Talk:Incel

Debunking black pill

The article needs a section dedicated to proving that the black pill ideology is objectively false using scientific studies. It is crucial to show young men that the extreme claims made by hardcore incels are incorrect and that this ideology can be extremely dangerous. It can lead to depression, body dysmorphia, harmful practices like bone-smashing, and, in extreme cases, even suicide or violent outbursts. The idea that one's lack of a romantic partner is solely due to physical appearance is an oversimplification. In reality, the reasons are often far more complex. Most people regardless their gender experience periods of involuntary celibacy at some point in their lives. The real question is: should this define who you are? Should a struggle confine you? The black pill ideology teaches that it does, which is why it is so important to debunk it. I strongly urge you to include a section dedicated to exposing the flaws of the black pill with factual, scientific evidence. Cherubionita (talk) 23:33, 8 March 2025 (UTC)

"lack of a romantic partner is solely due to physical appearance" That is news to me. When it comes to attracting potential romantic partners, the socioeconomic status always seems to be more important than the physical appearance. To paraphrase something that my brother has been repeating for the last 30 or 40 years: "the one with the greatest wealth gets the greater number of lovers. The one with no wealth gets no love." Dimadick (talk) 21:17, 9 March 2025 (UTC)

Well you don't have to convince me about that black pill is not real! :) Cherubionita (talk) 18:07, 10 March 2025 (UTC)

Hi, Cherubionita, a prerequisite for any such section would be reliable sources to support it. *We* as Wikipedia editors cannot be the ones to debunk anything; we can only relay the debunking done by reliable sources. Do you have any? Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 22:22, 9 March 2025 (UTC)

I can provide you only scientific studies that indirectly debunk every claims of the black pill. Like this one: https://datepsychology.com/male-attractiveness-and-sexual-partner-count/

As you can see according to numerous studies male attractiveness not a good indicator of success with women. It is a minimal difference between the most attractive and the least attractive men sexual partner count by life time.

I can provide a compilation about these to debunk one by one every claims that black pill has. Cherubionita (talk) 18:11, 10 March 2025 (UTC)

While I personally agree with you that the various incel pills are entirely nonsense, the source you provided looks to be WP:SPS - as such it's of limited use within the context of Wikipedia. Simonm223 (talk) 19:43, 10 March 2025 (UTC)

Unfortunately the article linked to debunking blackpill as pseudoscience is not a scientificly debunking the blackpill. Actually the methodology used in the article is mainly nitpicked posts from incelforums. This is not scientificly debunking the philosophy of the blackpill. Nor do I think one can scientificly debunk such a sociological claim. I would argue that argument based on evolutionary biology or psychology would be much better fit for "a scientific attempt". KalleHmath (talk) 01:18, 25 August 2025 (UTC)

That's not how Wikipedia works. To use words like "pseudoscientific", we don't need things to be directly debunked to every random person's desired threshold of confidence; it's enough to cite that reliable sources consider it pseudoscientific, as the source in question indeed does. And regardless, something doesn't need to be "scientificly [sic] debunk"ed to be considered pseudoscientific. "Pseudoscientific" and "false" are not identical in meaning. Many scientific theories have been disproven; that doesn't make them pseudoscientific, and inversely, many pseudoscientific "theories" have not been scientifically disproven. Indeed, a key feature of many pseudoscientific "theories" is that they are unfalsifiable; that is, they can't be disproven, because they don't say anything coherent enough to disprove, or they don't stand still long enough to be disproven, or any number of other things. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 01:43, 25 August 2025 (UTC)

"The blackpill is comprised of commonly held beliefs, such as hypergamy, the 'just be white' (JBW) theory, the 80/20 rule of dating, lookism, the halo effect and sexual racism that rely on pseudoscience" is false statement. There is statistical data and it is well agreed on evolutionary biology that a hypergamy is real. Lookism, halo effect and sexual racism are all as well scientificly proven in psychology and sociology. KalleHmath (talk) 02:56, 26 August 2025 (UTC)

I'm afraid that Wikipedia's policies require us to stick with the book from the academic publisher and not the statement from an anonymous person on a talk page calling it 'false'. MrOllie (talk) 03:02, 26 August 2025 (UTC)

Well the sources are on the wikipedia pages of those topics such as the page of hypergamy. KalleHmath (talk) 03:20, 26 August 2025 (UTC)

No. This would make the article seem less neutral. MoJoBroBro (talk) 17:53, 6 November 2025 (UTC)

Hey Cherubionita, could not agree more that countering the black pill is vital. Id class it as a second order problem on a level with AI & climate change. While it may be a net consoling & protective influence to a small minority, it's a clear net negative for tens of millions of young men & women across the world.

This said refuting the black pill effectively is a little more challenging than perhaps meets the eye. Even if your link was a meta-study in a top journal rather than just a blog, us including it in our article might do more harm than good. The article is largely aiming to disprove the popular wisdom that the type of men incel call Chads commonly have the most sexual partners. It's not trying to disprove the central black pill point that Incel's romantic status results from their looks. In fact, parts of it reinforce the black pill. Direct quote: Additionally, it may mean that being mid is sufficient. The “looks test” is binary. You pass it, you’re in, and from that point you can choose to pursue casual sex or you can choose to have a relationship. You meet the threshold.. with the obvious corollary that if you're below mid and you don't pass the threshold , you're not in the game and aren't going to get any sex, just as the black pill prophets preach.

It would sadly likely be no more effective than to repeat common gaslighting from the BrazillianMartian IT era "TeeHee Inkwell! Looks don't matter silly! I'd rather date an ugly 5'4" Janitor who is kind, than a Brad Pit lookalike who is mean. It just so happens I'm dating a 6'3" Timothée Chadamet type, but the only reason I'm with him is his caring personality."

