Chapter 1: A Young Man Becomes a Social Bomb

Make men great again?
Men are not inherently harmful
creepily ordinary men
Creating a space to vent anger
Beyond the Bad Boy Discourse

Chapter 2: The Marginalized Young Man

Is the man's situation really that bad?
The Promise and Betrayal of Masculinity
Betrayed by sex
A love story that ends in disappointment
It's a failure from the genes.
Swallow the Red Pill

Chapter 3 We are oppressed!

- Men as wounded subjects
Identity Politics and Wounds
Resentment on the loss of masculinity
The New Culture War
The government attacks men
Games men can't win (and maybe don't want to win)

Chapter 4: A Community of Manly Men

A man seeking friends and belonging
The myth of hard work and self-improvement
Physical strength is national power
Escape into consumerism
Network with fake faces
Betrayal of Self-Development
Illusory community

Chapter 5 Nihilism and Violence

Masculinity and Nihilism in the 21st Century
Anger, radical nihilism, and violence against women
sadness, passive nihilism, suicide
Limits of discontent

Chapter 6: Confronting Online Men's Communities

The harm of comfort
A misogynistic response to capitalist problems
A community where you are the problem because you are overly immersed
What are we going to do?
Banning or exile cannot solve the problem.
Get to the heart of the matter
Connect with your followers and fight misogyny.

Chapter 7: What Young Men Really Want

Again, creepily ordinary men
The Power of Anger and the Birth of the Far Right
What young men want, and what they should want
summation

Acknowledgements
Abbreviation List
List of pictures
main
References
Search

Threaten and terrorize the world!
The Jokers of Our Time Who Must Make Men Great Again

The film "Joker," which depicts Arthur Fleck, a man who has suffered from every misfortune a person can experience, including extreme poverty, lack of welfare, abandonment by his parents, neglect at work, and the absence of a loved one, transforming into the Joker, the greatest villain in comics, caused a huge controversy at the time of its release for glorifying male violence.
Thanks to that, Arthur Fleck in the movie became more than just a character; he became a symbolic figure.
He is the patron saint of incels (involuntary celibates).
Incels are a specific group of people who believe that they are genetically unattractive and therefore do not have good looks and are therefore destined to fail in relationships and marriages with women.
They isolate themselves and, beyond interacting online with those who share their struggles, vent their intensified, unchecked anger toward society and women.
In the United States and Europe, as mass shootings and misogynistic murders committed by incels have become social issues, academic papers and reports are being published to address incel men seriously.

Incels believed the movie Joker showed them empathy and support.
Arthur Fleck, who became the Joker, is a representative of marginalized men.
He is using violence, social unrest and riots to voice his resistance against the denial and destruction of masculinity in our society.
That is why progressives and conservatives clashed so fiercely over the film.
The progressive camp ignored the complex causes that led to the creation of the Joker and attributed the problem solely to Arthur's personal evil tendencies.
Although the conservative camp raised social structural issues, they also viewed Arthur Fleck as a bad person born with bad qualities and emphasized individual effort.


Author Simon James Copeland breaks away from this simple good-versus-evil narrative by studying "young male rage" and the violence they commit.
Why are they angry? Why do they direct that anger at women? Why are young men drawn to far-right ideologies that insist on restoring masculinity and that violence is inevitable for achieving it? By exploring these core questions, the author refutes the "toxic masculinity theory," which argues that masculinity is inherently divided into healthy and unhealthy aspects, and that today's problems are the result of the manifestation of unhealthy masculinity—violence, misogyny, dominance, and the pursuit of power.


This is because, as some people claim, even ordinary men, rather than being socially disadvantaged losers or born misogynists, feel aggrieved by reverse discrimination and sympathize with far-right ideologies in their hearts.
“Rather, they are just ordinary, boring individuals, no different from the guy next door.
They, like us, are simply trying to survive and find ways to succeed in their daily lives.
“Eichmann and men, too, are ordinary people seeking to survive in an increasingly burdensome world (albeit in a horrific way).” (p. 31) So where does their anger come from?

