Reading “Who are the flat Earthers?”, I decided to give the essay a 91.75 grade.  With organization, style, creativity, grammar & mechanics, receiving exemplary grades, I felt that content and development was lacking. Regarding content I felt that the social-scientific interpretation was not enough. Even though the writer included info on the haters in the community there was no direct quote towards the theory other than mockery of the logo. In development I felt that the piece was missing the communities norms. I would have liked to know more about what actions the flat earth community was taking in society instead of only what was seen on the discussion board. Overall I did feel the piece was creativity and the title was what attracted me the most to learning about the Flat Earthers.

Excerpt from “Our Incel Problem” by Zack Beauchamp gave insight into the Incel online community. Incel– a shortened term for the involuntary celibacy is a name given to those going through “romantic troubles”. Beauchamp notes that incels are awkward in real life surrounding topics of romance and sex. The author notes that the group started as a community that shared struggles and gave advice but developed into a dangerous subculture. For instance, the author described the old online community to be a “social justice warrior community”– and shares that 20 years later the group shares dangerous ideas and is potentially a reflection of the political environment.

As the online community of Incels change, Beauchamp mentions that there are a particular age group and a picture of what an incel looks like. Insiders have a shared sexist ideology of the “black pill”– a fundamental rejection of a woman’s sexual emancipation. Members of the community are hostile to outsiders who look to observe the community — and has changed from a group that includes all genders to one that mainly consists of men. The author notes that the sexist ideology stems from a larger problem in society. In broader western society there is a dark set of societal values and expectations of women that reflect the discussions happening within the incel online community. Beauchamp says that the black pill ideology poses a threat and can lead to violence if taken to a logical extreme. The author also notes that even if it isn’t murder, the ideology can create various acts of violence such as harassment and violent assault. The current online community of Incels as a reflection of society’s darkest values with the combination of modern technological advancements is reshaping politics– and is a conversation that the author describes to be, “not prepared to be confronted”.

The specific patterns or trends that the author notes about the members of incel or “involuntary celibacy” are the reasons for joining the group, how the members share an age range, and the language in their ‘culture’. The group turned into an online community because its members had the same trend in facing rejection in their lives from women. Incel pertains to millennial males that range from the ages of 16-30. The article explains the pattern of difficulties with communicating to the opposite sex, and a member’s fear of rejection. In the group, they vent about their battles with bullying and low self-esteem. These introverted and awkward men found comfort in this support group with people facing the same isolation and loneliness. These patterns inform the insider experience of this community by exposing the language and pathos that the members use. Abe, for example, calls women “emotional tampons” to express his frustration from being dumped. They also have a pattern of acting unfriendly and defensive towards outsiders: “1,267 Braincels users found that about 90 percent of forum participants were under the age of 30. The users are almost all men — women are banned on sight.” A member named Miguel “was drawn to the community because he felt they were the only people who understood his experience,” this shows that despite being a virtual medium, the member’s mutual loneliness and misery indeed craves some type of validation from another member. Overall, the author analyzes how the community began as an innocent way for men to vent about their misfortune in love into an absolute misogynist and hateful group.

Throughout the reading there are different things that tend to come up often, sort of like the main idea of the article. Two of the trends that the author mentioned were the ages and the gender in the group. Before the change in  reasoning for this group, there were woman and men who talked and gave advice about dating. It was more of a safe space for questions to be asked and advice to be given. According to the article, after the change in the groups motives, the age range was from 16-30 and the gender of the group consists of mainly men. Woman were no longer allowed in the group because now they were the target. Another major trend that runs throughout the group is the fact that the men are not able to keep a girlfriend or get a date in the first place. They blame women for not being able to be socially and sexually acceptable in society. The members of the community are men who are down and out. They decide to take their anger out on woman because they feel less than or felt less than in the past and can’t handle it. It’s honestly a big pity party in my book but with more aggression and stupidity. In the end, the author shows how the group was one thing in the beginning and led to a whole other community solely off of toxic masculinity. Communities grow and expand in many different ways but this ones foundation was completely changed and thrown off course.

Incel short for  “involuntary celibacy” is a group that formed into a community. The author discusses this group of noting the members all having the specific pattern of facing rejection in their lives from women. The members of this community, majority male range from the ages of 16-30 sharing their hardships from things like bullying, autism, anxiety, and unacceptance from others that have caused these men to feel unvalued and unattractive. These men are introverted and turn to the internet to seek refuge from their isolation and rejection. 

The author provides a context of the origins of Incel showing the insider experience through the altering of this community. This once small group that began from a shy lonely teenager evolved in two decades after the death of Sohe Chung beginning a trend of violence and hate towards women. This open-minded support group for those are lacking in dating and sex had degenerated into a place where praise for hate, mass killers, and ideas of this like rape has become normalized. 

The incels have this inside idea of “sexist ideology” which is a belief known as “black pill” having disrespect towards women labeling them as shallow, cruel creatures who will choose only the most attractive men. This tells us that the rejection these men have faced from women has caused them to blame women for their problems. From this community, we see constant loneliness these men feel has evolved into rage towards women. In this community, they all share the same feelings of misfortunes but don’t work in any way to empower or find a more positive outlook. 

The author’s analysis of this community relates to a wider context as he talks in the end about how all people can relate to members of Incel’s feelings of rejection and loneliness but this community takes their common misfortunes and has turned into misogynistic rage towards a gender. 

