Louis Theroux Needs to Make a Positive Case for Masculinity
Louis Theroux does a good job of exposing the false prophets of the manosphere, says Toby in his latest Spectator column. But after decades of feminist demonisation that drives men towards influencers like these, where is Louis’s positive case for masculinity? Here’s an excerpt.
His latest documentary, Louis Theroux: Inside the Manosphere, is an entertaining and at times disturbing watch. His diffident approach to drawing out these male social-media stars seems to throw them off balance. They sense he’s out to ‘rip’ them, not least because his reputation precedes him, but can’t work out how. They’re used to direct confrontation, expecting him to ‘come at them’, rather than to ask apparently innocent questions about their relationship with their mothers. They don’t realise he’s giving them an opportunity to condemn themselves out of their own mouths – so of course they happily oblige. …
As Louis probes his subjects about their worldview, they also turn out to be raging antisemites. One tells him the world is run by a cabal of Satanists with the Rothschilds at its heart. Louis got into trouble recently for a podcast in which he failed to criticise Bob Vylan about his “Death to the IDF” chant. But here he drops his guileless façade and tells these basement-dwellers they’re talking bollocks.
Inside the Manosphere isn’t without its faults. Louis shows selfies these braggarts have taken with Donald Trump and laps up their stories of how close they are to the US President’s inner sanctum. For once, the credulousness isn’t an act. He wants to believe it – wants to depict Trump as a product of this toxic universe – so his critical faculties desert him. Louis can be un-believably stupid about politics too.
The film would also have benefited from a bit more self-reflection. Yes, these ‘influencers’ are exhibit A in the case for banning under-16s from social media. But they’re filling a vacuum created by the unwillingness of grown-up, well-adjusted men with big media platforms – men like Louis – to make a positive case for masculinity. Successive generations of influential men have allowed the feminist demonisation of half the human race to go unchallenged, so is it any wonder aggrieved adolescent boys are turning to the manosphere? If you want them to reject these false prophets, it’s not enough to expose them – and Louis does a superb job of that. You have to offer something better.
Worth reading in full.
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But they’re filling a vacuum created by the unwillingness of grown-up, well-adjusted men with big media platforms – men like Louis – to make a positive case for masculinity.
How can someone who’s unwilling to make a positive case for masculinity be well-adjusted? Unless, of course, he knows which side his ideological bread is buttered on.
The fact is that the madleft has adopted misandry precisely because the madleft is utterly deranged. (Which is the the same reason the madleft is anti-white and anglophobic.)
The interesting thing about misandry is that, much like misogyny, it also applies to the same sex. So we know that women can demonstrate hatred and prejudice against fellow women, therefore, it stands to reason the same can apply to men demonstrating hostility and prejudice towards fellow men. I’ve mentioned it before but a classic example of this is the white men who are in charge of various organisations ( be it businesses, military, police forces etc ) who actively discriminate against fellow white men in favour of recruiting inferior quality candidates due to the fact they’re prioritising DEI because they’ve embraced the woke virus. And, no, it doesn’t matter a jot what’s happening in anyone’s HR department because, unlike what many would like to believe, an HR manager does not outrank a CEO, Chief Constable etc. These men at the helm aren’t opposing this woke garbage whatsoever when they absolutely could. Instead, they have adopted it and are promoting it. Who has a gun to their head? What if they refused? Therefore, isn’t DEI in and of itself both misandrist and racist against whites? A quick google of the definition of ‘misandry’ will get you the following, and nowhere… Read more »
Very true.
Ministers have in the past gotten themselves into trouble by making demands to the civil service officials of their departments these officials considered unreasonable.
A CEO (or military commander) cannot change procedures HR already followed before his appointment in arbitrary ways down to the last detail, not the least because he has a job of his own he needs to get done. Responsibility for this has been delegated to someone else who, in turn, delegated responsibility for the actual implementation to someone else.
