Reformed incel shares shocking story of falling into extremist ideology

15 August 2021, 12:32

Caller shares story of emerging from incel ideology

This reformed 'incel' ideologue shared his story with Natasha Devon, leaving listeners lost for words.

"I grew up in quite an abusive household" Josh told Natasha Devon, where he saw his father beat and berate his mother from an early age.

"My dad would always tell me, you know, 'oh, women are all the same, they all sleep around, they all want you for money,'" and this had a lasting effect on his views of women.

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The conversation came off the back of the Plymouth shootings, with the perpetrator Jake Davison was found to be subscribed to the extremist 'incel' ideology.

"I grew up just, kind of, hating women."

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He went on to note that he was in a relationship as a young man after the woman fell pregnant but he still had a deep hatred for her: "You end up in this relationship that's kind of doomed to fail anyway."

"Going then online and seeing that this incel community shared the same view as my dad had, you kind of put two and two together and I just thought that was normal."

He spoke of his moment of realisation, telling Natasha that he realised his hatred "can't be women's' fault, it's got to be something wrong with me."

"Was there one particular incident or something that happened...that made you want to seek therapy?" Natasha wondered.

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She noted that the caller had "given us some really concrete reasons" for where his hatred stemmed from.

"I can completely see how you'd end up in a place where you'd think of women as less than...and difficult to fathom."

The caller told Natasha that "it's scary to think my daughter can grow up in a world like that where you say one thing wrong to a guy and they start getting angry," and this must change.

"It does need to be taken more seriously," he concluded.