Let's review how your concern is covered in the top tier reliable sources - as Writ Keeper is saying these are really important if you want to change content here on Wikipedia. As of 2025, you get a largely different picture depending on what discipline you look at. In sociology and related fields, the attitude to incels remains broadly hostile, with little analyses of value. Albeit things have improved a little in recent years e.g as per this relatively compassionate 2024 systematic review: The incel phenomenon: A systematic scoping review . (This one is open access and you can read for free, other sources are behind paywalls unfortuneatly)

The CVE and especially Cognitive science fields mostly take a much more sympathetic and insightful view on incels. It was from CVE that we had probably the first journal article to discuss the need to refute the blackpill in a sensible way (2021). As the below review level articles show, in Psychiatry there's much emphases on incels wellbeing and promoting their best interests, including mentioning the importance of helping them move beyond their black pill outlook, but there's little in the way of actual debunking of core black pill concepts: Psychosocial Characteristics of Involuntary Celibates (Incels): A Review of Empirical Research and Assessment of the Potential Implications of Research on Adult Virginity and Late Sexual Onset or Involuntary Celibacy: A Review of Incel Ideology and Experiences with Dating, Rejection, and Associated Mental Health and Emotional Sequelae

This just released study does specifically debunk certain black pill attitudes: Seeing through the black-pill: Incels are wrong about what people think of them But if focuses on showing that how contrary to what Incels think, the general public is largely sympathetic to incels, would like them to have romantic success, and mostly doesnt blame them for their predicament. But even if incels believed this (& ~90% of hardcore incels won't IMO) I don't think it speaks to your central concern.

As you suggest, there are indeed extreme incels who claim a mans looks are the only thing that matters for dating success, with some even saying it's been like that forever. Which would be contrary to the finding of virtual every single 20th century study that's considered this question. But pointing this out is only going to debunk the weaker versions of black pill ideology, making black pill overall even more potent. The smarter research cells already know a mans looks used to be far less important, having reviewed for example the Personal sections of late 19th & early 20th century newspapers, where they report that single women often said they don't care about looks , and never give good looks or height as a required characteristic- just good character, money and sometimes status or class. But the world has changed since then. Young women now earn 9% more than young men across the UK, with a similar situation existing in some US localities (though not at State level AFAIK, and certainly not nationwide.) A minimal level of good looks is now considerably more important for a young man's dating success than it was even 15 years back. There's no up to date high quality source to refute this unfortunately, nor is there likely to be for some years (though would love to be wrong.) Countering the black pill here needs some subtlety, though I'm going to go out on a limb and say you have been helpful in this regard. FeydHuxtable (talk) 20:48, 11 March 2025 (UTC)

Restoration of outdated, inadvertently pro-misogynist & WP:OR violating lede

There's so much that's problematic with the just restored lede it would take thousands of words to fully explain. I'll focus mainly on the 66 word sentence starting. The subculture's attitude can be characterized by... It's unattractive writing & has been described as "arguably the most expansive demonising sentence in the history of humanity." Those judgments are admittedly subjective, but its an objective fact that the sentence violate our WP:OR policy. It's supported by the burton source and the 'resentment-etc' cite bundle.

The Burton source admittedly supports characterising incels as misogynist. But broadly it's sympathetic to incels, as one would expect from Anthony Burton, a scholar of great integrity and intelligence. Burton doesn't support the rest of the sentence - actually he strongly contradicts parts of it. For example, after mentioning Minassian, he writes almost all incels attempt to distance themselves from this violence . So allmost all the 66-word sentence generally has to rely on the 'resentment-etc' bundle, and sadly the WP:OR violations there are blatant.

To support the 'Misanthropy' adjective, the bundle lists just this vox source. It again supports characterising incels as misogynist, but says nothing about Misanthropy for incels as a whole. (At best, it weakly implies "radical incels" might be Misanthropes)

Similarly, to support the 'Self-pity' adjective, the bundle lists just this usa today source. All it says about self-pity is Posts from self-identified incels range from self-pitying (many call themselves ugly or even subhuman) to misogynistic to violent . That might support saying some incel posts express self-pity, but it's reaching way beyond what the source says to rely on it for the much stronger claim that the sub-culture is characterised by self-pity.

If it was just this article's effect on incel's best interests, I'd not be bothered. The POVs so extreme it's very likely helping them, in line with recent research finding a majority of the public are sympathetic towards incels. Similarly, while a few police forces are still given nonsense briefing about incels being a significant terrorist threat, not a single Five Eyes intelligence mid ranker specialising in Digital believes that as of 2025. Attention is rightly all on these guys.

But sadly, over the past 7 years or so this article, and perhaps especially the 66 word sentence, has been extraordinarily successful in making incels seem super bad and interesting in the eyes of young academics. Hence incels now by far the most well known of all Manosphere sub-cultures. Almost all social scientists have heard of incels, whereas in some surveys only a minority are au fait with Red Pillers, and less than fifth know about MGTOW. Granted, Blackpill has had significant impact on the mainstream, and some incel memes have proved potent. But overall, less than 1% of young men frequently look at incel content. Whereas the vast majority have a least some exposure to broad-sense manosphere - red pill influencers are all over the big mainstream platforms, and far more appealing to the average lad than incels, who are now minor players at best when it comes to driving misogyny. With the massive rise in misogyny among GenZ this last few years, it's been great to see Adolescence at last drawing attention to the wider manosphere. The last thing we need is the old WP:OR violating lede sucking all the oxygen back out of wider Manosphere research. FeydHuxtable (talk) 22:42, 15 May 2025 (UTC)

I see from searching the archives that the "demonising" quote is quoting yourself a year ago, in a talk page conversation where you never answered Writ Keeper's points: So, I'm curious what *actually* reliable sources you're intending to base any rework of this article on, because none of these seem to be both reliable and supportive of your intended changes and If you want to rewrite this article to be about "unwanted celibacy", you're going to need sources that actually discuss it in those terms.

If you think the sentence with common descriptors needs to be edited, that's perfectly well worth discussing (and I agree that it's overlong at this point). But that doesn't justify the complete reversion of the lead.

