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Reviving Neo-Orientalism: The Curious Relationship between Islamists and the Incel Revolution
Abstract
In April 2018, Alek Minassian, plowed a van through a crowd on Toronto’s Yonge St., killing ten and injuring more. In his police interview, Minassian expressed sympathies for an “incel revolution,” saying “he drew inspiration from other men who used violence as a form of retribution for being unable to get laid.” In broad strokes, Incels, shortened for “involuntary celibate,” are an online community of men who are unable to find sexual partners despite their desire to do so. This paper will consider the media commentary in the aftermath of the incident, which underscored the presumed relationship between the radical misogyny of Incel members and Islamist ideology, arguing that both share similar patterns of “exaggerated concern with masculinity” and hateful rhetoric about women and sex. Specifically, I will look at how and why both mainstream news outlets, as well as social media commentary have drawn parallels between the two, despite having no explicit association between its members. I will explore how the grip of contemporary Orientalism in our post post-colonial world, where Islamism appears to be the de facto global threshold by which one measures misogyny, violence and aggression, continues to remain firmly entrenched in public consciousness, and further ask why is it particularly difficult to disrupt this discursive narrative which continues to affirm false universalities about Muslimness.
Discipline
Other
Geographic Area
All Middle East
Sub Area
Cultural Studies