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I've seen clips of the documentary. Not going to watch it.
Just seems like your standard scare piece, like they moved on from climate change, declining bee populations, or unhealthy fast food meals, and now its the big, scary red pill men who are corrupting the youth and we should be having a satanic panic about it RIGHT NOW.
What just viscerally puts me off is how there is, apparently, no sympathetic examination of what exactly appeals about these guys. Sure you can kind of handwave it "guys want to feel powerful, superior, and important, and these are effectively con men who prey upon those urges." Fine. Whatever. What conditions in the material world are such that young men are looking to these men as role models, what is missing in their lives that they seek to fill it with this?
And I make this point semi-often... they always fail to offer up a competing vision of true 'healthy' masculinity that men should aspire to instead. Or to point out a non-toxic male role model that actually engenders the values they suggest men ought to seek to represent.
This creates an inherently muddled message to men. "DON'T listen to the siren song of red pill grifters, DON'T give in to misogyny, DON'T become a parody of masculinity. That's VERY BAD."
"Okay okay, but what should I do instead?"
"Fuck you, figure it out yourself or die alone."
It is a critical problem if you ask me. There are very VERY few well-known, popular male figures who espouse and represent a form of masculinity that demonstrates an appealing and attainable path an otherwise average guy can follow to get a meaningful, fulfilling life. Mike Rowe tries but I also just recently learned that Mike Rowe and his long term romantic partner ARE NOT MARRIED and DO NOT HAVE KIDS. Dude.
And I'll hit on it one more time: Charlie Kirk fulfilled that function pretty well and got murdered, in cold blood, in broad daylight, on camera and there has been no real replacement forthcoming. Yes I'm mad.
And young men by and large don't seem to want to outsource this stuff to social media or celebrities. They'd rather have a father figure (ideally an actual father) in their life to personally guide them on the path and demonstrate a healthy, successful approach to romance, business, family, life. And its the fact that society fails to provide that for millions of men that we find ourselves where we are.
You can dip into the stats and studies, its beyond obvious that whatever impact social media influencers have on guys, you can assume there's double that impact occuring on the female of the species. Its not even really controversial to say that science confirms that women are more susceptible to groupthink, peer pressure, social shaming, and use conformity to maintain social status. Whatever you want to refer to the social mechanisms for consensus formation as, its women who are being guided by it.
Sabrina Carpenter gets thousands of women to sing a lyric about men being 'useless' and we don't get thinkpieces delving into what impact this has on impressionable young women.
And of course, if you're so worried about the takeaway men get from redpill culture, please, feel free to tell me how you think men should react to THAT. What exactly is the 'healthy' male response there?
Its like we have a culturally-enforced Women are Wonderful Effect. It doesn't matter if they're performing objectively anti-social, destructive behavior for all to see. Women can do no wrong therefore if women are doing it, it isn't wrong. If you say its wrong and level a critique, YOU are in fact the bad person.
So Louis Theroux tossing ANOTHER parcel of cultural baggage onto young men's backs is simply not going to help the situation much. And I daresay its emblematic of cowardice, to a certain extent. If he wanted to court controversy and invite discussion, do the approximate equivalent of this documentary on the female side, look into what they're pulling from tiktok, from the media they consume, and how THEY are being taken in by bad actors for personal profit at the expense of their mental health and relationship with the opposite gender.
This incuriosity also applies in other fields. Why didn't everyone line up to vote for Hilary? Why did Trump win so bigly after Biden? The institutional response was to call dissenters everything from "deplorables" to "dangerous racists" to "fascist" to "almost literally the Führer reincarnate". The feedback mechanisms no longer exist (if they ever did), so there's no self-correction.
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The issue here is that the muddling of the message is the point, and encoded in that above interaction is the clear message: "figure it out yourself [the first step of which is to ignore everything my peers and I tell you to do and learn to think for yourself]." Women want men who can figure things out for themselves, and the only way to discriminate between men who do and don't is to give them a hard, confusing, self-contradictory problem and then see which ones figure out the answer.
Yeah, but the feedback mechanisms are all screwed up.