You argue that this is the stable version, but I would argue it isn't — the previous version (or one very close to it) has been in place far longer, including while the article passed GA. The edit several months ago that slashed the lead was never discussed, had no edit summary explaining why it was necessary, and moved portions of the lead into such strange places I wasn't even sure it was intentional.

As for the rest of your comment, it's getting a bit exhausting constantly replying to your years-long habit of making unsupported claims that this Wikipedia article is somehow "bad for incels' best interests" (see, for example, this 2020 discussion) and, now, absurdly, influencing academia. As you know, Wikipedia articles follow the sourcing, not the other way around, and I would suspect it is far more likely that academics and counterterrorism researchers were interested by, say, the dozen or so mass killings over the last decade than by a Wikipedia article that you claim was so POV it dared to repeat the very well-sourced claim that incels are misogynist, misanthropic, etc.

For next steps, I propose we restore the lead as of this revision and then we can discuss the long descriptors sentence and consider trimming it down to a smaller list of the most widely used and less duplicative descriptors. Work for you? GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 14:48, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

I prefer the longer lead as a starting point as we consider future tweaks. I am likely to respond much better to concerns based on Wikipedia policy/guideline or appeal to sources rather than trying to guess what is good or bad for incels. Firefangledfeathers (talk / contribs) 15:20, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

Agreed with both GW and FFF. In fact, the lede as it is now has been described as "the most blandly undescriptive lead in the history of the entire cosmos". By me. Just now. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 15:21, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

The shorter version is too short and is not that stable. There is, of course, room for improvement, but this ain't it. This version should be restored. OP's argument against has too much OR. Grayfell (talk) 22:13, 16 May 2025 (UTC)

Hey GW, were I up for re-writing the article, I'd first humbly request a fresh start, or at least if we could set aside various unwise IAR arguments I made in previous years. A 2025 re-write could lean more on systematic reviews or at least other types of review level WP:RS:

• RS#1 The incel phenomenon: A systematic scoping review
• RS#2 Psychosocial Characteristics of Involuntary Celibates (Incels): A Review of Empirical Research and Assessment of the Potential Implications of Research on Adult Virginity and Late Sexual Onset
• RS#3 Involuntary Celibacy: A Review of Incel Ideology and Experiences with Dating, Rejection, and Associated Mental Health and Emotional Sequelae

As per first sentence of Review article , such high-tier WP:RS summarize "the current state of understanding on a topic" . Relying on review articles - as opposed to using our own discretion to pick out things to say from the many thousands of individual studies & newspaper articles - gives us a better chance of complying with WP:Due. Even on a page like this that's been lucky to have sustained attention from several gifted editors. This might be especially clear on the hostility:compassion dimension. RS#1 is free to read , but #2 & #3 are pay walled, so to quote an Louis Bachaud open access article that cites them: Research in psychiatry and mental health therefore insists on incels’ wellbeing and recognizes them as a particularly fragile demographic (BTW, Bachaud's maybe the most gifted manosphere & incel researcher out there. Maybe a bit early in his career to cite him much in our articles, but he's awesome at putting these things in their wider context and repeatedly summarises the ever evolving research space, so would recommend anyone who needs a deep understanding of incels & manosphere to follow his work. ) If this article could be allowed to reflect the POV found in review articles then I'd suspect there would be fewer editors arriving on this talk page complaining of excess hostility, perhaps making it a less exhausting job for the good WP:Stewards here.

Naturally, Incel is partly a popular topic, so I'd not suggest removeal of all cites to popular magazines etc, just to trim a few, especially the ones 5 or more years old. Unless perhaps in a section covering recent historical attitudes. Same with older individual studies. All this said GW, unless you personally requested it, I'm not sure it would be top of my priority to undertake such a re-write. We're not in 2020 or even 2024 anymore, certain +ve outcomes that NPOV coverage of this topic might have led to back then are now closed off, at least in my imperfect perception.

Focussing on the 'unwanted celibacy' thing might help illustrate the wider consideration here. I'd no longer look to include that at all. Here's the article that first explicitly distinguished 'unwanted celibacy' (life circumstance) from 'involuntary celibacy' (sub-culture). The authors found that men suffering 'unwanted celibacy' but in no way associated with incel subculture still had significantly higher levels of misogyny than sexually satisfied men. There's been other studies that find an interesting U-shaped relationship, with those having both minimal & very high numbers of sexual partners showing higher misogyny than those in the middle. (On average, there are plenty of virgins & Cassonova's who are still very pro-woman.) But in the current climate I'd not see it as a net +ve for this sort of knowledge to be displayed more prominently. Most if not all who might react pro-socially already know - sensitive & experienced women become aware of the U shape relationship with out needing to hear about studies, in some cases consciously deciding to discriminate against chads as potential sex partners. (Only about 1 in 8 sexually active hetrosexual woman are like that though, so it's sadly not the sort of thing likely to show up in studies that could be used to refute the blackpill). In the current climate, others could perceive even a purely descriptive summary of the studies as an attempt to subtly guilt trip them into having sex with ugly men to reduce misogyny, & react in the other direction - this sort of effect would likely outweigh any benefits.

Ok, I typed all that in case you're especially interested in my views on this, per your curiosity emphasised in green (I normally only see editors do that to indicate a direct quote). And as it may be useful for future article improvement. But it's not germane to my current concerns, which are focussed on the lede and my strong preference for the shorter version. Your proposal doesn't work for me at all. In fact, I can't imagine anything worse than bringing back the 2024 lede and word-smithing the 66 word sentence. That would likely make it even more impactful and de-humanising! But I guess it doesn't matter what I think. I've already expressed my WP:OR concerns as clearly as I can, but have no support & 4 editors in good standing against. Much as I appreciate the graceful elements in your reply & the humour from others who chimed in above, I can't bring myself to self-revert. The best I can say is it would not be edit warring if anyone else does. FeydHuxtable (talk) 12:40, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

I have no objections to these sources being incorporated into the article if they have more information to add (and would note that the Sparks source is already being used fairly heavily). They seem pretty good at a glance, though I've not yet read them in depth.

