2025-04-07

It may be an abrupt break but recently, I have stopped ruminating about God, faith, and freedom. Hegel also went to the backseat because Adolescence has been running in my mind all day.

I believe that it is already clear to me what the show is about. Who is it for and why it was made are already set and defined in my mind as I've also been waiting for a show like this to be made. Almost two years earlier, I've been exposed to the "manosphere" ideology that has been rampant on social media. Micro celebrities, who are men, espousing these ideas and reeking of misogyny has been influencing young men about a kind of worldview that satisfies a kind of male insecurity that is most likely rooted due to an emotional misunderstanding of feminism.

It is also probably because I can say that I spend too much time online that I come across these people, and the online personalities that I am exposed to has frequently reacted to the stupidity of these ideas. Some have went into debate streams, some YouTube channels also try to create a space where this ideology rooted in misogyny can be put under a critical spotlight. However, all those efforts didn't seem to have come into fruition because those conversations often end up being emotional and confrontational. Every one ends up agreeing to disagree, solidifying those divide because, honestly, the left can also be emotional and passionate, adding more fuel to this fire.

The thing is, everything hinges on the refusal of toxic masculinity to recognize its own insecurity. It has become its own consciousness seen through this manosphere culture. It has resulted to a distorted perspective of Stoicism, the rise of the alpha and sigma males, the Chad, which are all conservative versions of masculinity. Older men push the idea that women are these objects that men must conquer, or else they would be virgins throughout their life.

I do think that young men are thirsty for a good model for masculinity, and we don't have that clear-cut simple definition of what a man is. Instinctively, young men still believe that a man MUST be a protector, a warrior, a hunter, emotionless in the face of struggle, this ideal image of authority. In this age of social media, these manosphere influencers are the most immediate sources of information available to them causing this perfect storm of cultural regression towards the toxic masculinity that feminism has been pushing hard against.

Perhaps this is also an indication that the traditional idea of masculinity has been abolished and those who have been holding on and benefited from its old definition are trying to build it back up, restoring the old regime.