Rothermel, A.-K. (2023). The role of evidence-based misogyny in antifeminist online communities of the ‘manosphere.’ Big Data & Society, 10(1)

Link: https://doi.org/10.1177/20539517221145671

Open access: Yes

Notes: Violence in digital platforms—and primarily when related to misogyny—is often associated with an impulse of keeping in place a power structure. That is, those who enact violence do so because they think that it is the best way to keep their societal power. In this commentary, Rothermel explores evidence-based misogyny as a strategy to sustain male supremacist worldviews. By drawing on various case studies, Rothermel shows how those belonging to the manosphere either fabricate or decontextualize facts to justify, maintain, and expand their harmful discourses against women—who they see as inferior in their imagined societal hierarchy. Through this discursive movement, those in the manosphere aim to situate themselves both as holders of the truth not allowed by those in power and as champions of the conservative status quo that places men on top. As Rothermel argues: “evidence-based misogyny not only helps to solidify and legitimize the collective identity of the male supremacist subculture in the manosphere, but also provides a pathway for male supremacist discourses towards both mainstream public conservative standpoints as well as other extreme Far-Right narratives” (p. 2).

Abstract: In recent years, there have been a growing number of online and offline attacks linked to a loosely connected network of misogynist and antifeminist online communities called ‘the manosphere’. Since 2016, the ideas spread among and by groups of the manosphere have also become more closely aligned with those of other Far-Right online networks. In this commentary, I explore the role of what I term ‘evidence-based misogyny’ for mobilization and radicalization into the antifeminist and misogynist subcultures of the manosphere. Evidence-based misogyny is a discursive strategy, whereby members of the manosphere refer to (and misinterpret) knowledge in the form of statistics, studies, news items and pop-culture and mimic accepted methods of knowledge presentation to support their essentializing, polarizing views about gender relations in society. Evidence-based misogyny is a core aspect for manosphere-related mobilization as it provides a false sense of authority and forges a collective identity, which is framed as a supposed ‘alternative’ to mainstream gender knowledge. Due to its core function to justify and confirm the misogynist sentiments of users, evidence-based misogyny serves as connector between the manosphere and both mainstream conservative as well as other Far-Right and conspiratorial discourses.