Incels, also called the involuntary celibacy community, is a group of men who blame women for their sexless life.

As crazy as it sounds, it’s a real thing, and it started with a community of men on the internet who have been around since 1990. It started with a woman named Alana on the internet who started a website to discuss her sexual inactivity with others. This started off as a group of men and women that would talk to each other and give advice. It then quickly turned into a community where they would ask the female members for advice on relationships. Incel became a support group for men who felt sorry for themselves, but it was never harmful like most of the groups that you can find on the internet, but as the group grew, it quickly turned into something deranged–something so out of one’s control that they confidently sit behind screens and glorify rape, murder, and harassment on the whole population of women.

In April 2018, two roommates named Sohe Chung and So Ra, college students, were killed by a member of the incel community who ran them over with his van while they were walking to the library. The reasoning behind this is unclear, but it is believed to be because of the incel community and the rage he had against women. After the incident happened, the incel group celebrated the women’s deaths and rewarded the killer with praise. Disgustingly enough, this was only the beginning. They called for more “acid attacks” and “mass rapes,” this all put on the internet to pollute young men’s mind into thinking that because they can’t get with  women so women are stuck up “cruel monsters” that they deserve to be raped and killed. It seems bizarre to think anyone would believe this, but tens of thousands of men have this exact mindset. 

Another famous attack on women by an incel member who was seeking “revenge” was  committed by Elliot Rodger. Rodger posted a video on Youtube where he explained that women are at fault for his years of loneliness and rejection in life, attacking and claiming vulgar things about women. He then went further into detail about his “retribution” that he would be getting on women for this abandonment in his life and what he thought they deserved for making him 22 years old and a virgin. “Girls give their affection, sex, and love to other men but never to me, I don’t know why you girls aren’t attracted to me, but I will punish you all for it. It is injustice and a crime” said by Rodger in his video “Retribution.” On May 23, 2014 Rodger killed six people in Isla Vista, California, and, soon after, killed himself in his car. He was viewed as an “incel hero” to the community after this happened, and it only gave incels more publicity. There are even shirts with his face on them and the word incel or “blackpill” (the thought of one’s sexual success is determined by your attractiveness at birth that will determine your sexual relations in the future) that you can buy from websites like “Redbubble.” 

This continues to be an ongoing group on the internet, and not many are aware of exactly what incels believe in and what extent they go to, to feel satisfied with not only themselves, but with the group as a whole. Although it only becomes more difficult to live in a society where groups like such strive off the belittlement and close-mindedness of women , we continue to rise up, build off that discrimination, and strive off of men striving off of our power.