The Toronto van attack has brought attention to a community of men who are involuntarily celibate and are known as “incels.” These men express their anger online about the absence of sexual relationships in their lives. They also commonly blame women for their lack of sexual encounters.
Alek Minassian is suspected of killing 10 people with his van on Monday. Fourteen people are still being treated in the hospital, and Minassian has been charged with 10 counts of first-degree murder and 13 counts of attempted murder. The majority of the victims in the attack were women, reported CBC.
Minassian purportedly posted a message on Facebook just minutes before he began his rampage in Toronto’s north end, which has since been deleted, that read: “Private (Recruit) Minassian Infantry 00010, wishing to speak to Sgt 4chan please. C23249161. The Incel Rebellion has already begun! We will overthrow all the Chads and Stacys. All hail the Supreme Gentleman Elliot Rodger!”
The Incel community is linked to the alt-right movement, which is known for being misogynistic and homophobic, according to CBC. They use the term “Chad” for men who are good looking and successful with women. “Stacy” is the name for women who reject men.
Elliot Rodger was a 22-year-old man who killed six people and injured 12 more in California in 2014. He posted numerous YouTube videos and wrote a 140-page manifesto in which he denounced women and was angry that he was still a virgin while in college.
This year, the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) started tracking male supremacy because “these groups consistently denigrate and dehumanize women, often including advocating physical and sexual violence against them. On the internet, the male supremacist ideology takes a few different forms. One of the newest forms is ‘incel.’”
Incels believe sex is a basic human right for men, and they think the women who deny them that right deserves to be punished. SPLC has noticed that many incels are celebrating the Toronto van attack.
Maxime Fiset of the Centre for the Prevention of Radicalization Leading to Violence told CBC that most people who are members of incel groups are not violent. However, online forums can radicalize people, who collectively rage against society and women.
In November 2017, Reddit banned a thread, “r/Incels,” which had 40,000 members, because it contained content that promoted violence.
One active forum for incels can be found here. Several of the threads are disturbing, with topics including: “The blood of victims of terror attacks is on the hands of females,” “It’s disgusting how easy women have it,” and “If you are a girl realize this: you could’ve prevented this, 10 lives = 5 minutes of your inconvenience.”
A Canadian woman named Alana is credited with coining the term “incels.” She told Elle magazine in 2016 that she created it to describe someone who doesn’t fit the conventional, societal norms of sexual relationships. Her hope was to “create a movement that was open to anybody and everybody.”
Incel terminology deciphered: (source via this Reddit thread):
Volcel: voluntarily celibate
Fakecel: someone impersonating an incel
Trucel: A person who meets their requirements to be an Incel
Beta: a weak man in their eyes, one who just often just treats women as people.
Femoid/FHO(female human organism)/femrroid: all dehumanizing terms for women
Chad: A impossibly hot and handsome guy that according to them gets everything in life handed to them. Chad is the Caucasian version, Tyrone is the black version.
Stacy: a hot girl who gets everything and spreads her legs open for everyone. Extremely vapid and shallow
Normie: someone who isn’t a Chad or a Stacy.
White-knight: A guy who comes to a woman’s aid for any reason. (Ex. A woman gets attacked by a someone and a man steps in, he’s a white knight.
Cuck/cuckolding: It can be a verb, an adjective, a noun. Full history and definitions
Roastie: derogatory term for women, can be any woman but meant for sexually promiscuous women under either the misconception, ignorance, or trolling of woman’s anatomy.
Adding -cel as a suffix to any word becomes a descriptor of why they believe they’re incel or how they’re “coping” with it.