Mistakes men make are probably overcorrected, i.e. punished too quickly and harshly for them to learn the proper lesson. Related to my point that women aren't good at gracefully rejecting guys (or accepting rejection) who approach them.
Attempts by men to coordinate into groups designed to advance their mutual interests and provide mutual support and advice tend to get disrupted and infiltrated if they gain any success.
Taking the correct action usually doesn't offer immediate rewards, and progress can be hard to perceive. Hell, you can even be PUNISHED for taking the 'correct' path, and the rewards only manifest if you push through that and have faith it will pay off.
A guy is going to take a LOT of lumps before he happens on the 'working' strategy, and he can't even be completely sure if the working strategy will be enough to win until he's followed it past the point of probable no return.
So its "figure it out on your own" but you dropped men into the wilderness with a mislabeled map, barely any supplies, and not even a walkie talkie, much less an expert guide to keep them from stepping off a cliff. So they can set off walking in a given direction and hope it works out, but without the actual resources to tell if they're walking to their doom or not.
And when the comparison point is VIDEO GAMES, which have very tight feedback loops, visible rewards and progression, and satisfying 'gameplay,' the real world seems intolerable by comparison.
That's only a problem if you believe that men in general or on average deserve a fair chance at accomplishing things like romantic partnership, sex, children, family, general life satisfaction. But my observation is that women aren't concerned with that, and I doubt it's physically possible to make them concerned with that, in general. They're concerned with finding the highest quality partner for themselves, and the highest quality partner is heavily determined by the partner's genes, and so the point of the test is purely to discriminate, not to be a system that men can learn from in order to pass it. The entire point is that they should be able to pass it without any help, despite the, again, bizarre, contradictory, nonsensical nature of the test, which also has a horrendous feedback mechanism. If the tests fixed any of these things, then the tests would work less well.
Women have sons and brothers though. Shouldn’t they be invested into increasing the fitness of their male children?
Sure, but who's going to hold them accountable if they don't do it?
(The current answer is "nobody, and if men themselves try it, they'll just get oppressed and blood-libelled even harder for it", and it shows.)
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They're not trying to correct men. They're trying to filter them. And the criteria are not legible, not to men and not to them. Any stated criteria will work out to be a brick wall; those aren't real.
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Sure, but instinct doesn't self-moderate in the presence of better alternatives, which is why a good chunk of [modern] men can now go "you're not worth it, go fuck yourself" to women (and society as a whole, for that matter). It's not necessarily a positive thing, but it is a necessary part of the process.
Just as fathers failed their daughters in the '50s and '60s by giving them outdated self-sabotaging advice (the "never make anything of yourself, just marry well" one that feminists complain about), mothers fail their sons now in the same way (the "respect women and make yourself as unattractive as possible" stuff).
Its not surprising some young men feel resentment at being set up to fail, and instead choose ruthless self interest (whether that looks like checking out of the dating market or sexual exploitation of women). You can't break the social contract and expect young men to unilaterally honour their side.
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The more common case is deliberately bad advice as a form of sabotage.
The effect is the same, but I doubt the bad advice is usually deliberately so.
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I will now answer how to become a Man
At its root "healthy masculinity" is an existential crisis that every individual man sort of has to navigate on their own. You can take advice from others, and the path you follow will be similar to many others, but it will still be your own.
The question young men need to ask themselves and repeatedly try to answer is "What makes me feel like a man?" They need to find answers that they can believe in. Then they need to pursue those things and believe themselves a man by achieving them. Humans are social creatures and they pick up on the behavior and beliefs of others. Women will love the genuine "I'm a man" energy, almost regardless of where it comes from. Other men will pick up on it and respect you more. Young boys will listen to your commands.
It can be almost anything, but you'll certainly notice lots of trends and similarities. A man is a provider. A man is skilled at hard things. A man has a beautiful woman. A man is knowledgeable and intelligent. A man has a family. A man is powerful. A man is wealthy. A man has convictions. A man fights for a cause. A man appears effortlessly cool or funny. A man has a strong healthy body. A man is a good father.
