed, but a lot of people think raves are fun. Same for the pasties; they're an option, but it sounds like hipsters in a version of full Victorian dress are just as much of a thing. The central fact being that they get a choice.
  The various cultures around the world have many, often contradicting versions of traditionalism. My own tells a good story about women having "respect", but it's a version of respect that doesn't require much from men.
  Listen to a random country song. There's a party with cheap beer, where the women are just potential bedpost notches, but the protagonist goes to church on Sunday and feigns piousness, so they still get to be One of the Holy Ones™. A girl's dad shows up and defends her "honour", but it's implied he did the exact same shit when he was young, and at no point are her preferences considered at all. The song ends with a thinly veiled plug for the pickup truck company sponsoring the artist.
  It's easy to see why dudes who hew to that are just looking for a way to justify how shitty they always were, underneath it all. Because in practice I see that all the time, living where I do.
Toxic masculinity, feeding itself, empowered by the forces of capital who desires culture war above class war.
- I love just saying "toxic masculinity" anywhere online, even if you're deep in the bowels of Lemmy, you will get a few reactionary turds who just see the term and lose all cognitive ability to think and mash the downvote button between heated breaths and tears streaming down their faces.
  edit: and it continues, very predictable. Seriously guys, just be honest if the term makes you feel shit, you will find truth by pursuing those feelings and the questions around them, literally you will figure out why you're actually unhappy. Don't pull back, push through. Yes, I am provoking, and if it's provocation that has an effect on you, that's a HUGE sign that you can figure out a big truth about yourself and the world if you spend like, 30 minutes in uncomfortable silence asking yourself "why" about things and being painfully honest in your replies until you hit bedrock.
- God damit this sentence makes me want to blow my brains out. It's too fucking thick in bullshit. You ever notice how the right will just call someone a pedo or gang member and that really works. It's not like they go " he's just socioeconomic poverty based victim of modern prison system" like just get to that point. Andrew is a grown man who targets children.
  
  That's... Their point? Either you misread what they said or you wrote your response wrong.
- I think it’s a good strategy but it’s not fool proof. They’ll tell you what you want to hear and then slowly start pushing your boundaries. Or they’ll pretend to be one way only to get what they want out of you.
  
  Sure, but I don't think it's meant to be foolproof, it sounds like a great way to start
- gives excessive gifts
  Huge red flag. Becomes a tool of control (I was married into a wealthy family.)
  The big thing is that they can change their personality after marriage - once you are trapped. There were red flags there, which I shouldn’t have ignored, but it was like night and day.
  Mine started getting interested in stuff like religion - noticed that his pastor friend got to play WoW all day while the wife basically did everything.
- How to pull them out of the bog, no idea.
  For my part I've just confessed my ignorance of what's going on on the commercial web, and shared with them the kinds of conversations I'm have on the non-commercial parts (fedi, email, chats, smol web, etc), which are usually nicer and more productive.
  Although to certain extent I still consider this here a form a social media... and I'm not actually sure that it's good for us past a certain number of people. It might be "more cacophony than community" to quote one of Matthew Graybosch's blog posts.
  It is better here than on the mainstream social medias, though. That's for sure for sure.
  EDIT anyway, that's a total aside. I just couldn't help picking up that one thread. Good comment. I love your approach.
You leave them.
Im in a bubble where these guys are like the most laughable parody of themselves so maybe I'm biased but... I mean nobody is taking this kind of stuff serious right? I mean cool, free speech and such but dumb behavior had consequences, right?
- They definitely are, more and more, it's the same as every popular movement. They pad the propaganda with legitimately good advice and some controversial but easily supportable facts. That makes the more controversial items easier to swallow.
I literally just blocked an NSFW lemmit of misogynygonewild and it blew my mind it was even a thing. Fucking trash.
- Cesspits like that should be cleansed with fire
- What is a lemmit?
  
  I believe a bot/site that mirrors reddit subreddits to Lemmy communities. It's anything @lemmit.online
there was plenty of warning signs for Years, even before the pandemic. if you look at how pickup artist operate, and then go on youtube. Tate isnt even a new phenemon, hes a culmination of the above problems. hes just the latest symptom, as was JOE ROGAN.
- Yeah but in the olden days they were on a print ad in the back of Popular Mechanics, not the leading talk show in the nation.
In the old days when you disappeared into a cult, you physically went to live with them and everything.
These days it’s “cult to go.” Good luck intervening and cutting off their link to the cult when the cult is speaking to them from their pocket.
- I miss those days, they'd go be weird on their own and not drag the rest of us into this crap
Its the Boisphere. No men are involved.
Get a new partner.. they're gone
- Even if they come back. It's not worth the labour to hold their hand through that shit. Maybe their mom or dad can talk some sense into them, but I sure as shit wouldn't want to live with someone like that while they figure out how to screw their head back on straight.
Isn't tate already old news for the manosphere?
- witch caused cognitive dissonance
  Ahhh it was the witches all along
  
  Before we rush to judgment about witches. We really should test them to make sure that they are witches.
i think if your husband has weird ideas about women you're supposed to argue with him or something
- Ideally, you have these "arguments" well ahead of time before you marry someone who has fucked up attitudes about anyone, anywhere.
  People can absolutely change and "wake up" to realize that the shit they're holding onto is going to cost them their future and they will absolutely change for the better when they care for someone else and want a better future. But not everyone is willing or capable of self-examination, and many are also not willing or capable of making changes.
  Find out before you both have your names on a mortgage or carton of eggs together.
  
  I have for almost my entire life been entirely too accommodating of other people. My husband has some issues, but a lot of them are small, lack malice or unintentional. Such is human interaction. He is a self declared feminist, however its taken a few years of us being together before he started doing half the cleaning and things like his own laundry. We both work full time. Such is society.
  He smokes 🌳 daily, i smoke 🚬 infrequently. He hates that I do, says he wants a divorce if he catches me and is quite controlling about it tbh. So I've always hidden it from him, I usually smoke 10 a week when I'm smoking and when I dont smoke I go 3-24 months without one. Last night I realized I'm a grown ass woman being treated like a child and I'm enabling the behavior. So I told him I was going outside to smoke. He kicked up his normal fuss, but this morning he initiated a conversation about it calmly and we spoke about it like adults.
  In the same way that the patriarchy harms both men and women, misogyny is upheld by both men and women. Not to equal levels of course on either count, but im so proud of all the people, men and women, who can call this shit out. It took me entirely too long in this example.
  (Also lol at the carton of eggs joke)
The culture war swung too far in a certain direction between 2012-2023 and this is the inevitable result. I saw this coming from a mile away.
Hmm. Follow the money people!
This seems like a ploy by therapists and divorce lawyers! Who else has to gain by this level of stupidity?
I mean i guess gene stealer cultist...But besdies them!
- There are money people?
  
  They have a monocle and a white mustache!
Just use a manometer.

131 comments