5min chapter

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Why Men & Boys Are Struggling and No One Cares - Dr Warren Farrell

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CHAPTER

Exploring the Complexities of Involuntary Celibacy and Masculine Withdrawal

This chapter examines the challenges men face in relationships, particularly through the lens of involuntary celibacy or 'incels.' It explores emotional complexities, societal pressures, and the dual nature of support groups that can both help and harm individuals grappling with their feelings towards women.

00:00
Speaker 1
Well, it's a very good question. So let's look at the words like incel. Incel for the novice of tuning in here means involuntarily celibate, involuntarily celibate. So these people, these men are saying that I don't want to be celibate. I'd like to be sexual with a woman, but I'm involuntary, but I have to prevent myself from doing it because, you know, for example, if I put my penis in a woman's body, I'm putting my life in her hands. She can choose to have an abortion or she can choose to sue me for support. If she decides to not abort and to have the child, I am sued and I'm sued for support. From that one sexual experience, I put my life in her hands. There is, if I want to have equal access to that child, because even though I didn't intend to have the child, I nevertheless feel like I want to help raise that child because I know children are due best when raised by both parents. And I feel it's only fair for me to be equally involved. And I'm being told that I can't, I don't have an option to be equally involved in that child's life. I only have an option to pay for that child's support. And I see that in court after court, I don't have more than a little chance of winning. And if I had a chance of winning, I'd at least have to spend the equivalent of 150,000 US dollars to hire lawyers, hire expert witnesses, hire people to convince the judge to allow me to be a good father. That feels like too much of a risk for sex. So you and I are programmed, Constantine, to work our rears off and to do what we need to do. You wouldn't be doing this podcast if you weren't that type of male. I wouldn't be writing books if I wasn't that type of male. But not every male is like that. Some men do not have, you know, they may have been brought up by them, you know, without a dad themselves. They may not be as motivated. They may, but they still are heterosexual. They still care for women. But it's too complex, it's too dangerous to be involved. It's like somebody wanting to, desiring enormously to ride a motorcycle and take risks riding that motorcycle, but then reading and understanding that it's 36 times more likely that you're going to get into an accident per mile of motorcycle riding. So you give up what you want to do because it's too dangerous to do it. That's incels. And basically, that's the same psychology behind men going their own way. However, there's two types of things that can come out of that. When men going their own way or incels meeting together and get together and sharing feelings and sharing their pains and sharing their anger and sharing sometimes hatred of women because they're so that either can be very healing because for moments when we're angry and we feel vulnerable anger is vulnerability's mask. And in any therapy group, every therapist knows that sometimes the anger of a woman or the anger of a man will be exaggerated. I hate my husband. I wish he was dead. I wish I had never met him. I wish I'd never married him. Well, that is anger, of course. That is a hatred of the moment, of course. But almost always, I learn this again and again from doing my couples communication workshops. Anger is vulnerability's mask. If you ask, what's the vulnerability behind this anger? You have a totally different feeling about what's happening. what happens is the anger is a stage and having a chance to vent feelings is therapeutic as it is in a therapist's office and this is a very healing men like this getting together and venting can be very healing and occasionally it can be very destructive if they don't get off the venting and move into a more constructive life. Now, for me, a constructive life is not withdrawing from women or withdrawing from society. For me, a constructive life is learning how to listen, learning how to interact, learning how to work things through. And, you know, I can write about what I feel and talk about what I feel. And I'm able to make a living doing that. And but let's open our hearts to the people who can't make a living doing that. They're not saying, they're not saying, I want to destroy women. I want to hurt women. I don't want women, good things for women. They're just saying it's too complex for me to be out there with women. I need to withdraw and be by myself.
Speaker 3
And Warren, the thing that really struck me when I was reading your book, which I really loved actually, and it was very, very powerful, was a fact that really hit home, which was more people would prefer to have a girl than have a boy. And that, to me, really hit home where the problem is. And that it seems to be as a society, we seem to prefer girls now.

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