My cousin Shawn used to be normal. funny. A little strange, perhaps, but kind. The kind of guy who will help you move forward. Who remembers your birthday? Who was really nice to be around.
Then they broke up. Started spending more time online. And gradually, over the course of about eighteen months, he became a person I did not recognize.
It started with YouTube videos about self-improvement. Productivity. Fitness. Quite innocent.
But the algorithm didn’t stop there. It showed him videos on why modern women don’t appreciate good men. Why is society harsh against people like him? Why is everything he’s struggling with someone else’s fault?
And he saw them. Because he was alone. And these videos made him feel seen. understood. Part of something.
Last Thanksgiving, he talked about how women are biologically incapable of fidelity. Used words I had only seen in the darkest corners of the internet. He talked about “female nature” as if he was explaining a scientific fact.
And when I pushed back, he looked at me as if I had been brainwashed.
This is what is happening to millions of men right now. They are alone. isolated. struggling. And the algorithm is giving them a worldview that makes them lonelier, angrier, and more isolated. Not because it helps them. Because it keeps them clicking.
Here’s how online algorithms are distorting men’s minds.
1. They are turning loneliness into something to be exploited
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Men are alone. This is real. There has been a decline in male friendship. Isolation has increased. The connection is hard to find.
And instead of helping, the algorithm monetizes it.
It doesn’t provide content about how to make real friendships or connect with people. It serves material that tells lonely men that their loneliness is someone else’s fault. Women’s mistake. Society’s mistake. Feminism’s mistake.
Because anger keeps people stuck longer than real solutions do.
Research on algorithmic content recommendation found that platforms that prioritize engagement over well-being systematically increase emotionally charged content, particularly content that externalizes blame and creates in-group/out-group dynamics.
The algorithm doesn’t care if men become less lonely. It doesn’t matter if they keep watching. And the content that keeps them watching is not the content that helps them.
2. They’re creating echo chambers
A man watches a video about feeling neglected by women. The algorithm watches the engagement and provides ten more services.
He comments. Other men comment. They all agree with each other. Share similar experiences. Validate each other’s frustrations.
And it feels like a community. Like he has found his people. Like finally, someone understands.
But this is not a community. It is an echo chamber designed to keep it inside the stage.
Real community challenges you. Presents different viewpoints. Helps you grow. But the algorithm does not want evolution. It wants retention.
So it creates these sealed spaces where men reinforce each other’s worst beliefs. Where disagreement is considered betrayal. Where anyone who questions the narrative is dismissed as brainwashed.
And the longer they stay in the echo chamber, the harder it will be to hear anything else.
3. They are normalizing extreme views
The first video is light. “Why Modern Dating Is Hard for Men.” Fair enough. That is worthy of discussion.
But the algorithm doesn’t stop there. It increases gradually.
Next Video: “Why Women Only Want the Top 20% of Men.”
Then: “Why women are incapable of loving unconditionally.”
Then: “Why is the modern woman your enemy?”
Each video is a little more extreme than the last. But because they are served slowly, it doesn’t seem radical. It seems like a natural progression of that idea.
Studies on pathways to radicalization show that gradual exposure to increasingly extreme material normalizes beliefs that would be rejected if presented suddenly. Incremental growth bypasses critical thinking by presenting extremism as a logical extension.
And within a matter of months, a man who started out frustrated with dating is now using incel terminology and actually believes that women are biologically inferior.
He is not a bad person. The algorithm slowly took him there, one video at a time.
4. They are replacing real relationships with parasocial relationships
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He is watching content from the same creators for hours. To hear them talk about their lives. His philosophy. His advice.
And it starts to feel like friendship. As if these people knew him. Understand him. Are in his favor.
But they are not his friends. They are content creators who have made money from her loneliness.
And the more time he spends in these antisocial relationships – feeling attached to people who don’t know he exists – the less he becomes able to form real relationships.
Real relationships suck. They require vulnerability, compromise, and effort. But parasocial relationships are easier. They don’t challenge you. They don’t ask for anything from you except your attention.
And the algorithm knows this. It knows that if it can replace real human connection with endless content consumption, its user is in for life.
