Many young men are driven to resentment and are financially exploited as influencers sell them classes, pills, and the illusion of clout, a new report reveals.

For many years now, a dark question has haunted parents, teachers, the internet, and media institutions: What’s wrong with young men?

Why, people ask, are boys so politically extreme, spouting misogynist rhetoric, and increasingly drawn into risky crypto schemes and online gambling? How did they become so lonely, with their depression symptoms often overlooked? The male youth vote broke for Trump in the 2024 election following a GOP campaign built on naked appeals to meathead machismo. Yet there are signs that his second term in office has done little to stem the anger of Gen Z men, whose support for the president is now plummeting.

The most common explanation of these interrelated phenomena is that younger men have banded together online under the umbrella of something known as the “manosphere,” usually conceived as an organic right-wing rebellion driving the culture wars. A new study, however, suggests that this is entirely backward: The digital ecosystem that produces red-pilled men is less of a movement than it is a pyramid scheme.

  • velma@sh.itjust.works
    26·
    3 months ago

    Barker says that while younger kids can be kept out of this pipeline by their parents, advocacy groups, and legislatively imposed protections, men entering adulthood don’t have the same support. “If we’re looking at the 18- to 29-year-olds, which is where we see the biggest traffic to these spaces, nobody’s got their back,” he says. This demographic “falls through the cracks” because society expects that they “should be able to handle this by themselves” as skeptical media consumers, he adds.

    However, in post-2024 focus groups, Reset Tech found that young men could demonstrate a “striking lack of self-awareness” when it came to their sources of news and perspectives on current events, considering podcasts like The Joe Rogan Experience essentially unbiased. They also “believed women were trapped in echo chambers looking at makeup and lifestyle content while they themselves received information from neutral, verified sources,” the researchers write.

    “We’ve got to reach them to basically be more critical with what they look at,” Barker says. “They do want to call out when stuff is bullshit,” he adds, it’s just that the digital ecosystem and its algorithms have, by their very nature, “narrowed” men’s opportunities to experience views that meaningfully challenge their own.

    In the absence of action from the platforms, Barker says, it will be up to the users to recognize that the people selling them peptides, dating hacks, and get-rich-quick schemes are taking advantage of them—and leave the associated online communities or even mobilize others to do the same by calling out the harms they cause. Maybe a young male commentator who devotes themselves to exposing the toxic lies and scams of the grievance economy would become an influencer in their own right.

    “I think it’s not gonna be a tomorrow thing, that we get a group of young men who are like, ‘Yeah, I’m gonna be the warrior for calling out injustice online,’” Barker says. “But I think it’s kind of where some of the action has got to come from.”

    We need to teach critical thinking at all levels. We are failing our children which in turn leads to us failing our young adults. And this is by design, at least in the US. The lack of education directly leads to this kind of deception. And all of this feels reminiscent of the conversations we’re having around MAGA voters being tricked essentially.

    There’s a vacuum here where an influencer can step in and start calling this stuff out and I love that the author concluded the article with that call to action.

    • Madzielle@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
      9·
      2 months ago

      When my husband was in his 20s he went through a lot. What saved him was having his father still there to support him. Hes now almost 40 and his father still supports him emotionally, whenever.

      When I was 20 and asked my mom for support of anykind, “youre an adult, no, figure it out, your actions have consequences”. She literally slammed the door in my face.

      The difference of having a supporting role in ones life. Fathers, mothers, fucking love your children always. it does more than anything a program or law could.

      • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
        3·
        2 months ago

        But we still must account for those of us who don’t have them, whether because of lack of will like you experienced or inability.

        I was very fortunate, despite not having parents anymore after by early 20s, I found community who were able to help me continue to grow and mature. We need to build community and partake in it so we can be people like I had. In my 30s I know I’m looking for opportunities to pay it forward as I see it in similar communities.

        • Madzielle@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
          2·
          2 months ago

          the fuck you mean lack of will? my mothers lack of will? My mom didnt raise me. I knew her, and after 18 saught out her support, but I was orphaned at 4 and turned 18 as a ward of the state

          Never found a crowd for support. Never liked putting that shit on my friends anyway. Two my siblings and I grew up close, and even tried, subconsciously, to parent eachother, or support one another in the way a parent would. Its not the same.

          The trauma of having your parents not give a fuck about you, is the worst of it. No friend can fix that. Best parents love thier kids right.

          Pay it forward is a good value. I try n do the same, first and foremost, by loving my kid properly.

          • captainlezbian@lemmy.world
            4·
            2 months ago

            I apologize if I wasn’t clear that I meant the parents’ lack of will. It’s never a child’s fault that they don’t have support. And even when the child is an adult, so long as they ask they should receive it.

            I’m very sorry your parents did all that to you.

            • Madzielle@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
              3·
              2 months ago

              Yeah, it’s a sensitive subject, Im sorry too. Only the first sentence was with fire in my heart, but I def spiked there, Im sorry.