You Owe Me: Sex, Entitlement, and White Privilege in the Digital Age

Incels.

Involuntary celibates. A new-age term for a generation of online men who desire a romantic partner but who are unable to attract one.

On the surface, this term doesn't seem particularly threatening. After all, we all have people in our networks and social circles who would like to be romantically involved but who aren't. Some are unlucky in love, others getting out of a toxic relationship, others still identifying ways to have a better work/life balance, and some simply are finding themselves and their confidence in the dating world. We've all had situations where either ourselves or someone we know has been a bit down as to their romantic prospects and it can take its toll, both emotionally and sometimes physically. So much of American culture is based on the idea of having a romantic partner. Family sitcoms is an entire television genre but equally popular are sitcoms where the main character or characters go through the adventurous dating scene. Rarely, if ever, do we see a character content being single and this is the type of message that our children see and internalize from a very young age. After all, nobody wants to go to the high school prom alone. 

But what we are seeing with this new generation of self-described incels is more than simple longing. It's more than down, out-of-luck men who cannot find love in the digital age. It's something new, rash, and unfortunately as we've come to witness, dangerous and in some cases, deadly. The incel movement is the worst traits of men, overwhelmingly White men, amplified in a digital setting. It is the continuation of GamerGate, which demonstrated the online toxicity of men being hateful and abusive toward women. Hiding behind the online cloud of anonymity simply empowered them to spew venomous misogyny and sexism toward women in an environment where they were free of any and all repercussions. What GamerGate showed all of us is that there was a subculture of online men who were more than happy to abuse women to make them feel better about themselves. 

For these men, the desire to abuse women comes down to one, simple thing: power. These are the type of men who are used to being in control. They come from privilege. They've never been told no in any type of setting so when they hear it from a woman is a unique type of shock. These are the type of men who make a scene in public when a woman denies their advances. They are the ones who get turned down by their female co-worker and then turn to their buddy and say, "Well, she's a slut anyway so no loss there." They are the ones who get all up on a woman in the club and start grinding on them only to become offended when the woman pushes them away. For them, women are objects to be had for sex and sex only. To deny them sex is to deny them their birthright. And to deny them their birthday is something that is simply unacceptable. 

This mentality is made worse through online dating sites and apps such as Tinder, Ok Cupid, Plenty of Fish, and Bumble. Here, these incels have multiple platforms with which to engage complete strangers with zero repercussions for their actions. Sure, a female user feeling uncomfortable with any interactions can "block" the user in question but nothing is preventing these users from harassing multiple women each and every day. Being in an online space has empowered these incels to be more and more bold in their demands for sex. Again, to them and their perverted world view, sex should come easily to them. Sex should be desireable for their potential partner. Any woman not interested in them is missing out. Any woman not interested in them in insulting them by their disinterest. Any woman insulting them is a "slut", "whore", or "cunt" and should be called out daring to deny them the sex that they feel they rightly deserve. 

At the end of the day, incels are cowards. They're frauds. Phonies. They're not getting laid because of some grand conspiracy against them but rather because they're terrible human beings who view women as objects rather than people. They don't listen to women on dates. They don't open car doors or bring them flowers. They don't wine and dine them or allow relationships to develop slowly and naturally. Instead, they blame women for their shortcomings. For their inability to listen or to keep a decent conversation. For wanting to take things slow and not jump into a physical relationship right away. Incels expect women to submit to them instantaneously and when that doesn't happen they have no idea how to respond. Rather than engaging in a period of self-reflection, incels instead turn to those across the table, in this case women, and blame them for their own inadequacies. Because blaming women is much easier than blaming themselves.

Not all incels will resort to the type of violence we saw in Atlanta. But the movement is dangerous and Trumpism has exacerbated incels' views on women. Having a mysoginist in the White House provided incels with a feeling of legitimacy in blaming women for their own struggles. Having Trump claim he wouldn't sexaully assault women based on their looks was exactly the type of message that incels needed to hear to justify their own perverted worldview. In Trump, incels saw one of them, one of their own. They saw somebody who could get sex anytime he wanted, who could grab women by the pussy to assert his dominance. To incels, Trump was what they inspired to be and who they wanted to emulate. If he could force women to submit, they could, too. It was only when they were rejected that incels began to struggle with the reality that they were't like Trump in this way. Like all Trump supporters they could not fail, they could only be failed. And it was women who were failing them by not submitting to their sexual desires.

The violence we saw in Atlanta was extreme and it was the culmination of the incel mindset. The Atlanta terrorist killed because he was denied sex, something he was in no way entitled to. But after having Donald Trump in the White House for four years and now having restrictions of COVID being lifted, incels like the one in Atlanta will continue to feel oppressed for their own shortcomings and will eventually reach a point where they snap. That snapping point may be a rude message on an online dating app. It may be a rude comment at the end of a date. Or it may be storming the United States Capitol looking for that "bitch" Nancy Pelosi. Whatever the ultimate outcome may be, it is critical that we recognize the incel movement as one closely aligned with the Proud Boys, Three Percenters, and Oath Keepers as many incels proudly affiliate with these White nationalist groups. White grievance is very real and as we saw in Atlanta, white grievance against women can be deadly. Nobody, especially women of color, should have to live in fear of mediocre White men demanding sex. 

And nobody should give these men a pass for the open harassment of women.