Racialization on incels.is: Racial Status and Status Threat

This project examined the historic-racial schema articulated by involuntarily celibate male members of the online forum incels.is. Based in a content analysis of images and comments from incels.is, it drew on a broad framework informed by double-consciousness, historic-racial and corporeal schemas, hegemonic and hybrid masculinities, and realistic and symbolic threat. This research documented what assumptions shape said schemas, how incels operationalized racial status and status threat, and how racialized and non-racialized incels incorporated those ideas into their corporeal schemas. It found that processes of racialization on the forum were articulated in a manner consistent with the warped ‘handing back’ of racialized identities described by Fanon and Du Bois. Racialization was akin to a process of objectification and racialized incels interpellated limiting core self-evaluations, while non-racialized incels drew on hybridized masculinities to distance themselves from privilege yet sought to entrench it. 

Author’s Note: Content warning for discussions of sexual assault and violence against women, dehumanizing language directed against racialized minorities.