Last Tuesday, during International Women’s Week, a speaker, Jay Marquis-Manicom, came to talk to us about his thesis, “From the Red Pill to ‘White Genocide'”. He talked about the Alt-Right and online male supremacism groups such as the Red Pill.

All of these groups support anti femininity. They basically want men to be superior than than women in every possible aspect. They all the praise the stereotypical white male, and for them just as Kimmel said, “to be a man is to be unlike a woman”. They need to prove within their peers that they are more masculine than them. They show no emotions, since it is seen as a feminine trait, talk about their sexual conquests, and how to create a white supremest environment where women are less than men. The only emotion that men are allowed to show is anger since it is considered manly. However, Jay Marquis-Manicom believes that this is a reason that the Alt-Right community won’t be successful. Since they are always angry they get into fights, leading difficulties figuring out how to achieve their goals. On top of this, they are lacking funding which makes it very hard to be successful.

The speaker also talked about an uprising online community known as “The Red Pill” This online society has the same basic values as any male supremacist groups. They believe women are evil by nature. They are born evil. According to them women are nothing but bad and they should only be used for what advantages men. For example, taking care of children and pleasing their sexual desires.

On Tuesday, March 3, we all attended Jay Marquis-Manicom’s talk about his thesis entitled “From the White Pill to ‘White Genocide’: An Ethnography of the Alt-Right in Montreal.

The first thing from his talk that really stood out to me was that the men that are apart of this group look like typical well educated white males. This gave me the idea that really any white man that I see walking on the street could be apart of one of these groups and that there isn’t really anything that would allow me to know that mans beliefs. For the most part, I find this frightening because just as much as it could be any man, it could also be a man that I know or whom I look up to. When thinking of this, I also thought about the fourth episode of “Man Enough” which we viewed in class a few weeks back. In this episode it was explained how most women and men have gone through some sort of sexual abuse or have done some acts of sexual abuse. Many ordinary people have gone through it, but you cannot tell by the outside of a person or what the person will allow you to know about them to see it. Its the same concept with the men that are apart of the Alt-Right group and victims of sexual abuse, these are not things that are discussed openly, therefore do we really know anyone entirely?

Secondly, he explained how Alt-Right groups are against the rights of woman, how they are against the concept of women being equal to men. This means that woman shouldn’t have the right to vote, lower salaries and other things. There ideas were more based on traditional values that are no longer appropriate in any way. This concept in my opinion is unacceptable due to the fact that we are in 2020 and applying such a concept would cause complete chaos. Most importantly, us women shouldn’t be valued as less because we now play a major role in society and are just as well educated as men, therefore we should not be treated as anything else. When thinking about this idea, I referred back to the text “Masculinity” that we read. In the text by Michael Kimmel, it is said, “Institutions accomplish the creation of gender difference and the reproduction of gender order through several gendered processes”, this means that institutions are responsible for teaching us gender differences. Gender differences that are taught can be a cause for the creation of these Alt-Right groups, they are taught about certain ideas that are taught by institutions, so institutions are responsible for the creation of Alt-Right groups in a way because ideas must originate from somewhere. To solve some of the issues with these groups, we must look into the issues and flaws in our institutions that push some of their ideological beliefs.

In conclusion, there were many things that stood out in Jay’s talk about the Alt-Right group which he studied. The things that caught the eye the most are that these men are really just typical white men that we see everyday and that a reason that we have such groups is because of issues within our institutions. These groups are a product of our own mistakes, we should try to fix the flaws in out institutions to prevent the creation of these kinds of groups.

On March 3, we were fortunate enough to listen to Jay Marquis-Manicom to talk about his thesis entitled “From the Red Pill to ‘White Genocide’: An Ethnography of the Alt-Right in Montreal.” He presented his experiences by surrounding himself with a group of men that have similar ideas: A group of white supremacist who hold antifeminine ideologies called The Alt-Right.