Is the man's situation really that bad?
Capitalism and the Crisis of Masculinity

Is the situation really that bad for men? When asked this question, men explain that they are actually being left behind in many areas of society today due to the influence of women and feminism.
Then the people in the opposing camp protest again.
There is nothing women do better than men, except replace the water purifier tank.
The author analyzes various statistics from Western society and diagnoses that a 'crisis of masculinity' has indeed arrived.
Many men score lower on academic tests than women, are less likely to attend college, and have learning disabilities more often.


Men also attempt suicide more often, die more often at work, and commit crimes and are imprisoned at a disproportionately higher rate.
Men's frustration and anger over this inequality are partially valid, and it is a problem our society needs to address.
However, the author believes that even these statistics do not fully explain the problems and sources of anger that men currently face.
Other statistics show that men occupy key positions in society after graduating from college, and the wage gap between men and women clearly exists.
The myth of the 'oppressed and wounded man' requires further exploration.


The author explores the structural causes of young men's anger from various angles.
First and most fundamentally, our socioeconomic structure and culture have dismantled traditional ideals of masculinity and manliness.
In the 20th century, our society had a narrative of idealized masculinity.
Men are pioneers, protectors who defeat enemies, supporters of families and unite in brotherhood.
However, capitalism in the late 20th century dismantled the traditional concept of work and economic security, and made labor replaceable at any time in the name of freedom.
This change in system shook the very foundations of men's life goals and direction.


The purpose of life is now money.
The author argues that this fundamental shift created the ideology of 'decorative culture'.
Decorative culture refers to a culture that encourages people to live only as decorative beings and consumers, without performing any functional role in the public sphere.
Masculinity is no longer defined as a pillar responsible for the nation and family, but rather as an individual influencer with youth, looks, charm, money, and ostentatious goods that distinguish him from others.
“Decorative culture has completely erased the social purpose and sense of belonging that the masculine mission once gave men.
“Countless men are now expected to prove their masculinity solely by consuming as much as possible on their own.” (p. 59)

These burdensome demands, which cannot be achieved through effort, have brought frustration and disillusionment to countless men.
Because men are now faced with the reality that their social role is merely that of a consumer, while in concrete reality they are still expected to fulfill the masculine mission of contributing to the nation, protecting women, and supporting the family.
As a result, countless men are confused and unsure of what it means to be a man.
The sex wars raging online, particularly between men who overreact to the discrimination they face in everyday life and women who insist that such a thing is all they're getting angry about, are rooted in this confusion.

Insecure men now believe they have lost the meaning of masculinity, and they harbor extreme anger and, to borrow Nietzsche's term, resentment against everything – "ressentiment."
The arrow is pointed at feminism and women.
Men who have a stronger desire for love and sex than anyone else and long for women to love them, but feel they lack the ability or talent to do so, become incels, believing that men and women are innately different.
Women are a race that only desires the best man who has everything, and when they realize this, they give up on love and 'go their own way.'


Angry men gather in their own communities, the so-called "Namcho" communities, and nurture resentment against women and society for not giving them what they want.
The Namcho community does provide purpose and solace to angry men.
But it is only a cheap comfort.
The messages from the male community reinforce the confirmation bias that they are being discriminated against, and only instill the illusion of self-improvement and effort, that all problems are your fault.
Men who have yet to regain their purpose in life are giving up their own lives through extreme nihilism or committing terrorism, causing great suffering to our society.

The myth of hard work and self-improvement
A fake community that provides false comfort

Men are lonely.
In a world of smartphones and social media, the proportion of face-to-face friendships is decreasing.
This phenomenon is particularly noticeable in men.
It's not ideological sympathy, but a desire for friendship and community that drives many men to join fraternal communities and far-right organizations.
In such communities, men believe they are healing from the wounds they have received from society and women.
Ironically, in these communities, men are indoctrinated with traditional masculinity to be ahead of others and disciplined, and self-improvement becomes a tool for achieving this.
Dominate others through self-improvement and become a respected and loved man! Examples include the popularity of Jordan Peterson's book "12 Rules for Life" and the admiration he receives from younger men, and the proliferation of pick-up artists who teach men a series of techniques to seduce women.

