Toxic Feminists Should Look in the Mirror Before Blaming Podcast Bros for the World’s Problems
The media loves to act shocked, horrified, and dumbfounded every time some new “manosphere” influencer blows up online.
They write these dramatic, lengthy pieces about misogyny, toxic masculinity, male rage, online radicalization, and all the usual scary leftwing buzzwords. Then they start trotting out the experts, blame Elon’s algorithm, blame Andrew Tate, blame podcasts in general, blame social media, and yet somehow, they miraculously never land on the most obvious person to blame…
Feminists.
Why are so many young men tuning into podcast bros in the first place?
That’s the million-dollar question feminists never ask.
Maybe it’s because the answer points right back at them.
Because when you spend a decade or so telling men they’re toxic, unnecessary, privileged, emotionally stunted, dangerous, and basically the root of all evil and the reason for every problem in society, some of those guys will wise up and go looking for support and empowerment elsewhere.
So, this “demand” for male voices and podcast bros didn’t just appear out of nowhere for some mysterious, unknown reason.
The BBC has this big new piece about the so-called scary rise of global manosphere influencers, and of course, the framing is about how dangerous and harmful these voices are. But as usual, the lede is buried deep inside the article, and it tells a much more interesting and truthful story.
It turns out that young men aren’t just out there looking for hate…
They’re looking for respect, confidence, purpose, strong male figures, discipline, and some explanation for why today’s society cares about everybody’s struggles except theirs.
The article kicks things off by focusing on Luis Castilleja, better known as “El Temach.” He’s a massive Latin American manosphere influencer with over 11 million followers.
Of course, the BBC treats his rise to podcast-bro fame like some radical transformation from liberal creative to toxic-masculinity goblin. But the fly in the BBC’s ointment is that his own sister says he started out wanting to help young men feel valuable.
The idea that all “podcast bros” are just sitting around spewing hate is absurd. A lot of them are thriving because they’re offering young men something the modern feminist machine has spent years refusing to give them: understanding, encouragement, and the basic message that they actually matter.
That sentiment is a key tenet of El Temach’s messaging – but he did not always hold these views, according to his sister Alex.
He grew up wanting to be a performer, she says, and after studying theatre in Mexico City, moved to LA to pursue his dream of becoming an actor.
But he returned home a couple of years later, she says, after a break-up and failure to book regular work. These setbacks motivated him to help other young men navigate difficult experiences, she says, and he began in 2020 to post content focused on male self-development.
“I think at the beginning it was very noble how he wanted to help other men to feel worthy and valuable, and that’s how he started,” Alex says.
Feminists can hate the messenger all they want. But they should probably ask why the message found such a massive audience, right?
The BBC eventually inches a bit closer to the real issue when it talks to men outside one of El Temach’s shows.
As usual, the article wants its readers to focus on the scary stuff. But the truth is that men just like that talk about confidence, discipline, and self-improvement, and he understands that men are being dismissed by society.
BBC:
One group of men we spoke to outside El Temach’s Las Vegas show told us what they liked about his content – that he encourages discipline, inspires them to find self-confidence, and acknowledges their problems.
“He focuses a lot on men as having been dismissed by society, and [the narrative that] women have, you know, been the stars of the show,” says Dr Ali Siles, gender and masculinities researcher at the National Autonomous University of Mexico.
“He has this message of: ‘You do matter, believe in yourself.’”
And this is what fan Julián says he likes about the influencer too. “The teaching that impacted me the most was about feeling confident.”
Women have spent so much time making every conversation about themselves that when a guy simply says, “What about me?” it’s treated like some apocalyptic nightmare.
So, if the only voices willing to tell young men they matter are manosphere influencers, then feminists shouldn’t be surprised when those podcast bros blow up.
You can’t starve men of respect and then panic when they go looking for it somewhere else.
A lot of young men genuinely (and correctly) believe women’s “equality” efforts have gone way too far, and that they’re the ones being discriminated against.
BBC:
Many of Julián’s generation believe that feminism has come at the cost of men’s rights, according to a recent global survey of 23,000 men and women by King’s College London. More than half of Gen Z men – some 57% – agreed with the statement: “We have gone so far in promoting women’s equality that we are discriminating against men.”
It’s a belief that manosphere influencers are tapping into. According to these influencers, “women are the problem,” says Awino Okech, at The School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in London.
Their belief, says the professor of feminist and security studies, is “it’s this gender equality thing that is leading to boys underperforming… It’s gender equality that is leading to mental problems for men and boys.”
Wow. More than half of Gen Z men are fighting back. Not with abuse or hate, but with brotherhood.
The BBC article also follows a Kenyan university student named Ryan, who watches Andrew Kibe videos and describes him as a “father figure.”
A lot of young men aren’t just looking for politics. They’re looking for guidance.
And when mainstream culture treats masculinity and being “male” like a disease, someone will eventually step in and offer them a cure.
BBC:
Kenyan university student Ryan, who follows the videos of Andrew Kibe, says as a young man raised by a single mother, he views the influencer as a surrogate father figure.
Using analytical tools developed by the University of Queensland, we found Ryan had watched videos on TikTok from Kibe – whose hashtag has attracted more than 500 million views – after searching for terms such as “success”, “self-improvement” and “masculinity tips with no father”.
But Siles says manosphere content tends to come “at the expense of” women and other gender identities.
“It’s very harmful to women’s rights and development, because it’s also trying to put them back in places a lot of them have been trying to get out of, with limited choices, with very stereotypical roles.”
Even when the story is about fatherless young men looking for direction, the conversation still gets yanked right back to women’s rights. God forbid anybody lingers too long on what happens to boys when fathers are missing…
Of course these male influencers are rising. They found the forgotten man and offered him a place to belong.
And we get it, many of these manosphere guys are obviously not perfect role models. Some of them say dumb things, push too far, or lean into outrage because outrage pays. But what exactly did feminists expect would happen after years of trying to neuter, shame, and dismantle every mainstream masculine role model young men once looked up to?
And if feminism created a world where young men feel invisible, then feminists should spend a little more time looking in the mirror. The answer they’re hunting for is staring right back at them.