One thing that stood out to me during his presentation was when he said that the Alt-Right people are normal looking people. It shook me because we typically view them as drug addicts with tattoos all over their body, but to know that their looks are similar to ours is honestly alarming because we may not be able to distiguish them in our daily lives. They might look normal but its their loneliness that makes them change their ideologogy. Jay said that they often lack a sense of belonging which results in joining a group and this causes them to change their views on certain things. In the text “Masculinity” by Kimmel, he stated that “each of these people is deeply affected by the gender norms and power arrangements of their society.” They may at first have a positive view on women but by joining a group like Alt-Right, it forces them to change it and become brainwashed into thinking that men are superior and that women has no values in the society just to fit in the group.

Moreover, Jay also talked about the Red Pill, a place where men can discuss their hate towards women. Sexual conquest is one of their topics in the Red Pill. In Killmartin’s text “defining men study”, he stated that “Men gain status by being successful in all that they do especially in sport, work, and sexual “conquest”. So by bragging on having sexual intercourse on the The Red Pill, they feel powerful and earn other mens respect. They are ranked higher than other men to the point where others asks them advices on how to get a women to sleep with them.

As of the late 20th century, the equality and equity between men and women have progressed. Although we don’t hear it much often, a big community of an all-men group has been formed to create a movement which goes against the dominant culture. A week ago, Jay Marquis-Manicom gave us a visit and told us about his observation as he was disguising himself as part of the Alt-Right in Montreal, which is a part of his thesis entitled “From the Red Pill to ‘White Genocide’: An Ethnography of the Alt-Right in Montreal.”

First of all, I must say that Jay Marquis-Manicom was quite brave to be able to withstand being in a community that goes against his own beliefs. As he was explaining that the Alt-Right was quite strict when it comes to masculinity, he mentioned the term biological determinism, which means that if you are born male, you should act like one. This have reminded me of the reading on Kimmel’s definition of masculinities, as it was explained how “the evolutionary processes produce two distinct categories of humans, one that represents the traditional masculinity and another that is more passive and submissive”. Furthermore, in this same reading it was scientifically proven that biologically, male are superior than women. The Alt-Right community are good examples of those who has a hegemonic definition of masculinity, as they are rejecting all the feminine traits. We can also associate them as Anti-femininity, men in a box. (Ch.1 p.5)

Lastly, as the guest explained how the red pill promotes masculine norms and are against gay marriage, I assume that they are indeed homophobic. “Homophobia is the fear that other men will unmask us, emasculate us, reveal to us and the world that we measure up, that we are not real men” ( Ch. 24: Masculinity as Homophobia, p,147). I believe that people in the Alt-Right fears each other which is another way of defining homophobia.

In conclusion, I admire Jay Marquis-Malicom for his effort and risks so that we can raise the awareness of how men can be in need of special help sometimes.

 Listening to Jay Marquis-Manicom talk about his thesis entitled “From the Red Pill to ‘White Genocide’: An Ethnography of the Alt-Right in Montreal.” was pretty interesting and he brought up many important topics that needs to be discussed a lot more in today’s day and age. To find concrete material for his thesis, he “hung out” with a couple of people who believe that while male supremacy is their ideal society. Also known as the Alt-Right.

During his presentation he explains one of the four key concepts that the Alt-Right follow: their philosophy. He basically stated that these men do not know how to be men and are anti-feminists. Like in “Defining Men’s Studies”, these people are described as individuals who submit to society’s definition of a man being that you have to “dominate”. From the Alt-Right’s perspective, they basically join dominance and anti-femininity to describe their Utopian or ideal society. Furthermore, these men only correspond through this white male supremacy movement and do not connect on an emotional level. Just like Kilmartin said, some friendships are activity based and provide no real growth relationship-wise like how an emotional-based one does because they reveal their true feelings, but creating that kind of relationship between these men is going to be impossible if they keep seeing that showing emotion is a sign of weakness and not “stoicism”.

Another strong point that Jay Marquis-Manicom is how they are mostly composed of millennial men and that they are the “techy” generation meaning that they were good with technology. Most millennial men are regarded, as kids, as people who stay behind their computer playing with other people online and talking to people online, who are a lot of the time only males, and not face-to-face. This reminds me of the part in “Defining Men’s Studies” where they talk about how some people talk to their peers side-by-side and not face-to-face” because they feel more comfortable that way. And that millennial behavior is very similar because they don’t meet in person and they are activity-based relationships most of the time. Moreover, since the demographic of the Alt-Right being all male also reminds me that Kilmartin mentions that, at a very young age, you start spending more time with the same sex rather than the opposite. Since males grow up with the idea made by society that a man should be dominant and show no emotion and that females are basically the opposite, they aren’t afraid to show their feelings, it might explain why they develop these anti-feminine ideas and why women have an upper-hand when it comes to communication.

