Netflix has released a new documentary by Louis Theroux where he goes inside the so-called ‘manosphere’, the world of young men who are followers of a small group of ‘influencers’. The whole set up is quite simple to understand. The influencers have become wealthy by acquiring followers from the pool of marginalized young men by telling them that their precarious lives with no proper jobs or financial security or female companions is not their fault but because ‘the ‘system’ controlled by a secretive cabal (read ‘Jews’) is keeping them down. References to the film The Matrix abound and these influencers say that they offer the ‘red-pill’ that reveals the world as it really is so that the men can defeat the system and become rich too.
It is a seductive message aimed at alienated and aggrieved young men that is wrapped in a package where the influencers show their followers lavish lifestyles in fancy homes and cars surrounded by young women in the skimpiest of attire and say that all this could be theirs as well if they follow the leaders and send in money for products, courses, and financial services.
This world exists on social media, especially Instagram and TikTok, so if you do not have accounts there, you probably have no idea of the extent of what is going on or who these influencers are.
Terms including “The Matrix” and “red pill” – referring to the idea that men have become “wage slaves” disadvantaged by a society that prioritises women’s rights – are popular in the space.
Manosphere influencers such as Justin Waller, an American businessman who appears in Theroux’s film, often portray themselves as wealthy, successful and surrounded by young women.
Many sell courses claiming to teach subscribers how to emulate them.
They often go viral in short clips where they will unapologetically make bold, divisive statements about gender roles or degrading comments about women.
The levels of misogyny, homophobia, racism, and anti-semitism expressed by these people are disgusting. The influencers believe in ‘one-sided monogamy’ which means exactly what you would guess it to mean. Women are meant to ‘stay in their lane’ which means being at home, cooking, and cleaning, be available for sex whenever it is demanded of them, and to accept that the men will be having sex with other women.
One big question is: How large is the target audience is and how many are being converted to these view? Those most susceptible seem to be alienated and even traumatized young men. It is clear that while some are buying into it, others are rightly skeptical.
Zeesham Khan, 23, said he and his younger brother both knew people who had radically changed their mindsets after engaging with it.
“I know people who have lost friends because those friends believe: ‘If you’re not rich, I shouldn’t be hanging around with you.
“I’m trying to get rich, I’m trying to go off to Dubai, I’ve got to cut you off’.”
Student Kenan says he’s looked at some of the courses many influencers sell and has not invested himself, but understands why others might.
“A lot of people, when you get to your 20s, they feel like they’re running out of time to make a move, to be rich, so they invest in these courses,” says the 20-year-old.
“You can’t just go to one of these influencers and buy one of their courses thinking that life’s gonna be so much easier after that.
“They’re the only ones profiting off that.”
The selling tactics are pretty straightforward.
What makes this worth noting is that these men deliberately flaunt their wealth, cars, and cash, specifically to attract women. And then they turn around and tell their followers that women only go after men for financial gain, presenting it as a universal truth about female nature.
The real goal is to become rich, because everything else is predicated on that. This is basically a pyramid scheme. The people who got into it early got rich by tapping into the market of alienated young men who wanted to find a quick way out of their present lives and think that sending in money to these influencers for courses, products, and financial advice is the way to do it. While the influencers say that anyone can replicate their lives, the reality is that as with any other pyramid scheme, it is only those who got in early that make any real money.
These influencers promise that if a man works out to build their muscles and wears flashy clothes, they can get any woman. In reality though, one of the women shown is quite frank about the fact that what she likes is the fact that these men have money and are willing to spend it on them. The young follower wannabees don’t seem to realize that only a tiny few can achieve what they have been promised is there just for the taking
I am sympathetic to the view that the system is stacked by the oligarchic rich against everyone else. But that is because of the late-stage capitalist world that we live in. The idea that it can be overcome by adopting deeply misogynistic, racist, homophobic, and anti-semitic views is to actually help perpetuate that exploitative system by dividing us along lines that weaken us.
Here’s the trailer.
I suspect that a lot of the young men being “influenced” are sad incels like Elliot Rodger was. They think that they are “owed” attention and adoration by women, when in reality, they don’t have the tolerance or attitude to attempt a real relationship with a real woman. They believe that only a “10” is worthy of their time and energy. The absolute truth is that these young men are at best a “5” themselves because of the attitude. No self-respecting woman would want to spend time with such assholes.
A lot of people from Ayn Rand to the original ancient sophists have gotten rich by telling people what they want to hear. They are analogous to the royal courtiers who would praise the vices of the ruler as virtues.
The internet have made them far more dangerous. Here are two articles from The Guardian.
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“Inside the Manosphere review – why doesn’t he focus more on the impact on women?” The Guardian .https://share.google/WCGUXm0zUjMFs0OLm
“Louis Theroux on the manosphere, marriage and misunderstandings” | .https://share.google/hIB26ra54AI6kcQrv
Such scammers have been around a long time; there are just a lot more of them now that we have social media. “Prosperity gospel” preachers come easily to mind.
Back in the 1970s, I was living in Pittsburgh, PA and had a part-time job on Sundays at a radio station that had a mostly African-American audience. It was a directional AM station that had a remote-controlled transmitter, and I had a First Class Radiotelephone License from the FCC (no longer a thing). I would be the only person there the first thing Sunday morning; and my job would be to turn everything on, fire up the transmitter, play the sign-on tape, and play a bunch of tapes from syndicated radio preachers.