All of this circles back to one indisputable fact, which only underlines my original point: the person with ultimate responsibility and authority over everybody else ( whether it be cabinet ministers or Civil Service ), the running of the country and the various laws and policies which are passed and implemented, is the Prime Minister. Only he wields the ultimate power to change existing laws, which would include abolishing DEI so that all organizations can get back to using a merit-based policy as part of their recruitment process.
By contrast, how many female PMs has the UK seen in the last century, let alone ones that could be described as feminists? All roads lead back to white men in positions of leadership screwing over the country and its populace, with very few exceptions if we stay within the context of previous prime ministers. The ones who’ve done the most notable damage ( both domestically and abroad ), in my opinion, are Blair, Johnson and Starmer.
Aside: Only parliament can change existing laws.
Apart from that, this circles back to nothing. You apparent idea of a complex hierarchical system being exclusively controlled down to lowest detail of the lowest tier by the top-level authority is so wrong that one really has to call it entirely bizarre. There’s not one master puppeteer who supremely controls the movement of everybody else who’s just a puppet. There are independently acting people everywhere who seek to implement their ideas about what the higher ups really want or should really be doing.
To use a real-world example: When I was in basic training for the German navy, there was a lieutenant who was the highest officer in our training unit. But he had no real world influence or control over how I had to arrange stuff in my locker. This had to happen according to what the petty officer leading our group wanted and/or was willing to tolerate.
What is ”entirely bizarre” about stating fact? The HR departments of any organization are obligated to adhere to all the laws and legislation around employment, including the Equality Act. HR does not operate within a vacuum, completely independent from the authority of the CEO, therefore what sex these HR workers happen to be is totally irrelevant. It isn’t some sort of collective feminist vendetta against the male sex fuelled by toxic femininity and progressiveness. All of this DEI discriminatory nonsense stems from the Equality Act, and who creates the laws and makes subsequent amendments to them over the years? DEI is like a baton passed from government to government, no matter which party is in charge. It’s government that is the real threat to white men in the UK. Not feminists, not women, not ‘BAME’ people or immigrants, but those that sit in power, who have the ability to repeal laws but choose not to. The only way the vicious cycle can ever be broken is if a radically different ( read: anti-woke ) government wins the next election. As you may recall, Suella Braverman recently had this to say. So it looks like all the eggs are in the… Read more »
I didn’t write anything about the sex of HR workers, just about the misconception that they guy who’s at the boss level of a hierarchy has detailed control of everything anybody below him does. In reality, he’s the guy giving orders to the second level guys about what they’re generally supposed to achieve. Which then set forth to accomplish it in whichever way they believe to be most sensible.
Eg, the CEO of a manufacturing company cannot just walk into the factory and tell the assembly line workers how exactly they’re supposed to to their jobs. The reason for this is two-fold:
The same goes for hiring decisions: The company wll have specialists for that who are supposed to know the applicable regulations and who are responsible for interpreting them in whichever way they deem best to get their job done.
As the HR guy who wrote a few articles here in the past pointed out: The Equality Act actually prohibits so-called positive discrimination. But people are doing it nevertheless and that’s the problem. Governments issueing paper decrees won’t change that.
Oh give over with this “manosphere” cobblers will you. I have no idea what this thing is, I am a man and I am not part of any sphere or represented by anyone other than myself, and if there are people talking bollocks on the internet or anywhere else (who knew?) I am capable of spotting it myself and I don’t need Louis Theroux to explain anything to me.
Is a dropdown oaf the opposite of a pickup artist?
I can’t help thinking that these manospherists would be much less generally known if the feminispherists wouldn’t constantly make such an awful fuss about them, that is, constanty amplify manospherist self-marketing. I’d certainly never heard about any of them otherwise.
Apart from that, teenagers I see in Reading seem to be pretty normal: The male tracksuits make a nuisance of themselve by staging mock fights and other showy “manliness acts” in public in order to impress the female tracksuits they’re chasing. The female tracksuits are duly impressed and seem to like the attention. No neurotic retreats to a manosphere here.
Agree 100% and your experience mirrors mine.