Meaning of incel | Babel Free

Definitions

1. A member of an online subculture of people (mostly men) who define themselves as unable to find a romantic or sexual partner despite desiring one.
   countable, uncountable
2. An individual who is not sexually active despite having such a desire.
   countable, uncountable
3. A misogynistic man, with the implication that his misogyny makes him undesirable to potential partners, thus limiting his romantic and/or sexual prospects.
   countable, derogatory, uncountable
4. "Involuntary celibacy": the state of being not sexually active despite wishing to be.
   informal, uncountable

Equivalents

Examples

“Though, involuntary celibates (or incels) shouldn't try to rationalize a dateless season or pass off sexual awkwardness as virtue; […]”

“It is not clear when the term incels was coined, but the link between misogyny and violence against women has emerged on sites where incel communities gather.”

“The incel ideology has already inspired the murders of at least sixteen people. Elliot Rodger, in 2014, in Isla Vista, California, killed six and injured fourteen in an attempt to instigate a “War on Women” for “depriving me of sex.””

“The framing of inceldom as an “adverse life circumstance”, repeated across the Wiki, lends credibility to the framing used by incels who wish to dissociate themselves from the common descriptions of incels as a ‘movement’, ‘ideology’ or ‘community’. […] This report finds that the Wiki is a site of attempts to divorce the concept of being an incel from believing in the blackpill, and we argue that this is intended as a means of both expanding the category of incels to make them politically relevant, and dissociating the label ‘incel’ from violent misogyny.”

“Online forums dedicated to incel culture are a reliable way to see how the term evolved and is used today. A subreddit, or forum on Reddit, called r/incels was one of the most visible meeting places for self-identified incels until it was banned by Reddit in 2017 for “violent content.””

“Another study by Donnelly of seventy-seven incels in marriages or long-term relationships in the Journal of Marriage and Family used a web-based questionnaire to ask people why they stayed in their sexless relationships (defined in this case as no sex for six months).”

CEFR level