The author calls this phenomenon “cruel optimism.”
Because the more you focus on self-improvement, the more isolated you become, and the more you continue to invest time, energy, and hope in activities that actually worsen your situation.
Self-improvement discourse creates a perfect image of masculinity that most men cannot achieve, and therefore almost always ends in failure.
“Self-improvement almost always ends in failure.
This is because of not only resource constraints but also the unrealistic and unattainable expectations that self-development creates.
However, these failures are rarely discussed within the manosphere.
Because failure itself is considered unmasculine.
The moment you admit failure, it becomes a serious threat to your position and identity within the community.
“In the end, failure remains unspoken, hidden, and unexpressed.” (p. 205)

Moreover, the community of young men formed on social media is an illusion that easily disappears.
All content posted on social media platforms is used solely for the company's profitability and platform maintenance.
The author's study of posts in the Namcho community shows that deep relationships do not develop within the community.
Funny memes drown out serious texts, and conversations end with short comments.
The promises made by posts on social media telling young men that life will be better if they follow the rules and focus on self-improvement are not kept.
Young men hope that with just a little more effort, things will get better, but such hopes are never realized.
All that remains is an explosion of anger.

What can we do in the face of such immense anger?
Creating alternative narratives, not bans and exclusions.

The anger of young men becomes prey to far-right ideology, armed with extreme hatred and violence against outsiders.
Our society has experienced it firsthand.
On January 19, 2025, men dissatisfied with the court stormed the Western District Court, vandalizing court property and threatening people.
We were powerless in the face of this immense rage.
Misogyny-motivated murders are also occurring more frequently than ever.
In the author's native Australia, in April 2024, a man named Joel Couch entered a busy Bondi shopping centre in Sydney and wielded a knife, killing six people and seriously injuring several others, including a young girl.


Five of the six dead were women, and the only male victim was a security guard who tried to stop it.
Australia's federal and state governments held emergency meetings to discuss legislation aimed at curbing the extremism of young men and the rise of violence among men, but little has changed.
Because it was nothing more than a temporary measure to hastily isolate such dangerous men.
Measures to isolate men and ban male-dominated communities have led to excessive surveillance of citizens, violations of rights, oppression of minorities, and a ballooning effect for extremist groups.
Blocking doesn't solve the problem; it just shifts the problem elsewhere.


The defensive strategy against bad men has been the 'counter narrative'.
The counter narrative is 'mirroring', which is the direct reflection of the man's wrong words and actions, and an immediate rebuttal.
This is a way to counter the claim that the gender wage gap does not exist by presenting evidence that the gap actually exists, or to counter the claim that men are disadvantaged in society by showing that men still hold significant power.
Unfortunately, this kind of counter-narrative is ineffective.
Men don't change their minds.
Rather, it only strengthens hostility.
The author says that what we should pursue is an 'alternative narrative'.
Instead of arguing, encourage men to talk about the real causes of their problems and work together to solve them.
Alternative narratives are very difficult, but they start by acknowledging that men feel that way, even if we don't agree with their anger.
In fact, the research results have proven that when the "Exit Program", which aims to rescue boys who have fallen into far-right ideology, is operated with the boys in a confidential and non-judgmental manner, the boys are more likely to leave the far-right group on their own.

The author strongly argues that men's anger and discontent are not limited to gender issues.
Our society needs to improve their overall lives.
First, we need to change the way men perceive masculinity.
Gender experts should talk to young boys and help them develop positive role models and healthy relationships.
We also need to provide new forms of belonging so as not to force men into male-dominated communities.
The state and local governments must step up to enable people to meet and communicate with many people face-to-face, both online and offline.
The state has a more difficult obligation: to make institutional and policy efforts to create stable employment and reduce economic uncertainty.
It will lay the foundation for a new masculinity that weakens decorative culture and focuses on cooperation, community, and the joy of life.