5. They’re teaching men that women are the problem
He is alone. dissected. Struggling to build relationships.
And the algorithm tells him: It’s women’s fault. They are very picky. Very shallow. Very influenced by feminism. Focused too much on the wrong things.
Instead of learning how to connect—how to be vulnerable, interesting, emotionally available—he learns to resent.
He watches videos about female hypergamy, biological imperatives, and sexual market value. And all this pseudo-scientific language rationalizes his anger.
Research on gender-based online communities found that platforms that promote gender-essentialist content substantially increase users’ hostile attitudes toward women, while reducing their motivation to develop interpersonal skills or seek therapy.
And the scary part? His loneliness is not decreasing. she’s annoying.
The algorithm does not solve his loneliness. It just gives him someone to blame for it.
6. They are glorifying violence as the answer
Content starts from desperation. Venting. Complaining about how unfair things are.
But it doesn’t stay there. It grows. And eventually, it begins to make violence understandable. Justified. Brave too.
They do not explicitly call men to commit violence. They are much smarter than that. Instead, they romanticize the men who did it. They analyze the manifestos. They discuss “what drove him to do it” with sympathy rather than fear.
They create this narrative where violence becomes the logical endpoint. Where it is presented as what happens when men are pushed too far. When they are ignored, rejected, dismissed.
And they condemn the individuals who committed these acts not as criminals, but as martyrs. Cautionary tales. Proof of what society does to men who don’t conform.
Online research on violent radicalization shows that repeated exposure to content that rationalizes or glorifies violence increases acceptance of violent ideology and reduces perceptions of violent acts as inappropriate.
Most men will not act on this. But algorithms are creating a worldview where violence isn’t shocking – it’s sympathetic. Where mass shootings occur are not monsters – they are tragic individuals whom society has failed.
And that change in perception? that’s dangerous. Even for men who are never violent themselves.
7. They’re destroying their ability to talk to women
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He has consumed so much material about how to “read” women, how to “decode” female behavior, how to “understand” what they are “really” saying, that he can no longer talk to a woman normally.
Every conversation becomes a test. Each sentence is analyzed for hidden meaning. Every smile is a game she is playing. Every rejection is a power move.
They came to know that women were protesting. Testing it. And they have to pass these tests to earn their respect.
That’s why he is not present in the conversation. He is strategizing, running scripts learned from content creators, treating human interaction like a game whose rules he has been taught.
But real people don’t follow those rules. And when reality doesn’t match the algorithm’s version, it doesn’t adjust. That gets doubled. Admittedly she was lying. playing games. To be clever.
He can’t work with women. Can’t be friends with them. Can’t date them. Because the algorithm has taught him to see enemies and strategists instead of people.
And the separation that is created sends it back to the algorithm. Joe tells him that this proves he was right all along.
8. They are explaining to him that it is futile to fix himself
Some content starts with self-improvement. work out. Build skills. Develop self-confidence.
But it doesn’t stay there. Because self-improvement content has a natural endpoint. You make improvements, and you no longer need the material.
That’s when the algorithm rotates. This tells him that self-improvement is not enough. That the game is rigged. No matter how much he improves, the system stands against him.
It is called the “black pill”. The idea that trying is futile. Nothing you do will make a difference because the root problem isn’t you – it’s society, biology, women, whatever.
And once he gets there, once he’s convinced the effort is futile, he gets stuck consuming content that confirms his despair.
Because frustrated users don’t leave. They don’t build a life and log off. They live. Watching. To click. Feeding the algorithm.
I don’t know how to get Shawn back. In every conversation we have, he retorts to some video he has watched. The algorithm has created an entire worldview for him.
And the worst part? He thinks he is the one who sees clearly. That I am the one who has been brainwashed. Now he’s so into it that I don’t know how to reach him.
This is happening with millions of men right now. Because they are alone. And loneliness makes you insecure. And the algorithm knows exactly how to exploit that vulnerability for profit.
I don’t have any solution. All I know is that we need to start seeing it for what it is: not men who choose to live this way, but men who are being radicalized by systems designed to keep them addicted, angry, and isolated.