I would reiterate that we really need to focus our work here on complying with Wikipedia policy, and not on what specific editors think would be beneficial to incels or any other group. Your conversation about a Wikipedia article influencing women either to "hav[e] sex with ugly men to reduce misogyny" or to "react in the other direction", combined with your discussions of influencing academia, are concerning from a WP:NPOV perspective. We are not in the business (nor should we be) of dictating where scientists direct their research, or trying to make members of incel communities feel better about themselves, or influencing women in their dating or sexual choices.

Regarding the green, I was quoting. Those were comments by Writ Keeper in the previous discussion.

I've restored the previous lead per the emerging consensus here, and am still open to suggestions on the sentence that seems to be the basis of most of your concerns with the lead, but would again encourage you to focus on Wikipedia policy around sourcing and NPOV rather than trying to make sentences less "impactful". GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 14:36, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

While I'd much prefer deletion, WP:OR violations in the sentence could be eliminated simply by changing the opening words from "The subculture's attitude can be characterized by" > "The subculture's discourse has been criticised for including". With that change, no part of the sentence would be drawing a conclusion not supported by the sourcing. FeydHuxtable (talk) 16:09, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

Can you expand on what exactly that change fixes in your mind? GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 19:57, 17 May 2025 (UTC)

I'm completely new to this article and talk page. I can see the answers to that question are in the first six paragraph post to this talk section and in the last sentence of Feyd's previous comment above. The sources don't say the subculture has an attitude, they say that some of its members have written and said things with the attitudes in question. So I would agree with the proposed change to the beginning of the sentence. 98.147.21.126 (talk) 18:39, 19 May 2025 (UTC)

Succinctly and accurately put IP. You know, before Louis Bachaud came along, Naama Kates had seemed to be shaping up to be the most influential voice on the incel topic. Here's a track she made with legendary guitarist G. E. Stinson - I was feeling exactly like the mood in that track until you rescued me! You've got to the heart of the matter, but there's two other aspects. Proposed change would also resolve WP:OR in the sense that the excellent Burton source would no longer directly contradict parts of the sentence it's cited to support.

Last but not least, the change would help a little in resolving NPOV issues arising from the sharp contrast between the article's hyper-hostile tone & the relatively compassionate way incels are looked at by the general public and across various academic disciplines. I was going to keep my mouth shut on this per requests made above, but I've long been passionate about the near impossible task of making things better for incels ( E.g as recently mentioned despite strong views on global warming risks I took an incel related flight across the Atlantic back in 2023. ) And GW's generous wording on what the 'change fixes in my mind' does kind of invite this sort of response.

The good custodians on this page are of course entitled to request folk refrain from making arguments based on what's good for incel's or indeed wider matters like reducing misogyny. To be clear though, that's not generally reflective of Wikipedia policy, or the unwritten rules that govern the editing community. We do have an influential essay that says editors are not suppose to use the encyclopaedia to right great wrongs, but few take those words literally. All the essay actually says is that one should follow the sources rather than lead them - e.g., you shouldn't go beyond what the sources say even if you have strong views about "evil inkwells". It may be interesting to break down how the editing community stands in relation to "dont try to right great wrongs"

Carebears > 50% , editors who like most of the world's people have affinity with the Golden Rule. They believe in putting policy first, but see no contradiction in trying to achieve social good. For example, if they have expertise to improve NPOV on two different articles, they may chose to spend their energy on the one they feel would have the most +ve impact.

Hobbyists ~25% , scholarly editors who just like to impartially follow the sources without worrying about societal impact - they might be very caring in their off wiki lives, but see editing as a break from real world responsibilities. While these guys aren't closely aligned with carebears, they also aren't opposed to them.

RGW literalists, make up about 10% of the editing base, and while good faith, sincerely believe that editors should never be concerned about article impact. Fortunately, carebears can normally quite easily sidestep these literal minded types.

POV warriors compose about 5% of our editing base, and while they may pay lip service to RGW and actual policy, they are concerned chiefly with distorting article NPOV in favour of their agendas.

Griefers, making ~2% of our editing base, again may profess to believe in policy, but are secretly motivated just by causing strife. It's to the communities credit that so few have this as their primary motivation, considering how much stress there now is in the wider world. (Most of the inter editor drama we have is due to good faith differences of opinion)

Over-carers at < 2% are why our WP:RGW essay is necessary. They are good faith, but don't believe their altruistic emotions should take second place to policy. The reason there are so few of them is that they soon find themselves perma'd , leaving out of frustration, or upgrading to carebears.

Switching back to the problematic sentence, Ed Conduit has been a practicing psychologist for over 40 years & an author published by Routledge. He paid with his own money to have a journal article published saying this about the problematic sentence : There appear to be ten depersonalising mass nouns in this one sentence, with no sentience attributed to the persons. Instead, they are referenced with ten pejoratives that readers might perceive egocentrically as causes of harm to themselves. ... Should Wikipedia and the BBC slur incels, who are at high risk of suicide ...? We shouldn't want to risk influencing the public to perceive incels in such -ve egocentric ways, which would only make life even harder for them. Especially as even if we properly sourced every -ve quality the 66 word sentence attributes to incels, there's still nothing like that sentence even in the most anti-incel WP:RS . As per review articles linked to above, Conduit's compassion towards incels is characteristic of psychiatry, psychology and related disciplines. I've long pondered why the good WP:Stewards here seem to have such divergent views, as the ones I'm most familiar with like GW & WK seem exceptionally compassionate when I see them about elsewhere. Even the best of us have blind spots, so it could be for all sorts of reasons, though normally the cool kids never stoop to virgin shaming. (And at least some of the stewards here could easily be in the cool gang if they wanted to ) I wonder if they've been influenced by spending time on certain websites populated by folk not cool enough to be on tiktok, insta or snap? Not going to name the main website Im thinking of, and in fairness the young folk who populate it have it harder than folks from older generations like Ed Conduit or G. E. Stinson. The just published 2025 global flourishing study has confirmed that across the world, the long established U shaped pattern for youth & old ages to be the happiest times of life no longer holds true, with youth now an especially miserable time for many. This is partly related to the global sex recession, so I guess not surprising that some feel the need to punch down on incels. There are fell influences at play in the realm of Eros. These are the forces Im now called to contend with, requiring somewhat more painful & exhausting efforts than the most intense wikipedia discussion, so it's unlikely I'll have time for further editing for a while. But nice to depart on a note of agreement thanks to you IP. FeydHuxtable (talk) 23:28, 19 May 2025 (UTC)

