Misogynistic terrorism : analysing the growing threat of incel violence and how social media fosters this dangerous subculture

Abstract

There exists considerable literature on cyberspace and the threat of cybercrimes. Yet there still remain understudied areas of new online and digital contexts which have contributed to real-life violence. This dissertation focuses on the online ‘Involuntary Celibates’ or ‘Incel’ subculture: A product of new twenty-first-century communication technologies as well as the rhetoric of mid-twentieth-century men’s movements. The Incel subculture is known to have repeatedly motivated wide-scale acts of violence and continues to pose an international security threat. The aim was to analyse how today’s social media platforms potentially foster the dangerous Incel belief system, and what real-life consequences this kind of subculture could have if social media platforms continue to lack efficient controls concerning radical extremism. Drawing on data collected from TikTok, the language and imagery were analysed to better understand the prevalence of right-wing extremism and indoctrination into misogyny. The five emerging themes (1) Be a Masculine, Strong, Successful Man, (2) Aggression, Danger and Violence are Good, (3) Life is Sad, Unfair and Hopeless, (4) Feminism and Women are Bad and (5) Society is Corrupt and Unfair, revealed that TikTok and its algorithm do in fact harbour content that could act as radicalisation pathways into dangerous and violent extremist ideologies like Inceldom, calling for a serious review of their content moderation policy and the role of AI in creating harmful echo chambers of hate.