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incels.is, formerly known as incels.co and incels.me, is an English-language crime encouragement and dating frustration forum founded in 2017 after the banning of r/incels. It since gained notoriety for being the largest, English-speaking, self-described incel internet forum, and became a main subject of academic literature treating the incel online subculture.

Due to its content and moderation, it has faced suspension from domain registrar services. According to the .me registry, the forum owner didn't make an honest attempt to remove violence encouragement from the forum when requested. Accounts on the forum encourage mass shootings, attempt to normalize rape, and stalking guides are compiled on the forum. During March 2022, the forum created an implicit allowance for the sexualization of teenager minors. According to a CCDH report, more than half the posters (53%) during their study period (2021-2022) supported pedophilia. Accounts on the website glorify the 2014 Isla Vista Killings and celebrated the 2018 Toronto Van Attack. Both of the website's public and hidden content are characterized by hate speech and trolling.

History

The incel subculture became an online phenomenon in the early 2010s, during which various chat rooms and message boards dedicated to it started to emerge.

The website was founded on November 8, 2017, after the banning of the r/incels subreddit. The founders, "Marquis" and "Serge", as reported by BuzzFeed News, also run the suicide encouragement forum Sanctioned Suicide. In the same article, they claim that both forums are intended as support communities.

Over years, it has switched between .me, .co and .is TLD extensions due to suspension from domain registrars.

Public image

Both of the website's public and hidden content are characterized by hate speech and trolling. The Guardian reports that users on the website encourage mass shootings. Due to its content and moderation, it has faced suspension from domain registrar services.

Notable members

• Jack Peterson, media personality.
• Nathan Larson (criminal), American politician and white supremacist.

History

The website was founded on November 8, 2017, after the banning of the r/incels subreddit. The founders, "Marquis" and "Serge", as reported by BuzzFeed News, also run the suicide encouragement forum Sanctioned Suicide. In the same article, they claim that both forums are intended as support communities.

Over years, it has switched between .me, .co and .is TLD extensions due to suspension from domain registrars.

Ethnographic research

Journalist Talia Lavin conducted ethnographic research into the forum while it was named incels.co, including their main chat room. She noted forum users frequently making fun of a random, overweight Reddit user for his looks. She also noted that the co-administrator of the forum at the time, named SergeantIncel, "expressed amusement at the anti-Semitism, racism, and misogyny" on incels.co.

Site characteristics

The website is a primary gathering place for incels. Registration is approval-based. The moderators ban women and LGBT individuals from joining, justifying so by stating that the forum is oriented towards straight men.

It is composed of public and registered message boards for self-described incels to discuss their personal experiences.

Demographics

Despite common stereotypes of incels as young white men, according to the website 40% of its users are of an ethnic minority background.

According to a 2019, internal website poll, one in four members were on the autism spectrum, and two thirds considered suicide.

The CCDH found that incels.is had millions of monthly visits. They also found that, what they call the "heart of the incelosphere network", by which they meant incels.is, had only 4,057 active members from January 1st, 2021 to July 7th, 2022. According to the study, 406 incels.is users account for 74.6% of all incels.is posts during the aforementioned study period. As incels.is was reportedly the largest self-described incel forum during this time, this is in slight contrast to a now-deleted The Spectator article authored by Toby Young which estimated the self-described incel community was hundreds of thousands people large. The CCDH found that usernames from the incels.is forum overlap with what the CCDH calls "incelosphere" forums about body image and unemployment also owned by the incels.is owners.

Notable members

• Jack Peterson, Media personality and self-proclaimed spokesperson of incels.me in 2018.
• Nathan Larson (criminal), American politician and white supremacist.