I've made an edit that will hopefully address your concerns. Re: the rest of your comment, to be honest, I don't have the bandwidth to engage with the extended meta-commentary, much of which is off-topic for article improvement and includes several assumptions about editor motivations. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 17:39, 22 May 2025 (UTC)

Yeah this is one of the reasons I think that having a seperate article for involuntary celibacy is important, the incel subculture that came in the 90s-2010s is misogynistic and extremist but the term "involuntary celibacy" is a completely different thing. Aradicus77 (talk) 02:33, 1 August 2025 (UTC)

Recent edits

@ILoveHirasawaYui I am a little bit concerned that your recent edits represent a somewhat WP:EXTRAORDINARY revision, particularly with how you are effectively claiming in wiki voice that these new papers definitively prove prior research outmoded. It seems a bit undue with its definitive tone. Now I have read one of your four sources and do believe it is due inclusion. I just worry that your framing seems non-neutral. I will read the other three though and will not make any further reversion until I have thoroughly reviewed your sources. Simonm223 (talk) 01:14, 2 June 2025 (UTC)

I reverted. Pretty standard WP:BRD situation. Thanks for diving into those sources, Simon. Ed ^{[talk] [OMT]} 07:01, 2 June 2025 (UTC)

Ok so notes:

1. [1] This article was published in Feminist Inquiry in Social Work in 2023. It discusses how incel communities construct race in some detail and ends up... ambiguous. The conclusion states It is relatively easy to dismiss incels as entitled, violent individuals representative of toxic masculinities, but it becomes a bit more strenuous to blame them for their inability to attain the impossible standards of desirability that whiteness sets forth. Their racist misogyny is repugnant and unacceptable. However, rather than condemning them, this study urges social workers to undertake a closer, more nuanced understanding of their perceived (and perhaps very real) grievances. It's definitely a reliable source but it doesn't do anything to undermine previous literature. It is due inclusion in the article but, on its own, is not due rewriting the lede.
2. Taking the Black Pill: An Empirical Analysis of the "Incel". I accessed via Wikipedia library so no direct link. It is also reliable, published in Psychology of Men & Masculinities in 2021. I think it is also due inclusion in the article. It discusses race and racism in the context of Inceldom as a white supremacist belief system which includes both white and non-white participants who feed into hegemonic white masculinity. It also does not do anything to contradict prior research.
3. [2] This article was published in The Communication Review in 2025. It talks about race less than the prior two articles but does note On dating apps, research suggests that over 90% of non-Asian US women who state racial preferences reject Asian men (Robnett & Feliciano, Citation2011). Incel forums allowed him to connect with other Asian incels who had these experiences. Specific subgroups raised by participants included “the black manosphere,” “MRAsians,” “currycels,” and “ricecels.” Each had dedicated forums or Discords to discuss ways in which they have been discriminated against. This layered analysis can be superficially aligned with feminist intersectionality, though the underlying framework is incompatible This presents a weak opposition to prior research describing inceldom as supporting or upholding white supremacy through the presence of two non-white participants. However they were labeled P6 and P8 which implies a majority of participants were likely white.
4. [3] Actually provides full demographics for its study participants saying, "participants were predominantly Asian (n = 9) and White (n = 8). Other participants described themselves as Hispanic (n = 2) and multiracial (n = 2)." and Asians were the majority in the sample over whites. However the sample sizes are minuscule. This particular study had 21 participants listed here. That is not a representative sample. This paper is, however, also a good find.

All in all I would say that @ILoveHirasawaYui did a very good job finding reliable sources. However none of these sources seem to support that we can say with certainty that incels are not "mostly white". I think it would definitely be a good idea to explore the complicated relationships with race these studies piece out in the article body though. Simonm223 (talk) 12:07, 3 June 2025 (UTC)

I'm not sure where you got "rewriting the lede" from. I don't wanna change the lede, I think it's pretty good as it is. But those studies warrant making the changes I made to the Demographics section, don't they? Number 4 literally says "Recent research suggests that common perceptions that Incels are almost all White are inaccurate", not based on its own sample but citing numbers 1 and 2 (and another article which I couldn't access). And I cited number 3 because it says that incels are "ethnically diverse", contrary to the sources currently cited in that section, which say that incels are "primarily white" or "young, frustrated white males".