One of the preachers was Reverend Ike whose principal message was, if you pray really hard (and incidentally send money to Reverend Ike), you too can have worldly success. His show would include testimonials (yes, really). I remember one in which a woman said, “Reverend Ike, I prayed really hard, and you know what I found in my driveway the next morning? A Cadillac!”; and Reverend Ike said, “A Cadillac?! That’s what rich people drive!” (I’m not making that up.)
I lasted three or four weeks and decided I could no longer be a party to ripping off poor people.
I wholly agree with Mano about the cause of this phenomenon: the oligarchic rich, late-stage capitalism, that we live in, has made wage-slaves of us all.
But, I think that the young man quoted, Zeesham Khan, isn’t quite right. He said that, in their late 20s, men feel that they’re running of out *time* to “make a move”, i.e. try to make their lives better.
I think that it’s more that they see that, in our society where they face an endless future as faceless, meaningless, wholly unimportant, wage slaves, there is no way to have a meaningful job or life or place in society, except through desperate measures to achieve the traditional life of a “successful” and respected man: money, physical strength, good looks, and dominance over women (since there is no one else that they can feel “looks up” to them. That they can feel superior to.)
The viciousness and decay and despair of late-stage capitalism. You remember Tracy Chapman’s song “Fast Car”? “I had a feeling that I could be someone.” False hope, of course, as is this pyramid scheme.
so, if all the women are at home for the ‘one-sided monogamy’ who exactly are the manosphere having sex with?
release the epstein files and find out.
birgerjohansson @#2, The Guardian uses URLs that work just fine:
Louis Theroux: Inside the Manosphere review …
Louis Theroux on the manosphere …
Is there a need to use routes via a personal data collector?
Oops, sorry. That’s awkward. The 2nd link:
https://www.theguardian.com/tv-and-radio/2026/mar/07/louis-theroux-interview-inside-the-manosphere-2026-documentary
@johnathan catman #1: While incels approved of his murders, and his fantasies of raping virgin cheerleaders and disposing of them… at the time most of them didn’t consider him one of them, and it’s unlikely he was even aware of the term. He was a rich prettyboy, after all, and actually did have at least one hot girl after him. Not some poor uggo freak that no girl would ever touch because females are all so shallow. (Actually most were middle class and ordinary-looking, but they were deeply insulted if you pointed that out.) I don’t know if that’s changed, maybe they’re claiming him now. Yes, yes, I know that the term “incel” is now defined almost entirely by people who don’t identify by that label, and “Saint Elliot” was an incel by current non-incel definitions… but so are certain married people who have lots of sex, which makes the label disconnected from its origins of “involuntary celibate”.
Personally I think we should just leave “incel” as a community ingroup label, even if a delusional one, and just use the term “manospherian” for the broader group of entitled, disaffected misogynists (which the vast majority of self-described “incels” are a minor subset of). I seem to be in the minority, though.
Somehow the OP reminded me of the novel Soul Mountain written by Gao Xingjian about life in China in the 1980s/1990s (kind of).
One of the descriptions was of gangs of male youths who had basically despaired of life because the one-child policy meant female children were aborted in preference of having a male heir. Leaving a large number of young men who would never find a wife (note: even a 60/40 split could result in a large number of men unable to find women). IIRC, the novel described angst-ridden young men who chose to be unemployed wandering through the country subsiding on handouts, or theft, because they were unable (for various reasons) to find a mate. I wonder what has occurred since the novel was written?
aka slavery. Reminds me of the following article (warning, very upsetting):
https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2026/mar/12/a-few-beatings-wont-kill-you-judge-rejects-divorce-request-of-woman-abused-by-husband-in-afghanistan
Brother, Islam allows you to beat your wife? Then Islam is shit, brother.
Hilarious they don’t know that the Matrix was by trans women about the trans experience.
https://www.bbc.com/news/newsbeat-53692435
Silentbob @#11,
In response to a comment by you on an earlier post, I emailed you my concern about it but the email was returned saying it was undeliverable. It may be that the email address you gave when you registered was incorrect. I then posted a comment asking you to email me privately. Can you please email me at mano.singham@case.edu so that I can re-send the email?
Any chance of Louis doing an exposé on the TERFs now?
@Mano #12:
You meant @case.edu
[Yes, thanks! Mano]
I’m reminded of the famous LBJ quote, that seems so relevant today:
To the MAGAs, the target is primarily “immigrants” (hispanics), but also includes women, jews, and liberals.
They just swapped the primary message to a different -ism than the norm. For a lot of the people who are perfectly happy to blame everything wrong with their lives on some other group the primary message ends up being about racism. Oh they’re mysoginists and antisemites and so forth as well. But the call to gather around the fire for them is mostly racism. These guys just realized they could put mysoginy front and center instead.
If you’ve read the short story The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas this might sound familiar. I believe it’s freely available online because it won a literary award. The main difference between the story and reality is that a lot of people in the real world aren’t arguing whether they should torment a child to gain prosperity for everyone else. They’re just arguing about which child should be tormented. And who gets to choose. And of course why stop at just one child when you can torment a whole group of children? That’s what they’re working with.