References

1. ^ The Incelosphere: Exposing pathways into incel communities and the harms they pose to women and children (PDF) (Report). Center for Countering Digital Hate. September 23, 2022. Retrieved February 16, 2023.
2. ^ Lorenz, Taylor (September 23, 2022). "The online incel movement is getting more violent and extreme, report says". The Washington Post. Retrieved September 24, 2022.
3. ^ Barbaro, Michael (9 December 2021). "Kids are dying. How are these sites still allowed?". The New York Times. Archived from the original on 13 February 2023. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
4. Squirrel, Tim. "Spitting out the Blackpill: Evaluating how Incels Present Themselves in their own Words on the Incel Wiki". ISDGlobal. Archived from the original on 26 February 2023. Retrieved 26 February 2023.
5. ^ Beauchamp, Zack (2019-04-16). "The rise of incels: How a support group for the dateless became a violent internet subculture". Vox. Retrieved 2023-05-01.
6. ^ Goerz, Thelonious (20 May 2019). "What incels are, and why you need to know about them". The Daily of the University of Washington. Retrieved 2023-05-02.
7. ^ Horta Ribeiro, Manoel; Jhaver, Shagun; Zannettou, Savvas; Blackburn, Jeremy; Stringhini, Gianluca; De Cristofaro, Emiliano; West, Robert (2021-10-18). "Do Platform Migrations Compromise Content Moderation? Evidence from r/The_Donald and r/Incels". Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer Interaction. 5 (CSCW2): 316:1–316:24. doi:10.1145/3476057. S2CID 224803187.
8. "'I am an absolute grotesque subhuman': Incels use inferiority complex to justify misogyny, study shows". nationalpost. Retrieved 2023-05-01.
9. Halpin, Michael (October 5, 2022). "Weaponized Subordination: How Incels Discredit Themselves to Degrade Women". Gender & Society. 36 (6): 813–837. doi:10.1177/08912432221128545. ISSN 0891-2432. S2CID 252740108.
10. Costello, William; Rolon, Vania; Thomas, Andrew G.; Schmitt, David (2022-12-01). "Levels of Well-Being Among Men Who Are Incel (Involuntarily Celibate)". Evolutionary Psychological Science. 8 (4): 375–390. doi:10.1007/s40806-022-00336-x. ISSN 2198-9885. S2CID 252252373.
11. Hajarian, Mohammad; Khanbabaloo, Zahra (June 2, 2021). "Toward Stopping Incel Rebellion: Detecting Incels in Social Media Using Sentiment Analysis". 2021 7th International Conference on Web Research (ICWR): 169–174. doi:10.1109/ICWR51868.2021.9443027. ISBN 978-1-6654-0426-6. S2CID 235307794.
12. ^ Binder, Matt (2018-11-20). "Incels.me, a major hub for hate speech and misogyny, suspended by .ME registry". Mashable. Retrieved 2023-05-01.
13. ^ Ling, Justin (2018-06-19). "'Not as ironic as I imagined': the incels spokesman on why he is renouncing them". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Retrieved 2023-05-03.
14. ""I laugh at the death of normies": How incels are celebrating the Toronto mass killing". Southern Poverty Law Center. Retrieved 2023-05-02.
15. ^ Jaki, Sylvia; Smedt, Tom De; Gwóźdź, Maja; Panchal, Rudresh; Rossa, Alexander; Pauw, Guy De (2019-11-25). "Online hatred of women in the Incels.me forum: Linguistic analysis and automatic detection". Journal of Language Aggression and Conflict. 7 (2): 240–268. doi:10.1075/jlac.00026.jak. ISSN 2213-1272. S2CID 199183681.
16. Grau Chopite, Jessica (2022-03-17). "Framing of Inceldom on incels.is: A content analysis". PsychArchive.
17. Hinds, Zachary. True or False Incels: an analysis of the Incels.is forum (Thesis). University of Chicago.
18. Kardaras, Nicholas (21 March 2023). "A new book examines how digital media turned an 'incel' support group into a misogynistic nightmare". Scroll.in. Retrieved 2023-05-01.
19. Klee, Miles (2023-04-27). "The 'LeBron James of Incels' Swears He Has a Girlfriend Now -- He Just Can't Prove It". Rolling Stone. Retrieved May 19, 2023.
20. Nashrulla, Tasneem (6 June 2019). "Incels Are Running An Online Suicide Forum That Was Blamed For A Young Woman's Death". BuzzFeed News. Retrieved 2023-05-03.
21. Love, Shayla (November 19, 2020). "People Are Dying After Joining a 'Pro-Choice' Suicide Forum. How Much Is the Site to Blame?". Vice. Retrieved May 19, 2023.
22. ""I laugh at the death of normies": How incels are celebrating the Toronto mass killing". Southern Poverty Law Center. Retrieved 2023-05-02.
23. Grau Chopite, Jessica (2022-03-17). "Framing of Inceldom on incels.is: A content analysis". PsychArchive.
24. Hinds, Zachary. True or False Incels: an analysis of the Incels.is forum (Thesis). University of Chicago.
25. "'Nathan Larson, the self-described incel paedophile, is running for Congress. This is how he groomed vulnerable young men'". The Independent. 2018-06-05. Retrieved 2023-05-03.
26. Klee, Miles (2023-04-27). "The 'LeBron James of Incels' Swears He Has a Girlfriend Now -- He Just Can't Prove It". Rolling Stone. Retrieved May 19, 2023.
27. Nashrulla, Tasneem (6 June 2019). "Incels Are Running An Online Suicide Forum That Was Blamed For A Young Woman's Death". BuzzFeed News. Retrieved 2023-05-03.
28. Love, Shayla (November 19, 2020). "People Are Dying After Joining a 'Pro-Choice' Suicide Forum. How Much Is the Site to Blame?". Vice. Retrieved May 19, 2023.
29. Lavin, Talia (Oct 13, 2020). Culture Warlords. Grand Central Publishing. Retrieved 5 June 2023.
30. Ling, Justin (June 2, 2020). "Incels Are Radicalized and Dangerous. But Are They Terrorists?". Foreign Policy. Retrieved May 19, 2023.
31. Stadtmiller, Mandy (2018-04-29). "Sympathy for the 'Incel'". The Daily Beast. Retrieved 2023-05-03.
32. Nashrulla, Tasneem (6 June 2019). "Incels Are Running An Online Suicide Forum That Was Blamed For A Young Woman's Death". BuzzFeed News. Retrieved 2023-05-02.
33. Rozsa, Matthew (2022-10-12). "Which came first, the incel or the misogynist? A new study delves into the incel mind". Salon. Retrieved 2023-05-02.
34. "Hitting the Books: The racist underpinnings of incel ideology". Engadget. Retrieved 2023-05-02.
35. "Radical online communities and their toxic allure for autistic men". Spectrum | Autism Research News. 2020-05-13. Retrieved 2023-05-02.
36. Young, Toby (May 5, 2018). "Here's what every incel needs: a sex robot". The Spectator. Archived from the original on May 16, 2018. Retrieved May 23, 2018.
37. "'Nathan Larson, the self-described incel paedophile, is running for Congress. This is how he groomed vulnerable young men'". The Independent. 2018-06-05. Retrieved 2023-05-03.

• Internet properties established in 2017
• Internet-related controversies
• Internet ethics
• Virtual communities
• Incel-related violence
• Websites