Also, I didn't remove the sentence that said incels are mostly white, I just changed "most" to the more specific "55% of", because that's what the cited source says. Sure, 55% is technically most, but as it stands, the Demographics section says that incels are "predominantly" white, which isn't true, and cites older sources that are rebutted by these newer ones. 💖平沢唯を愛しています💖 (talk|contribs) 04:01, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

Also, if we do add a section about non-white incels, should there be a sentence like "Among non-white incels, the acronym "JBW" (Just be white) is often touted to reflect the perceived advantages white men have in dating"? I can find many good sources on this. 💖平沢唯を愛しています💖 (talk|contribs) 08:39, 4 June 2025 (UTC)

It's been about a week with no response, so I think it's safe to just be bold and restore my edits now 💖平沢唯を愛しています💖 (talk|contribs) 03:18, 11 June 2025 (UTC)

The blackpill should be its own seperate page, I'll make a draft for it but the user is right that its become much more broader, it encompasses looksmaxxing, superdeterminism, eugenics, and some of what he sourced of nihilist and doomer attitudes. This isn't talked about enough on red pill and blue pill and there's significant coverage on blackpill ideology recently for it to warrant its own page. Aradicus77 (talk) 13:45, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

Working on the draft at Draft:Blackpilled (it's called that for now but I'll submit it for a move to Blackpill when it's finished. Aradicus77 (talk) 14:14, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

"Blackpill" listed at Redirects for discussion

The redirect Blackpill has been listed at redirects for discussion to determine whether its use and function meets the redirect guidelines. Readers of this page are welcome to comment on this redirect at Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion/Log/2025 June 22 § Blackpill until a consensus is reached. silviaASH (inquire within) 22:31, 22 June 2025 (UTC)

Discussion at Talk:Blackpill (disambiguation) § Requested move 23 June 2025

 You are invited to join the discussion at Talk:Blackpill (disambiguation) § Requested move 23 June 2025. silviaASH (inquire within) 20:39, 23 June 2025 (UTC)

Move discussion in progress

There is a move discussion in progress on Talk:Blackpill (disambiguation) which affects this page. Please participate on that page and not in this talk page section. Thank you. —RMCD bot 21:10, 23 June 2025 (UTC)

Blackpill seperate article

Making a seperate article for the Blackpill, it's been denied numerous times by a seperate person who seemed to not have updated it when giving feedback, but right now working on it at Draft:Blackpilled before it should be moved to article space. Does further talk have to be done for this? It currently ties into Looksmaxxing and the Manosphere. And seems to be its own vast ideology seperate to Red pill and blue pill. Aradicus77 (talk) 16:07, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

If you go through Google books and search involuntary celibacy through the 19th century, there's many books that showcase the term, it seems to be a term that's been around for a while before appropriated by the incel subculture, so I'm making a seperate page for it at Draft:Involuntary Celibacy. There's also many articles by the Guardian and New Yorker regarding the trend of involuntary celibacy in general besides the incel movement so its useful as its own page. Aradicus77 (talk) 20:55, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

I'm not sure why you deleted my previous comment (see WP:TPO), but I'll put it here again: See point one of the FAQ regarding the subject of this article, which is the online subculture and not the circumstance of sexless people more broadly. Existing articles on sexual frustration or celibacy are more suited to those topics. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 00:44, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

I deleted my whole thread there, not your specific comment. Why make that accusation? If threads are concluded they get deleted, which is normal on wikipedia. Now this new thread is about a completely different topic which is that of creating different articles for Blackpilled and Involuntary Celibacy, which you have ignored and just pasted what you said last time which has nothing to do with what I'm saying. Let me repeat what I said, the articles you linked are not at all the places for talk about "involuntary celibacy" or the "blackpill" those topics need their own articles. Aradicus77 (talk) 03:05, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Deleting threads is not normal on Wikipedia. Threads may be *archived*, but that is an entirely different process. Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 03:08, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

How do I archive a thread properly? This seems like semantics. I made a thread a while ago here and it seems its no longer here, so it's been deleted, you can call it archiving but I still feel that was an accusation, when what I did was in good-faith and not in a way to "silence" or censor what they said. Aradicus77 (talk) 03:09, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Anyway this still has nothing to do with the topic at hand. I'll work on the articles. I just wanted to leave a heads up. Aradicus77 (talk) 03:13, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

You can archive conversations by moving them to the talk page archives (linked in the template at the top of the page), but more normally you can just leave them to be auto-archived by the bot. While you can remove your own talk page comments, it's frowned upon to remove them once someone has replied, and you should not delete other comments. If the past thread of yours you're alleging was deleted and not archived is the February 2023 section about Henry Flynt, it was archived, not deleted: Talk:Incel/Archive 10#Avant-garde musician Henry Flynt coined the term "involuntary celibate" in 1974 after being called a "creep" by Helen Lefkowitz in 1956.

My reply, which I've copied here, is quite relevant to the comment you've just made anew in this section. You're proposing creating some new page about the pre-online subculture idea of "involuntary celibacy", and as I said previously, there have been plenty of conversations about that precise thing on this talk page that lead to FAQ#1 and #2, and the general consensus that such material is best put at sexual frustration or celibacy. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 03:18, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Thank you, but there's not a single mention of "involuntary celibacy" in sexual frustration or celibacy. Given the extensive writing on the topic. It does seem it's eligible for an article now. Back in 2021 I asked about this and they said there wasn't enough coverage. But the looksmaxxing wave recently has led to a lot of prominent newspapers writing about the topic of "involuntary celibacy" as well as the blackpill. Here are some examples:

https://www.vox.com/culture/390911/luigi-mangione-uhc-shooter-manifesto-reddit-blackpill

https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2023/apr/26/the-rise-of-voluntary-celibacy-most-of-the-sex-ive-had-i-wish-i-hadnt-bothered

https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2022/oct/20/involuntary-celibacy-incels-problem-right-to-sex-not-the-answer

Anyway, this talk page isn't really the place for this. I'll just keep writing the articles and move them to article space when they are done. Draft:Involuntary celibacy and Draft:Blackpiller just leaving them here in case of anyone who previously was working on similar articles stumbles across this thread Aradicus77 (talk) 03:25, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Apologies there's one mention of it in sexual frustration but still it's very peripheral and not indicative of the larger subject matter. It is also only used as a link to this article, which further states why there should be a seperate article for that concept. Since involuntary celibacy is not synonymous with the incel subculture that came later. People have been saying "involuntary celibate" for over 100 years. Aradicus77 (talk) 03:25, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

