The propagation of gender war ammunition is an ever-growing and highly lucrative market. This seemingly innocuous pop culture fodder is anything but.
The mongers of the gender war industry are committing crimes against love with every inflammatory, degradation that they launch against the other side. The gender war propaganda that we are collectively indulging in, in the ‘privacy’ of our digital lives is infiltrating public life through both the personal and the political.
“There is nothing concealed that will not be disclosed, or hidden that will not be made known. What you have said in the dark will be heard in the daylight, and what you have whispered in the ear in the inner rooms will be proclaimed from the roofs.” Luke 12:3
The skepticism and villainisation of each sex toward the other permeating social media is cancerous to collaborative, open, loving engagement. There is certainly truth to many of the accusations that men make of women and women of men but do we want to be without each other? It is a sick culture that enjoys humiliating its male or female counterparts for sport.
Zoomers are gauging dating content at a rate and scale far outweighing our real life experience. The specific issues that Tate faces with his haram of women or Julia Fox’s words to the “wise” on how to bag a rapper (while morbidly fascinating) are just not relevant. Very few people of sound mind would broadcast the inner-workings of their most intimate relationship and very few young people personally know the intimacies of a healthy couple in real life. Enter, podcasters and ‘political’ commentators, the (mostly false) prophets of our age.
Young people need sanctuary and meaningful connection and we are hindering our chances by consuming gender-war/ actual porn. The internet has magnified our intolerance of the foibles of others, making chronically online youths both paranoid and narcissistic when it comes to dating. If we are burning someone alive every other week in the digital space, this inevitably translates to unrealistic expectations and overly harsh judgements in the squishy realm.
Tiktok is a terrifying insight into the spread of unreasonable dating expectations and toxic tactics coming from both the manosphere and the girl-bosses. Interestingly, both sides promote the offensive “get them before they get you” tactic when it comes to the other sex, an approach which doesn’t seem like a promising start to a relationship. It’s a tit-for-tat mentality, not to mention a depressing outlook.
THE GIRLS
It is obvious to me that the infamous, pop-feminist dig “men are trash” is a flimsy coping mechanism. Beneath its hubris is pain. Girls are delicate. Most women want to be cherished and protected. Whether she knows it or not, Doja Cat’s smash hit “N*ggaz Aint Shit” is a heartbreak anthem, not a feminist one.
If I had to summarise the inception of the “Call Her Daddy” mission it would be to encourage young women to give him that Hawk Tuah but don’t catch feels because he’s probably a scumbag (just like your Dad). Pop “Feminist” talk spaces have evolved (or devolved) to promote female delusions of grandeur and exalt only the most vain, self-centred and navel-gazing women you could possibly imagine.
Of course, there is a sourdough baking, summer dress wearing, child rearing alternative feminine ideal rising. While I like this one better (because I find the aesthetic pleasing and Ballerina Farm is aspirational), it may be leading young women down a dangerous road. At the core of marriage must be a robust, mutual partnership or it could quickly devolve into a 1950s style horror film. I suspect mounting economic pressure also has much to do with young women’s pronounced interest in landing the role of a “trad-wife-influencer” to a man in finance.
Pop-cultural dating advice for women is polarised and a bit shallow. Most girlies exist somewhere between an Only-fans babe flying to Dubai every other week to be pooed upon by a Sheik and a chaste Mormon beauty, ready to marry the first man who asks. Though the average young woman is more likely to be channeling her romantic nihilism into smutty fiction than online forums, she is longing for acceptance and connection with someone of the opposite sex just as much as young men are.
THE BOYS
If the girls think men are trash, the boys seem to think women are gold-digging thots. According to the red pill space, without the constraints of social pressures and religious institutions, women’s true nature has been revealed. A diabolical, hypergamous nature. From this perspective, women prefer to marry or sleep with someone “up” the dominance hierarchy and are even willing to share a prized man if they must. According to bro-(and some actual)-science, what has been revealed by the liberation of women’s selection is that women in their prime sexual years don’t seem to want to date the majority of men. If women don’t ‘need’ a man and they can’t get the one they desire, many would prefer to go without… or date the same bloke.