Another good point was when he mentions that people join because they are lonely and are searching for their “identity”. From my perspective, I’m just guessing that these men are just looking for someone to talk to, but are scared to talk to open up, so they look for people in the search of the same thing but in the end they’re just fed with these dangerous ideologies.

I think some interesting points that we heard about last Tuesday fall in three basic categories. Primarily we heard some interesting facts about gender and how there is a small/ insignificant number of women who take place in the alt right movement. Secondly we heard about race and how it seemed that the major players in the alt right movement (notably nazis) were white. Finally what seemed to me as being the most interesting part of this presentation was that members of the far right/ neo nazi group that was infiltrated were more likely to have come from less severe right leaning group, in this case, a misogynist group called the red pill.

So an interesting part of the presentations that tied in nice with our course was the role that men played in the leadership of these right leaning groups. In reading literature from this course it becomes clear the role men play in conflict and leadership along with conflict resolution. Example : Why men would declare war on half of the worlds population (women) instead of developing social skills to cure celibacy.

Secondly, the racial aspect to the alt right was an important topic at the talk. Obviously the Neo nazis were white but what was interesting to me was the way this tied in with the mass murderer/ sociopath profile which tends to be isolated lone white male.

Finally and to me the most interesting point brought up in the presentation was this idea of men following other men down a rabbit hole. These members of alt right groups aren’t just born fascists, they follow important figures they look up to, the same way incels look up to mass murderers.

Last week, I assisted to a talk given by Jay Marquis Manicom, named “From the Red Pill to ‘White Genocide”. During this talk, Manicom basically explains his conclusion after being surrounded by a group of Alt-Right, and the links that relied the Alt-Right and the Red Pill together. Sadly, they are both against the power of the women and want men to be as powerful as they were before, taking away most of the women’s rights.  

First, Jay talks about how the Alt-Right and the Red Pill are both antifemininity. Usually, the indoctrination starts by the Red Pill and then people join the Alt-Right community, where the hate toward women is brought to another level. They want to feel more powerful than women and to prove that they are stronger than them. Their main goal is to be everything a woman is not. As Kimmel explains on page 2 of his text “Masculinity”: “What it means to be a man is to be unlike a woman.”. Therefore, the group is known as a group that doesn’t show any weakness and doesn’t talk about their emotions, which are considered as women trait. The only emotion that they do talk about and share together is their anger towards women. For men, showing the emotion of anger is totally fine, it only proves that they are more masculine, just like when they get into fights.

Also, the Red Pill is basically a place for men to discuss how they hate women and where they share tips about how to get women. By doing that, men, once again, are trying to prove their superiority over women and that they are real men. According to Kilmartin, in his text “defining men study”, statue and achievement is one of the fourth terms enumerated to prove someone’s masculinity. “Men gain status by being successful in all that they do especially in sport, work, and sexual “conquest”. Powerful men earn respect and admiration of others.”. Which is basically what the Red Pill is about. Men are out there sharing tips about how to get women to sleep with them and trying to convince/prove that and that women should only be used for their need because they don’t worth anything. As they talk about tips to get women to sleep with them, they talk about what has worked for them, therefore they do talk about their sexual conquest and others at them with admiration wishing desperately that it will for them as well.

More, the Red-Pill and the Alt-right is all about a social hierarchy. As mentioned earlier, those men want to feel more powerful than women, and if they could they would like to bring back the system where women are at home doing what their man tells them to do and where women had no right. As Jay mentioned in his presentation the Alt-Right really wants to take away from women some rights that they have, like their right to vote for example. Moreover, there isn’t just a social hierarchy toward women, there is also one inside the group. They divide the group deciding who is going to be superior and inferior. We can say that they use manhood toward each other. Which Kimmel expresses as the power over women and men that men used to prove that they are powerful than others. By denigrating others, they probably feel more in control and confident, which provokes a feeling of power.