I’m an ex incel myself, but I’ve been seeing a few users here exhibiting the tell tale signs. “I’m not attractive enough”, “I don’t socialize correctly”, “I’ll never find a woman” - all extremely unhealthy attitudes.
Personally I burned through many friendships and ruined a lot of chances with women because I was in the incel community. The community warped my view of women so much that I made it even harder to meet women, I became my own worst enemy. I lost friends because all I could think of was how horrible it was that they had girlfriends.
I have a friend who helped me out of it. She was the one who started calling out my bad behavior for what it was, and I started on the long uphill path out of it. I’m now married and stable for well over a decade, but I still think back to those days, and it depresses me seeing other people causing this themselves and not being aware of it.
So, Lemmy, for those who have clawed out of it, what’s your story?
I don’t think I was ever an incel, but back in 2011-12, I was being “red-pilled” on facebook. Goshdarned wimminz, they ruined everything!
The first thing I want to say is how fucking ashamed I am to have fallen for that shit back then and I’m really fucking glad I managed to get out soon-ish. Perhaps ironically, what kept my sanity intact was that I was a very common target of “real men” because the FB groups would often attack the political left and communism with some of the stupidest takes I’ve seen in my life, like “Every failed African country is communist” or “Nazism was left leaning, it’s National SOCIALISM!!!” - Younger me would see that shit, get pissed and write how wrong that was, which has led me to being banned from 2 groups back then.
Now, how did I even end up there in the first place? Well, as nearly everyone else, I suppose, it felt like I wasn’t getting what “the world” had promised me, a cis white man: a woman. I’m not bad looking, but my manners and social skill were caveman level for the most part, I rarely, if ever, thought about others, I just made rude remarks left and right because “haha fuck you”. Of course, back then, I was deluded and saw myself as a gentleman, that disconnect between my own perception and reality (aka how others saw me) no doubt played a huge part in me feeling that I was wronged, that I wasn’t getting any because of some fault within the system instead of myself. Once you’re in this mindset, seeing posts that blame women for your problems make a lot of sense. It’s not that I’m rude and deluded, it’s women that are too picky, it’s women that have terrible taste and go for “obviously low quality males”, it’s women that just want a man they can easily manipulate, etc etc.
As I always fancied myself as left leaning politically, anything that was more political than “personal”, like posts about women in the workforce (women should receive less because they’ll ALWAYS get pregnant!), I’d just ignore and think they were stretching things a bit.
SOOO, I got out of that. My recommendation for anyone that wants to get out of that mindset, the first thing I tell you is: stop fucking following and taking in ANY such incel content. Literally block everything that can remind you of that shit. That’s step one. You don’t need that in your life, you don’t need to feel like you’re in that specific group of losers. There are many better groups of “losers” to be part of
Second, reassess yourself and compare how you view yourself vs reality, how others look at you. In a 10 second interaction with a random person on the street, what would they likely think of you? Any answer that is too extreme on the positive or negative means you’re very likely deluded as I was with myself.
Third, and perhaps most important, when it comes to having any relationship, amorous or not, is: what makes you interesting? “Nothing”? Then you better work on something, anything. Just because you’re into nerd shit doesn’t mean you have to be a nerd shit. I love anime, I love videogames, boardgames, tabletop RPGs, but I never undersell them as nerd shit, I always prop those things as these amazing hobbies I want to SHARE with others, and I’m always 100% ok with people that don’t like them or don’t want to try them (the latter mostly because of all the bad rep thanks to toxic nerd shits)
Adding to the “what makes you interesting”, expand your horizons a bit. Try something new and different, look for any group activities that are cheap or free near your job or your home. You are not the things you like, the things you like are part of what makes you you. You change, your tastes change, you grow up, don’t think current you is too precious to change.
Thank you for your honesty and your story. I can agree that’s one of the ways I got into it, I viewed myself as a catch and women had been conditioned to not want me, such a good person. The whole thing too, it’s their fault for not realizing that it should be a good person instead of a hot person.