The MGTOW (Men Going Their Own Way) community reveals digital mobs of men (some with pitchforks at the ready), calling for a reckoning against all of the baseless, degenerate, sluts of the postmodern world. You’ve seen the clickbait titles, “Blue Haired Feminist DESTROYED by BASED Chad”, “B*tch Thinks She’s A 10 and Gets HUMBLED”, “Crocodile Tears From Only Fans 404” ETC. ETC.
I get the distinct spidey-sense that men who indulge in this kind of digital defilement don’t have much positive real world experience with actual women. Perhaps vilifying these women (who always look like Instagram filters and say really stupid stuff) alleviates the sense of powerlessness that young men feel within a culture that outwardly despises maleness and praises female degeneracy. There is also a dark catharsis in watching the object of your sexual desire (who you cannot have because she doesn’t want you) have her status and dignity publicly stripped. Similarly to the pop feminist perspective, the thot-hating portion of the manosphere emphatically deny the humanity of the counter sex.
ESCAPING VELOCITY
The hurt and resentment that drives young daters into their chambers of indignation and outrage is real. The digital dating revolution has ravaged the old world of finding love. Apps project the illusion of a revolving door of potential mates but in reality the promise of intimacy melts away like a mirage. Most young men can barely get a match, let alone a date and most young women realise quickly that their matches are indicative of sexual suitors who have no interest in husbandry.
What I am witnessing, I would liken to “Trump Derangement Syndrome”. When we consistently and without solid evidence endow each other with nefarious intentions on the basis of sex, we do so at our own peril. In our perception, the reality of who someone is distorts into the monster we have made of them.
On the flip side, a young man or woman may consume so many perfect representations of the opposite sex, absorb so much chatter about how things “should be” that they become completely paralysed when their aspirations of perfection are shattered by… human interaction. Sometimes a date is a tad awkward, sometimes someone smells a bit or says something slightly rogue, that’s life. If we are only engaging with idealised, two-dimensional versions of the other sex, will we be completely shattered when a person, in all their flaw and flesh, doesn’t fit the algorithm? I know plenty of Chad’s and Stacy’s (normal, hot, alphas of the sexual marketplace) and they don’t exist up close. Everybody is and feels like an unloveable blob from time to time.
The chasm between male and female outlooks is a tale as old as time but the demonisation and alienation of the other has run utterly rampant. Young men and women are left to descend into their respective echo chambers to lambast each other or alternatively, they are sold a vision of a hyper masculine/ hyper feminine dynamic that sidelines the realities of intimacy. These binary effigy’s of men and women do not resemble what it is to be a fallible human, one possessing both masculine and female qualities. Being a doe-eyed, virgin who can bake banana bread or a jacked gym junkie with a Bitcoin will not spare you from the messy intricacies of lasting interdependence.
Dating discourse is an online colosseum of horrors, it’s entertaining, sure, but it is soul rotting. The most profitable business model is to platform the worst ideas and most horrible people. We must not let ugly, spiteful, mutant podcasters let us hate the opposite gender, when deep down our true desire is to experience complimentary companionship.
If any cultural commentator (conservative or otherwise) is willing to viciously degrade another human being, their moral high ground is void. It is exonerating to see our perspective validated and thrilling to see our enemies decimated but it is anything but Christlike to revel in it. If there is in fact a spiritual battle waging, the enemy remains the devil and not each other.
“My son, pay attention to what I say; turn your ear to my words. Do not let them out of your sight, keep them within your heart; for they are life to those who find them and health to one’s whole body. Above all else, guard your heart, for everything you do flows from it.”- PROVERBS 4:20-23
Well written and concise. If I had another chapter I would include the political polarisation which concerns me the most.
I did not think that the mess of the dating world rn could be summarised so well.