24-April-26
THE FEMOSPHERE AND THE MANOSPHERE: SAME NARCISSIST, DIFFERENT AUDIENCE
I set aside my novel to write about something I went through in my twenties — something profoundly deluded, but which I’m seeing gain traction today.
Over twenty-five years as a hairdresser and barber, I had thousands of conversations with strangers — many of them profound. I coiffed Dublin’s locks for years, from working-class women to supermodels, then shifted to London where, as a barber in the public area of BBC Bush House on The Strand, I trimmed the heads of bankers, politicians and lawyers. The British Queen’s personal priest was a regular of mine.
Working first around predominantly women, then men, gave me a wide view of people. How they appear is often not who they are. Most of us are decent, or can be teased into remembering our decency without much arm twisting. Whether I was working in Dublin or London, I found that 95% of people hold strong opinions and can be reasoned with. They want to be reasoned with — because nobody wants to live in permanent anger, bitterness or unease. We want resolution.
But back then, I wasn’t one of them.
I pushed boundaries. I was expected to work on a building site like my dad; instead I took a job as a hairdresser to demonstrate that strength could look different. Choosing your own path despite what people say. I left that job, but the point I was making stayed with me.
At twenty-six, after five years in London, I went home to Dublin. I was burnt out from years of non-stop work and partying, compounded by significant family difficulties. That year, I lay in bed depressed, unable to hold down a job, thinking obsessively about the future.
Fast forward a few months to when I’m making my comeback. I’m still depressed, but I’m making plans for when I’m not. I start thinking: I could make money helping people who haven’t yet been through everything I’ve overcome. The idea stuck around for about a year afterwards. I pictured myself in a room full of young men, sitting in the hot seat, just talking. These men were all lost in life; they needed a friend who wasn’t closed off, someone the world might call ‘toxic’ today. They paid me a lot of money not to feel so lost.
I saw myself as a kind of guru. White robe. Grey beard. Probably a cane.
It was laughable — someone depressed and directionless, guiding others through life.
Fast forward fifteen years, and the internet is awash with YouTubers and amateur gurus doing exactly what my depressed self once visualised.
Looking back, I was trying to help myself.
If we look around and see so many lost and lonely people, it’s often a reflection of our own state. Humans mirror. When we bond, we aren’t always aware of our expressions or body language and how that creates a feedback loop in others. We can feel fine and still look sad or lonely because someone near us is carrying it. We are social creatures.
What I see now is a whole generation of people — capable, smart, outgoing — with deeply toxic attitudes. Mainly toward the opposite sex. And this did not happen naturally.
We live in an era where anyone can pick up a camera, talk into it and become enormously influential. I’ll keep this generic and avoid names, as that tends to be divisive. It became very easy for a narcissist with a bad relationship history and a camera to construct a convincing case for why the opposite sex is the problem. Whether that person came from the Manosphere or from feminism (what some are now calling the Femosphere).
There’s been a lot of talk about both groups. The Manosphere is broadly considered toxic and hateful, while feminism still gets the benefit of the doubt. But is it still feminism? And is the Manosphere just a collection of men who reject equality?
In my experience, people use hot topics to vent frustration with other aspects of their life. I know that I release little social clashes by screaming at the football on TV. I can only assume it works similarly for women. Perhaps for all of us it is the same frustration. Not with each other’s mechanism per se but with the parts of each other’s machine. The cogs must be modified before they can slot together and work as one engine.
Metaphors aside, one group has fed the other, in my view. I think it all stemmed from a perfect storm back in the early days of the internet, just when society had finally shed the social fabric in favour of neoliberal values; during the rise of YouTube (pre-censorship, roughly 2007–2015); and a surge in depression among younger demographics due to social media.
I see my old self in many of the lead figures in both movements. Had I followed through on that plan, I’d have been called an influencer. But isn’t portraying yourself as a saviour the move of a charlatan? And isn’t trafficking in polarising views the antithesis of genuine help, given that we must all live in harmony or pay the price? Isn’t that a fake guru?
Modern feminist and Manosphere influencers operate like cult leaders but get away with it because we dress them up as ordinary people who are just mouthpieces for what everyone is thinking. But they really only represent the worst aspects of those opinions — they are mechanics tinkering with the machine, trying to fix it. Yet, when you open your eyes, you realise the machine pays out more whenever it breaks down.
That old saying: there’s no profit in peace.
The Femosphere grew out of feminism. The Manosphere is a reaction to this shift. Its adherents find it threatening, as if women are encroaching on their territory. Feminism pushed back. Hard. It demonised the whole male realm through social media, amplifying young women’s empathy and emotional sensitivity to do it.
But it contradicts the self-image of strength and independence to selectively protest men’s insensitivity to border disputes — citing children dying — while other wars and genocides go unremarked by that same demographic. The contradiction is evidence of influence at work.
Influencer is a soft word. It deflects from its predatory nature. It’s a “gonna start a revolution from my bed” kind of plan, but with a narcissist at the helm. If these movements genuinely cared about the young people they influence, they’d build more level-headed, far-reaching platforms — ones the opposite sex might also listen to. Instead, they profit from straw-man arguments, with a view to dividing us. And we need to call it what it is.
Offline, I have been part of a quiet movement to expose these charlatans. Someone who wants you to switch off the internet. Pick up any novel written by the opposite sex and discover (or remember) our similarities. Go outside and see with your own eyes. Talk to people. That’s where things change — for everyone. Not just one side while the other loses and narcissistic fake gurus make a killing.