I keep seeing posts mentioning this phenomenon more and more often.

For instance:

More and more men are being sucked into parts of the internet that circulate misogynist content, leaving their families to deal with the wreckage

‘Andrew Tate phenomena’ surges in schools - with boys refusing to talk to female teacher

Like, why? Why now? Why even? I really wish I had a time machine where I could go to the future and ask them what the general reasons were for this social development. But I feel like I’m looking for the specific thorn on a cactus that popped my balloon.

  • FRYD@sh.itjust.worksEnglish
    9·
    17 hours ago

    Something I rarely see brought up is specifically the edgelord to right wing pipeline. When I was a kid, it was essentially standard for any boy online to try to be super edgy. Adolescents and teens just have a natural urge for rebellion.

    The problem comes when kids think edgy and shock value humor is their favorite thing, but more mature online users reject that behavior and exclude these kids. These kids feel misunderstood and are drawn to figures and role models that accept what they like.

    I’ve met a bunch of younger, “conservative”, incel types recently and they’ve all been edgelords who found their own little community instead of growing up. They largely have no ideology in the beginning but slowly absorb manosphere bullshit and over time they become less “ironic”.

    The thing that got me to stop being edgy was joining the swim team and having my friend group go from edgelords to gay swimmers. I developed a ton of respect for them and they were my teammates; it completely changed my mind without me having to “conform” to the things I wanted to rebel against. I don’t really know how to get that across to some many kids that get sucked up into this madness though.

    • Katana314@lemmy.worldEnglish
      5·
      16 hours ago

      I call this Shadow the Hedgehog darkness. When something wants to look dark and mature from the outset, but it’s really a form of childishness. Same appearance takes effect for a lot of “dark” anime, where people are routinely betraying and causing pain, and “At its heart most of humanity just wants chaos” blah blah.

      I do think there’s a lot of horrible stuff in the world, but it’s usually far more banal than anything these edgelords envision. When put face to face, people usually want to be kind to each other. But we’re not put face-to-face often enough.