The path to becoming a man can be given. Someone like Andrew Tate can get young men to believe that having beautiful women is what makes you a man, and he will teach you how to get those women. But its a weak path, for two reasons:
If you see being a man as having a beautiful woman, then you marry a beautiful woman and feel like the ultimate man. But slowly that woman ages, or her body is stressed and shredded by child birth. If she is no longer beautiful, are you still a man? No, you lose your man belief, and she notices and loses interest in you too. Both of you feel that the other has failed in the marriage, but you will both lack the words and ideas to describe it.
Instead you learn how to find many ways to be a man. A man is a provider, but what if you lose your job? A man has a healthy and strong body, but what if you get in a car accident and are maimed? This is why you must learn to forge a belief in yourself as a man for the things you achieve. A single path might become closed to you, so you need to know how to open new ones.
No it is not easy. Yes it takes a while. Yes the rewards are totally worth it.
Maybe I've read too much Nietzsche, but the whole " A man is a provider. A man is skilled at hard things. A man ..." always comes off as external validation seeking weakness.
What sort of man needs the world to tell them they are a man? What sort of man is concerned at all about their manliness? By even wondering how/if you are man enough, you become not.
In summation: The Cis Het Neurotypical etc etc so on so forth are not alright, I think I dodged a bullet when god was rolling up my traits and I didn't get "Really concerned with performing gender".
"Man" is a useful Schelling point for mentally organizing virtuous traits linked to systematizing and testosterone. Plenty of them would still be useful (critical even!) on a desert island.
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I do think external validation is a "weakness", but that the line between external and internal is always blurry and nothing is fully internal. There is a spectrum and I think internal motivations are more lasting. That is why I have a problem with some of the Andrew Tate manosphere types. They are providing an external validation.
But truly internal validation seems a bit ... psychopathic to me. Humans are social creatures. Adam Smith is quoted as saying "Humans want to love and be loved." Optimum tradeoff from my perspective is probably 80-90% internal and the rest external.
What I really think matters on a social level is your personal belief in manliness. For many people that means external validation. I think it is healthy for most teens to have that external validation. To look to other male role models and see what works for them. But by your thirties as a male you should be charting your own path. I think midlife crisis is often men figuring out how to be manly on their own.
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Lets just take a quick audit, though.
Which of those things does western society actively deter and hobble young men from achieving these days? I'd argue almost all of them except the strong-healthy-body part, which is why so many men are now gym-maxxing, its the only unrestricted avenue left.
How much of the advice we do provide young men is actually outdated/useless under modern constraints? i.e. actively unhelpful and arguably setting them up for failure?
What if a prospective man surveys his potential paths to manhood, and concludes that the current structure of society is his primary obstacle to achieving it? What if he's correct?
What course of action does that man likely arrive at, assuming he doesn't give up and become a NEET on the spot.
And the whole problem with "the rewards are totally worth it" is that the big reward: wife, family, kids... those are objectively becoming less likely outcomes. Everywhere. So how do you convince these guys to get up and keep plugging away when they can observe with their own two eyes that it is increasingly unlikely that they'll get their preferred outcome unless something drastic changes?
Again, it is not easy. If it is easy, then it less likely to contribute to the feeling of manliness. Because manliness is somewhat a sense of achievement. It doesn't have to be that. But it is and it has been. If you are upset about that, then the blame does not lie with feminists it lies with ancient human culture and norms.
Artificial and natural constraints are interchangeable in my view. If people believe that only the top 10% of height is attractive that is fine. They might also believe that only the top 10% of funnyness is attractiveness. Add an endless number of competitive "best of" categories. With enough categories most men can be best at something. Its important for males to realize where and when they can be competitive with others. The smart guys will create their own categories.
I will emphasize again that this cannot be easy. To be easy defeats the purpose of it all. Working hard at being good at something is the point of it all. Its what women want. If it is too easy you won't be proving anything.
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Neither of these require any external input, western society does not deter or hobble you from doing them. It doesn't promote them, but that's the key underlying point. You need to do them on your own, because "figuring it out" is part of that skill. Competence is sexy.
Not going to weigh in on your other stuff because it's not necessarily wrong, but these two were glossed over and you are wrong about them.
Well that's two, then.
Of course, what's the incentive for doing them if the reward isn't there.