Of course it never crossed my mind back then that they were with good people, and maybe I wasn’t as great as I thought I was. I’m still pudgy and I still am bit too sarcastic, but that doesn’t matter, my horrid views on women and myself did enough damage back then.
Also all great advice. “Nice” isn’t a personality. Nice is the bare minimum. You need to be a person, hobbies and geeky things are great. My wife and I started chatting because I talked about music I liked and lord of the rings lore. You are expected to be nice, it’s a personality trait, one part of your personality.
First, I just wanted to say I am very proud of you. This is all tough to admit, and I really hope you share your story more. The fact you got yourself out is huge, and could really change things for others suffering from incel-dom.
Second, “You are not the things you like, the things you like are part of what makes you you. You change, your tastes change, you grow up, don’t think current you is too precious to change.” is a pretty great line.
Thanks. I can’t even say that my life was shit back then, I always had a comfortable lower middle class environment, but due to a number of less than ideal family interactions and lack of self awareness (or maybe, just a lack of general maturity), I ended up in that hole. Calling women bitches and every other type of misogynistic name felt like a relief, that I was getting back at who wronged me. Again, when you’re in that kind of deluded mindset, it makes sense. I got a girlfriend around 3 years after leaving those groups and I told her about this dark time I had, and I’m grateful that she could see from my actions that I wasn’t that piece of shit anymore, she barely even believed that I ever got there.
I understand that not everyone will get out by themselves, some people will need external help, but anyone that feels like that something doesn’t feel quite right in one specific post or another, there’s hope they might get out of that. Like I said, the main thing that drove me away was that their general, ass-sourced toxicity turned against me because I was a stinky commie, but there were other stinky commies that ate that up and preferred to keep seeing women as inferior.
On that line, the last part is what I felt a lot about myself, I often feared that I would “change too much” or that I “wouldn’t be myself” anymore, completely ignoring that I was already different from whatever I was 4 years before that, which was also different from 4 years prior, and so on. Small epiphanies that helped me make sense of myself.
Hey I just wanted to say I think this is a beautiful post, and I’m sorry I somehow checked it off without seeing it. Thank you so much for sharing this, I hope it helps someone going through what you were.
Hmmm.
I never fell into the whole “the system is against me” idea, but I do struggle with self confidence.
But you have a point there. If they are interesting to me, maybe I should share them more and ignore the inner voice of my ex cutting me down. Recently a friend told me “look, you aren’t an incel in the slightest, but your look gives off incel vibes.” It hurt, but she was right. I just needed to dress like I care a little. which isn’t that hard.
It’s not like I really consider myself a nerd. I like painting minis way more than the game. I’m not great at video games, I just really enjoy the stories you can tell. I love science and history, and get way excited about things. I like hitting a golf ball and enjoy watching baseball.
Maybe you opened my eyes to a better me just now. Maybe it’s more I need to find joy in the things I like, rather than just doing them.
I’ll never be a professional painter. But the things I paint look cool. I’ll never get into the PGA, but a birdie is always a brag.
If I like me, others can like me too maybe.
Miniature painting is an amazing hobby to show people, everyone always gets amazed because “it’s so small! How do you do it?” - even if your painting skills are subpar, simply being able to do anything is already enough to amaze anyone outside the hobby
For videogames, I personally love anything that can be cooperative and/or chaotic. For story focused games, talking about the characters tends to be what gets people more interested in participating, much like fans of any movie or show enjoy talking about them. As proof: Tali Zora is the best girl in Mass Effect, Picard is the best Star Trek captain because he’s pragmatic.
Humans naturally love gossip! The key difference that can lead to interesting chats is asking people who “don’t like games”: “if you could control character ABC from the show, what would you do different?”, that’s usually what makes them understand why games with a story can be so interesting to play
Understanding and being able to explain why you like your stuff can certainly help, as you can then properly share with others why you like it, you understand the value of your skill and indeed, when you know your value, it’s easier to like yourself. I really hope all these insights help you figure your own self 😊 (and anyone else that might be reading)
Just popping by to also say I’m proud of you.