I also previously mentioned in the thread that the term "involuntary celibate" was originally used for women. And the connotation with males came later. At the moment, it would also be good to have that involuntary celibacy article as to have a Femcel and Volcel article later down the line as those topics have also seen renewed talk in the media. Aradicus77 (talk) 03:28, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

(edit conflict) Given that articles very similar to the one you're drafting have been repeatedly deleted at AfD, with the most recent deletion discussion resulting in an panel outcome of Overall we find there is a stronger consensus to delete the page and prevent its recreation. The deletion arguments are more numerous, better based in policy, and less well refuted. The consensus to salt the page comes not only from a large number of delete voters, but also a number of keep voters, who note the amount of community time wasted with the continual recreation of this page, a new page like your draft likely needs to go through WP:DRV. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 03:31, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

The blackpill article was incredibly biased and undersourced, with it reading as if the user was part of the community and trying to promote it. The involuntary celibacy page was also similar in being either biased or undersourced. My page when its finished will have at least 50-60 distinct sources, most of them coming from reputable sources. At that point there would be no reason to delete the article. At the moment my draft hasn't been finished but when it does it will go through WP:DRV or Wikipedia:Requested moves Aradicus77 (talk) 03:46, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Also the blackpill article was given feedback and the user abandoned it and didn't update the article only to keep re-uploading it to be reviewed. That's why it appears to be deleted numerous times. I'm a good writer and don't use AI or whatever nonsense I've seen people using on this site when making articles. These pages are necessary to better map the phenomena of involuntary celibacy and its subsequent subcultures. Wikipedia is an encyclopedia for notable topics. And these 2 topics have become increasingly notable in the past few years. Aradicus77 (talk) 03:47, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

The fact it's also being called a neologism at (Articles for deletion/Involuntary celibacy (4th nomination)) Shows how little people even know about the topic. Looking through many previous writers used bad sources or mainly original research. I can notice the one issue the article involuntary celibacy will have is the lack of substantial secondary sources for its earlier examples. But for Draft:Blackpiller it should be fine. Also Red pill and blue pill should be split into 2 different articles, one discussing the concept. And the other related to the manosphere. Aradicus77 (talk) 03:53, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Also the last deletion of involuntary celibacy was 10 YEARS AGO. Wow. There's way more talk about this topic now than there was in 2015. It should definitely be able to go through AfD. Aradicus77 (talk) 03:56, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

I was referring to your plan to recreate the article on "involuntary celibacy", not the blackpill draft. I have my doubts that there's enough for a standalone article about blackpill (not to mention the increasingly long list of subtopics from this page you're talking about splitting out), but it's your involuntary celibacy article that I was saying should go through DRV, not the blackpill one. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 03:57, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Ahh. I get you, but still it feels like it's been a while since it was last deleted. The blackpill article was deleted I think June 2025? But it was really badly written.

What in particular do you doubt about the blackpill article? The concerns listed in the old involuntary celibacy page seemed valid. As I've been researching there is a lot more talk surrounding just mention the term "involuntary celibacy" or it not being properly defined. There aren't like official books just surrounding it, but there are many studied that were made between 2020-2025 which didn't exist 10 years ago. So we'll see.

Sorry if I came across a bit hostile btw. Thank you for replying and for your contributions. Aradicus77 (talk) 04:11, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

You do know that we deleted a previous article on "involuntary celibacy" due to POVFORK concerns, right? Guy (help! - typo?) 13:37, 7 August 2025 (UTC)

I suppose it's possible that there was some recent surge in interest by scholars in the use of the phrase "involuntary celibacy" a century ago and I just didn't notice, but my suspicion is that any new studies from 2020–2025 would have to do with the subculture (i.e. this page, not the one you're proposing). I see that all of the sources in your draft, save for the primary source from the 1700s, describe this topic. But perhaps you have more waiting in the wings, and we can discuss it at the DRV when you're ready to give it a go.

Regarding the blackpill article, I'm just a bit skeptical that there's enough material to justify a standalone page, rather than a subsection at this article or Red pill and blue pill. I could absolutely be wrong there, though — like I said, my concerns have to do with the other draft. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 04:24, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

You'd be right about that. It does seem a lot of this is still being talked about in culture. It would be fine to expand the blackpill section at Red pill and blue pill, but it would probably be far more possible for the split between the red pill blue pill concept associated in fiction and the Matrix and the manosphere. Also I wanted to ask if any additions on "series" to this page were possible? I felt something like "this is a series in extremism" or "series in terrorism" or "series in hate"... etc. That I've seen on other pages fit with the Incel subculture page. The community is rife with misogyny and extremism full stop.

Again thank you for replying and genuinely apologize for previous friction. I really do want discussions on here to be amicable and encourage people to want to be on the site, and I feel bad for the way I was writing before. Aradicus77 (talk) 04:28, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

You're thinking of sidebar templates (more at WP:SIDEBAR). Which one were you thinking should be added? I'd note there are two navboxes (alt-right and manosphere) at the bottom of the page, but I'm not aware of sidebar templates that make sense. A quick search of the talk archives suggests that the conservatism sidebar was being used on this page for a bit, but it was determined to be too tangential a connection to justify the sidebar.

No worries about the friction, and I appreciate your hope for amicable conversations on Wikipedia. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 04:38, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

See also

@Aradicus77: Re: [4]: As explained in the section I linked, As a general rule, the "See also" section should not repeat links that appear in the article's body. GorillaWarfare (she/her • talk) 03:14, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

OK, that's fine then. Thank you Aradicus77 (talk) 03:15, 29 July 2025 (UTC)

Neutrality issue, inclusivity

Should be:

'The incel subculture's online discourse has been characterized by resentment, hostility, sexual objectification and dehumanization of men and women, misogyny, misandry [...]' 185.75.37.146 (talk) 11:30, 5 August 2025 (UTC)

We go by published, reliable sources. The best of those are scholarly and peer-reviewed journals and monographs, which emphasize the incel community's misogyny and dehumanization of women specifically. Sticking "men" in there just because somebody feels like it would be a false balance. —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 22:32, 5 August 2025 (UTC)

Definition

A lot of people were active discussing and working on this article, but it still lacks the proper definition or description for the word incel or who belongs to that term:

a) Are all people having difficulty with starting romantic relationships (e.g. due to social anxiety, traumatic experiences, ...) and discussing those difficulties online, incels? Are there good and bad incels with the later having additional mysogynistic and violent philosophies? In that case the article has to balance much more those differences and change words as 'often' to 'some few'.

b) Or are incels a single sub-culture with those bad traits. In this case the self-definition in the first paragraph just does not describe incels well, and it should be clearly contrasted that most people from this definition (unable to find a romantic partner) are not incels, and beside the name the sub-culture is much more specific.

c) Or there is no common definition among reliable sources. Then the article should also state this.