Men ARE in fact deterred from traditional paths that would lead to knowledge. A properly motivated guy can learn all he wants through self-driven research and reading and discussion... like we have here. He just won't get the official 'certificate' that signifies he is intelligent and knowledgeable.
But he will not earn much respect merely for his intelligence and knowledge unless he can convert that into money, which is also made very difficult these days.
And becoming skilled at 'hard things' ultimately depends on what barriers exist to acquiring the skills. And what, precisely, do we consider 'hard things' in terms of skill?
Existential self-satisfaction and discovery. Needing to be rewarded for doing/knowing/being good at things is the behavior of a child or a dog. Part of being a man is cutting your own path in the world for yourself, not because other told you to, rewarded you for doing so, told you: "you were are a good little boy", etc.
Yes, collectively society can be at tension with the individual in conferring certification of competence, and even that certification can degrade in actually being a clear signal of competence. Doesn't make that competence any less masculine.
For some things sure, but I disagree its difficult. Yes somethings like being handy around the house will not get you money, but being able to do them on your own displays competence, saves you money. People absolutely will respect you for it.
Idk, figure it out, its a personal journey towards being competent. For some its being handy, woodsy, crafty. For others its great partner dance skills. I don't know of anyone who has ever thought that being a Renaissance man was a negative. Giving people a template to follow destroys the credibility of the signal. You need to figure out what "being skilled or being competent" means to you on your own.
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Your comment reminded me of a quote-
“A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.”
― Robert A. Heinlein
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I mean that might be its role for some and the reason it's been made, but it's Louis Theroux, he is just meeting influencers and asking them questions and then leaving long silences for them to hang themselves, just as he has done for many other interview subjects. There's not really any editorialising. You can say it's selectively edited to make them look bad but if you watch it, it's hard to say it does anything than show conversations with them play out in real time and leave it to the viewer to make their own judgements (which will surely be negative, because the interview subjects are objectively absolute bell-ends).
I think that's a hole in the culture generally, but this particular documentary is hard to watch without seeing a clear contrast between Louis Theroux himself and the influencers. He is weedy, softly spoken and awkward, but much more comfortable in his psoriasis-striken skin than they are in their suntanned muscle suits. He actually comes across as much more masculine and secure than they do. Albeit adorkable fearless modern day Socrates may not be an ideal your average teenage boy is going to gravitate towards (although I actually did as a teen).
Two criticisms: This documentary is biased and trying to pile on young men, and, Where are the female equivalents?
Focusing on the latter maintains your good points here about just Theroux just letting these people speak.
The most direct counterpart to this that springs to mind is another UK documentary that came in the midst of a similar moral panic (and also leaves the audience to make up their own mind): '1000 Men and Me, The Bonnie Blue story' by Victoria Silver. This had similar profile to the manosphere one in the UK but would not have benefitted from the Netflix effect globally.
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I'm not throwing any particular accusation out.
But Documentaries are always going to be 'tainted' by the choice of interviewees, the topics they actually ask about, and selective, if not deceptive editing.
I think the types who agreed to interview are also somewhat more likely to be bad examples since they are the attention-seeking types, rather than the more grounded, intelligent ones who could in theory steelman their own positions.
But hey, if Louis' sole intent is to expose a grift and undermine the status of the grifters, I can overall approve. But again, its not examining why this grift is successful.
Dorks need role models too.
And I guess he can at least attest to being married with kids.
I have seen the claim that anyone in the sphere with a shred of sense or self-respect refused the offer to interview.
Not entirely sure who such people might be, tbh.
Warren Farrell would be a good example, but he is about a thousand miles away from the contemporary manosphere.
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Back in my day, the big three of the Manosphere were Roissy, Roosh, and Rollo (Dalrock was a distant fourth). But those were bloggers, and it seems like the new meta is streaming? Yet, when I think of big manosphere streamers I think of Andrew Tate, Kevin Samuels, or Richard Cooper. I've never heard of the guys in this documentary.
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There are some RedPill guys who were around since the early days who have maintained a sheen of respectability, and they aren't spotlight-seeking anymore, so they might interpret an interview invite as an unnecessary risk.
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