I read the essay #Sullie. It was a very powerful essay describing how powerful words can be and the fact they can be able to take away a person’s life. The author had a great set up throughout the essay and the way she portrayed the message she wanted to deliver. I want to give the essay a total of 86%. The author did clarify all that she wanted to say in a clear format and the way she described how the artist had lived her life. I would have wanted to see more quotes on the people who were really close to her and describe her experience about the hate on a more personal level. I really like how she even incorporated quotes about how Sullie felt and how she wanted people to stop judging her because she only wanted to progress in life, but unfortunately things did not go her way. Overall, the author did a really great job in organizing her thoughts and details.

Involuntary celibacy, otherwise known as “incels” are people who have very severe romantic troubles. In the excerpt from the article the author interviews various people from the incel community and notes various patterns amongst them all. The majority of incels are males, aging anywhere under 30. They all share this hate for women because of their romantic troubles. They believe these troubles are womens fault, who choose to only seek material things in men. So long as their loneliness continues, they will continue to hate women. Many of these men have their very own issues, and joined together in this community they share their horrid experiences with women and relationships. As a whole, a lot of incels have a lack of confidence. This is something that some have always had due to their very own personal flaws that they see within themselves. Others believe their confidence was destroyed due to their experiences with women. This keeps them down, where they just continue to build all of the hate and anger toward women. In a wider spectrum incels represent the age-old misogyny that has existed all throughout history. Women have been subject to prejudice, much of which has been perpetuated by men.  Men who project their hate on to women because of their very own issues and seek to destroy women and degrade them. As technology has advanced incels just found a medium to form communities where they share this hate.

The author Zack Beauchamp goes into great detail describing the demographic that the incel community is composed of. What I find interesting is that many of the people in the incel community are not monsters that commit acts of violence (although of course there are very much examples of that) but rather lonely, young, and frustated men. It is very sad to see these young men begin their journey down a very dark path. I think the incel community breeds an attitude of hopelessness, and hatred, but again these men aren’t all villains, they just have very small (if any) support networks and thus these incel communities are the only place where they can find some sort of social support. Unfortunately, seeking these communities out as support networks instills the bad mentalities onto these young men and thus the misogynistic attitudes are spread.

Besides that though, I think that the patterns shown here help to enhance our understanding of the insider experience  in many ways. The author helps us learn just what kind of people are in this incel community and I think it is good that they actually interview some members of this community so we can get a better understanding of them. As stated above, the demographic is primarily frustrated, lonely, young men who seem to want validation of how they feel, they seem to want to find others who are like them, and who have gone through what they have.

The authors analysis of this community shows how the misogynistic attitudes can spread through these communities and why these young men in particular are so vulnerable to adopting these particular misogynistic mindsets that the incel community has.

Incel is short for involuntary celibates, a name for those who lack romance and intimacy in their lives. The author notes a lot of interesting things about these members, such as describing them as awkward in real life, specifically with sex and dating. Not only that, they describe it as a “social justice warrior community.” A trend that followed after the death of Sohe Chung was calling for the disrespect of women and to encourage attacks on them, blaming them for their lack of sexual intimacy. What started off as an online forum for advice on how to approach women became a safe place to bash women and call for violent attacks. These patterns and trends inform the insider experience because it shows a progression of how a group went from mild to extreme after an incident opened up the stream of negativity. A trend I noticed while reading this is that it begins with loneliness and possibly being left emotionally fragile by a woman. This tells us that these men might be a bit unstable and insecure because they all claim that attractiveness is the root of all problems with women. In a wider context, this all seems to relate to insecurity which can lead people to look for help over the internet rather than with a therapist. While they might find comfort in a community consisting of people with similar issues, one can not fix another person’s problems or provide help if they have the same unsolved issue. As the author stated at the end, everyone shares rejection, some until  adulthood, but not everyone finds comfort and similar opinions about blaming women for the lack of confidence and sex in ones life which Beauchamp relates to misogynistic rage. While these men might need a range of support, love, and intimacy, it is not a woman’s job to give it to them nor is it a given right for men.

Some specific trends the author notes about the members of the incel community is that somewhere in their life they have had some form of rejection from life and women. Many share that they had been bullied when they were younger or have qualities about themselves that are not valued in our current culture or not deemed attractive. Some shared their disabilities such as autism and having extreme anxiety which can lead to being introverted and avoiding social situations. All the members of the incel communities are young men aged sixteen to thirty.

The patterns that inform the insider experience in this community is the constant loneliness and rejection that these men have experienced which later develops into rage against women which eventually becomes hatred. What that tells me at least about the members of the community is that they don’t want to empower their members to be confident (which will get them women guaranteed), they want them angry, sad, to feel sorry for themselves and blame a whole gender on their misfortunes in life. The members of the community need an outlet to express their rage and sorrow. Instead of turning their misfortunes into a positive thing and discovering a healthy outlet. The incel community wants to stay and melt in their insecurities, which in my opinion will never help them with women instead push them away. It’s like their doomed from the start, just bringing their pain deeper into their subconsciousness. When people experience trauma it’s a very delicate situation. A good way to combat trauma is support from other people who have experienced the same thing. To also combat it you need to accept it to move on to better yourself. Using rage as a way to deal with your problems just gets you into more problems. Your moving from a place of hurt that needs to be addressed.

I really liked how Beauchamp balanced factual evidence and personal stories of people of the incel community. I think the analysis of this community relates to a lot of things we experience in this world such as sexism and misogyny. It tears women down. It’s an outlet to openly hate women due to their lack of understanding and hatred of themselves. It moves in a circle once you get hurt you move your hurt onto someone else. And that just keeps repeating until you break it.  I was disgusted to read that this community was twisted into hating women and actually killing innocent people. But I hate to say that it didn’t surprise me.