Sebastian --88.217.185.170 (talk) 08:30, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

Incels as currently understood are men who can't get laid because of their toxic misogyny. Guy (help! - typo?) 09:31, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

How is this a good definition when there are people associated with the subculture who are non-violent or are not misogynist and have just either been socially inept or impaired by their looks? The documentary. The 2011 documentary Shy Boys: IRL by director Sara Gardephe showcases one character who says he only goes on the forums because he has no friends and doesn't partake in anything the other misogynistic boys in the documentary believe or say about women. While the pickup artist who is a rampant misogynist is the one that has had the most dating experience.

Basically incel = involuntary celibacy and is a short-hand for it. But in the modern sense it's strictly to refer to an internet subculture. But this nuance should be clarified like the OP says Aradicus77 (talk) 11:37, 21 September 2025 (UTC)

It's (b). What exactly is unclear about An incel [...] is a member of an online subculture? Writ Keeper ⚇♔ 12:32, 15 August 2025 (UTC)

Etymological history

How come specific etymological history is relegated to note sections?

The "black pill" being coined on the site Omega Virgin Revolt in 2012 has been pushed down to the bottom of the page. As much as this article is trying to outline the "philosophy" of the community. It also feels like it misses the point of an Encyclopedia by not outlining the evolution of the terms and the history of it. Aradicus77 (talk) 15:53, 20 September 2025 (UTC)

Because we go by the best available sources such as scholarly and peer-reviewed journals and books, which tend not to dwell on the exact circumstances surrounding the coining of the term "black pill". Why do we care what the specific name of the website was anyway? —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 22:50, 20 September 2025 (UTC)

Because encyclopedia's focus on history? Why is it that this page is the one that stresses on specific peer reviewed journals and books while the hundreds of other pages I've edited on Wikipedia are fine with adding information like this based on just one article by the Guardian or the BBC? And it's completely uncontested. What I'm seeing here is some kind of loop-hole being used where by saying we only go with "best available sources" (to avoid being accused of WP:OWN).

It's actually limiting the "kind" of sources that would be controversial or challenge public consensus on the history of this term and community and so relegates everyone to use the same sources made by the "same" kind of people. Which perpetuates the same agenda on the topic. People have added scholarly sources before that take a deeper look into the topic, mostly focused on the history of the term "involuntary celibacy" and other stuff of that manner and it gets removed either with the response that the scholar is not "notable" enough or some other nitpick. And I don't understand why, the article itself says "incels", "black pill", "looksmaxxing" are not scientifically backed up ideologies and phenomenas. So why do scholarly journals even matter? Why does public consensus such as what would be said on a news article not be as valuable to understanding the community? Why not have a specific section with scientific analysis while also having other more broader sections on the topic?

The thing is my edits are barely ever about the community and more specific tid bits of history that has been removed throughout the article, like origins of terms, years they were coined... Which is all pretty important as people think this community started a few years back when it has roots in the 1970s...

Open-discussion on a topic like this is necessary, but given the social climate of today it seems that will take a long time before this topic is given the right amount of nuance. Aradicus77 (talk) 11:26, 21 September 2025 (UTC)

The hundreds of other pages you have edited are not this page. We go by reliable, published sources, not whatever individual users happen to think is important, nor by public consensus, whatever that means. An encyclopedia like Wikipedia is a summary of accepted knowledge on a topic. Going into obsessive detail over the specific origin of a term would be giving it undue weight. If you have other scholarly sources to present, feel free to do so here. —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 22:08, 21 September 2025 (UTC)

• I think that real issue here is that the "pill" section has grown too much and should be spun off into the main article. A more lengthy etymology would make plenty sense there.

And anyway, the black/red pill thing goes beyond incels. See for example "Black Pill" (2024) by Reeve. GMG^talk 23:49, 21 September 2025 (UTC)

Disagree; the "black pill" is a specifically incel worldview, whereas the "red pill" metaphor is more widely used, particularly in the wider manosphere. —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 01:06, 22 September 2025 (UTC)

Then as much as that's the case, black pill should have its own article, linked to in summaries here and at the red/blue article. Any way you look at it, ten paragraphs with more than 1k words is pushing it for a subsection. GMG^talk 07:12, 22 September 2025 (UTC)

Or we could drastically cut down that section, since a lot of the sourcing is just news stories about Jordan Peterson etc. We can retain the main ideas by summarizing the best scholarly books and papers. —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 08:00, 22 September 2025 (UTC)

since a lot of the sourcing is just news stories about Jordan Peterson That doesn't seems especially accurate. GMG^talk 10:38, 22 September 2025 (UTC)

Jordan Peterson etc. —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 13:36, 22 September 2025 (UTC)

Well that's inane.

Besides that, no, the section doesn't seem to be particularly overwhelmed by news articles, and there is no prohibition against using them. This is especially true on contemporary topics. GMG^talk 15:03, 22 September 2025 (UTC)

I never said there was a prohibition. But just because we can doesn't mean we should. Especially when there is more authoritative sourcing from scholarly books and journals. —Sangdeboeuf (talk) 17:54, 22 September 2025 (UTC)