Get the Ricochet app

Ricochet will work fine in a browser on your mobile devices, but for the best experience please download our app.

Download on the App StoreGet it on Google Play

Become a member.

Tired of the toxicity of social media? Why not join Ricochet for just $5/month? Think of it as an online bar. Come in, have a drink, hang out, say whatever you want. But don’t badger, bully, or berate the other drinkers. That's our only rule.

Discussion (77)

  • Burwick Chiffswiddle@Kephalithos

    James is right. People who earnestly call themselves "incels" subscribe to an ideology -- an ideology which is little more than a mirror image of the critical theory-inspired credo common among the left.

    In defense of sad, lonely young men -- not incels, but more sympathetic people who risk being tarred with the same brush -- I'll say this: Modern society places the burden of forming relationships almost entirely on the individual. For better or worse, it no longer throws people into involuntary contact with each other --at least, not to the extent it once did. If I want to meet someone, I can't expect institutions to do the work for me; I must seek her out. And that's difficult -- particularly for those of us who aren't exactly overflowing with bravado. Add to that the fact that many people have high standards and low self-esteem, and the fact that relationships only work when they're sustained by regular contact (even with the Internet, most friendships are made or broken by geography), the result is a large cohort of men who've all but given up.

    Most people follow the path of least resistance. That path once led to marriage and family. Now, it leads to video games and prolonged adolescence.

Scroll for later comments
+72 more comments
Join the conversation

You're seeing five of 77 comments. Sign in, or join for just $5 per month, to read them all and add your own.