Andrew Tate is a social media influencer, branding himself as a coach for his viewers on how to get rich by hustling. What’s special though, about his brand, is that his content is mainly targeted towards young men. While harmless at face value, Tate’s views on sexual assault, as well as his views on women, allowed radical misogynistic themes to go into the mainstream.

Even after his arrest due to charges of rape and human trafficking, Tate continues to create content in his personal channels, gaining sympathy from his followers. This type of content is part of the online social circle called the ‘manosphere’ – an assortment of pages, groups, and forums focusing on masculinity but also tend to have conversations that tend to be misogynistic in nature. 

‘Subspheres’ of the manosphere

Communities in the manosphere have already been active for a long time. There is no single organization maintaining this entity, but subcommunities trace their origins from individuals or other groups. 

Men Going Their Own Way (MGTOW) advocates for gradual disengagement from society and rejects the notion of gender equality. They regard themselves as having taken the “red pill” (referencing the movie The Matrix where the protagonist is given a red pill to learn the truth) 

Pick-up Artists (PUA) pose themselves as personal development coaches. Being vastly dominated by heterosexual men, PUAs teach techniques of flattery, gaslighting, and manipulation to convince women to have sex with their students. Branding themselves as mentors makes it the perfect setup for online audiences to subscribe to their beliefs without question.

A Voice For Men (AVFM), in principle, aims to fight for laws that were designed to protect women, such as anti-sexual assault laws, be applied to men as well. Members often congregate in-person and have evolved into a support group for those who have experienced being harassed and assaulted. They distance themselves from other men’s rights’ groups and pose themselves with a somewhat less radical approach.

Incels, a shortened term for “involuntary celibates”, believe that they have not been given the genetic characteristics that make them attractive to others. A community consisting mostly of men, surrendering to the fact that women would not like them results in a sense of isolation and frustration, as well as jealousy towards those that do have these relationships.

Although its subcommunities are diverse and at times counter each other, individuals tend to have shared experiences and values. The manosphere is bound together by the common narrative that society has made men the victim, and that proper action must be done to counter this. 

Unlike the feminist movement and other movements, the manosphere tends to keep conversations and interactions online, but its on-ground impacts to individuals give them the propensity to harm.

To establish their brand and success rate, PUAs oftentimes post their “lays”, proving that through their seduction techniques, men can end up having sexual intercourse with women they met in a bar that day. This has resulted in women reporting cases of rape and PUAs bragging about it in their group.

The hashtag #Gamergate became viral in 2014, of which female game developers were subject to gender-based online harassment. Those that defended the women, particularly gaming websites run by women, have had their ad sponsors be pressured to pull-out from them.

In 2021, Jake Davison fatally shot five people, including his mother, in Plymouth, United Kingdom. It was discovered that Davison had been part of forums about incels, where he searched a thread on why incels felt the need to end their lives. 

Manospheres in the Philippines

Local versions of these groups also exist online. A Facebook search for ‘MGTOW’ or ‘Red Pill’ would recommend pages and groups maintained by entities based in the Philippines. Content by these entities is similar to that of their international counterparts – critiquing women’s rights while heavily encouraging a certain standard for men to live by.

The pages and groups as well as their posts currently have a relatively low reach and interaction rate, though. Online communities with the same characteristics can be considered as fringe groups, where interactions are limited only to a few loyal individuals. 

Dr. Teresa Paula De Luna, anthropologist and professor at the College of Arts and Letters, University of the Philippines – Diliman, posits historical reasons as to why such radical communities form in the Philippines. 

“It is ingrained in our mindset that men have the burden of providing for their families. Frustration then arises if they are not able to provide. It is easiest to blame women for these, since western culture has led to the notion that women are less powerful than men.” Men tend to subscribe to the manosphere because it is here where their frustrations are validated.

The harm that fringe groups pose come in two layers: societal micro-aggressions in the short-term, and widespread normalization of their narratives in the long-term. 

Online communities form around content that they sympathize with. It only takes a few individuals actively sharing content to form a solid group that constantly interacts around their shared experiences. They continue to thrive even without any external influences or any increase in membership.

For fringe groups in the manosphere, this just means that there is no stopping members from sharing stories about how gynocentric modern society is and how the feminist movement has ‘gone too far’. However, the characteristics of these individuals shouldn’t be considered in a vacuum.

Just like every individual, humans are members of several different groups, which also means that a young man who subscribes to the manosphere can also be part of communities based on religion, hobbies, and occupation. It is in these communities that ideas and thoughts can be shared with relative confidence.

“With words like ‘kapatid’ (sibling) and ‘kaibigan’ (friend), Filipinos derive their identity from other people, showing that communities are very tight-knit.”, De Luna adds.  “With the advent of the internet and social media, individuals can now define their identity from even more communities. Too many identities tend to have individuals negotiate the better reality, one where their struggles are exclusively heard.”

The influence also goes both ways. Far-right groups have used anti-feminism values to extract sympathy from the manosphere and have since radicalized them to the point of doing harm.

The effects of the manosphere become increasingly harmful once it penetrates mainstream communities. Even if these values have been existing before the internet, several other institutions such as the church, school, and local community have served as regulating mechanisms. De Luna then recommends that social media platforms can act as a regulator to moderate content being spread.

In the grassroots level, De Luna is optimistic in the fact that as long as public opinion views manosphere values as negative, then these communities remain in the fringes.

“Before the introduction of western values, people in the Philippines viewed women as strong icons. We view our mothers as our role models. With sayings like ‘ ‘di ako pinalaki ng mama ko ng ganyan’ (my mother didn’t raise me like that), we are constantly reminded to oppose actions and values that disrespect our mothers, and women in general.” – Rappler.com