The Price of Becoming an Alpha Male

Instead of spending my Wednesday evening of Spring Recess lying on the beach clutching a piña colada in one hand and my faith in humanity in the other, I watched Louis Theroux’s new documentary titled “Inside the Manosphere.”

For 91 minutes, I witnessed Theroux try to disentangle the bizarre nature of the “manosphere”—a vaguely connected network of misogynistic male influencers. Using his wildly calm demeanor and ability to coax a cat into water, Theroux baits his subjects into volunteering shockingly egregious convictions. In almost a greater torture than walking on a trail of Legos, I forced myself to suffer through the cartoonish bravado and painful immorality of self-proclaimed alpha males in an attempt to decipher how this “manosphere” operates. At some point during my oscillation between amusement and terror, the film helped to unravel a realization: the manosphere is not simply an ideology, but also a dangerous business model.

Anyone familiar with red pill content understands its focus on hegemonic masculinity, in which the “formula” for success is extraordinarily superficial. Own a fleet of flashy cars. Flex a set of six-pack abs. Keep at least one attractive woman hooked on each arm. But Theroux ventures to explore exactly how this mentality constructs profitable “careers,” exposing the digital chameleons that manufacture a narrative for their personal gain.

Consider Harrison Sullivan, a British chauvinistic content creator known online as HSTikkyTokky, who meets with Theroux early in the documentary. During his interview, Sullivan maintains a shallow definition of building this alleged manhood, equating masculinity with financial gain and being “outside” the mainstream. 

“I teach guys how to be proper guys, not these little soy boys,” Sullivan tells Theroux, while sizing up his stature like a peacock checking out another’s plume. Of course, his rhetoric perfectly pairs with the financial services he sells, which claim to help men escape the supposedly ghastly nine-to-five. Later, Theroux’s own investigation reveals that Sullivan takes a cut of any money invested—even if his advice fails.

Along eerily identical lines is influencer Justin Waller—a known associate of charged rapists Andrew and Tristan Tate—who often spouts the argument, as shown in the documentary, that a man “has to create value in the world,” while women are “already born with their value through beauty.” Like a sleazy salesman who sells you a broken car that he owns the repair shop for, Waller pushes a laughable, unaccredited online course designed by the Tate brothers that allegedly teaches men how to become “money makers.” Both men copy the same playbook: convince young men they have little worth, and then push the solution to a problem they helped create.

The final element sustaining the allure of the manosphere is instructing men how to “possess” one last status symbol: women. Crucial is the word “possess” as these influencers weaponize virulent language associated with domination and control. At one point in the documentary, Theroux confronts “Fresh and Fit” podcaster Myron Gaines about past comments in which he frames relationships with women in hierarchical and controlling terms. Immediately, Gaines doubles down, asserting that he champions this patriarchal power dynamic because he “knows what’s best for them.” He justifies his cesspit of misogynistic remarks by pushing half-baked pseudoscience that men are the natural leaders. To illustrate his point, Gaines carefully selects OnlyFans models willing to risk humiliation for views, which he uses to make faulty generalizations about the nature of women to his gaggle of subscribers.

Bemusingly, it becomes apparent that their advice is more hypocritical than a vegan opening a taxidermy enterprise. Gaines is quick to criticize the women for their high body counts, yet proudly states that he plans to have multiple wives, under “one-way monogamy.” In a similar display of “rules for thee and not for me,” influencer Justin Waller presents a relationship that Theroux describes off-camera as “founded on a Darwinian view of alpha supremacy.” Using an overtly defensive tone, Waller explains that it’s acceptable for him to have multiple girlfriends while with his wife, but she must continue her devotion to him. 

As the film progresses, we see that the men’s walking contradictions funnel directly into their wallets. Sullivan reveals that he profits heavily from his OnlyFans promotion agency, but simultaneously describes their behavior as “disgusting.” Most ironically, this is the same man who grinned like a Cheshire cat, bragging to Theroux about how he recorded a sex act being performed on him to post as content. If he were stuck in 1949, Sullivan would evidently star as the doctor in a Camel cigarettes commercial.

Although Theroux’s documentary does not fully address why young men are so easily buying into their product, a few of the influencers’ followers are featured throughout. One insists that “as a man, no one is going to give you a handout,” demonstrating a dangerously isolationist mindset. His response, when taken in conjunction with the “male loneliness” epidemic, offers a tangible explanation for the magnetism of the manosphere. 

According to Gallup, 25% of U.S. men aged 15 to 34 report feeling lonely “a lot of the previous day,” compared to 18% of women in the same age group. Their alienation is made worse by the lack of emotional intimacy in their relationships, with 30% of Gen Z men believing they should not say “I love you” to their friends. Rather than encourage community-building, the manosphere acts as if commodities can substitute for connections. They provide a mirage of financial success so encapsulating that, when followers drink the water, they scarcely notice they are being asphyxiated by the sand of their own despair and insecurity.

Alas, “Inside the Manosphere” reveals that what could be regarded as a countermovement to feminism is also a subscription-based trap. These influencers craft their own venomous ideology that preys on the self-loathing of young men so they can offer the antidote. Their business model depends entirely on their audience remaining isolated and insecure enough to keep lapping up their fraudulent services. Sullivan’s admission to Theroux—“I don’t give a fuck, I’m doing it for the money”—is the only candid moment in the 91 minutes of red pill conspiracies and aggressive masculinity. 

While they laugh all the way to the bank, they leave young men stranded in an oasis that was never actually there.

Ella Ricketts ’28 (ericketts@college.harvard.edu) sincerely wishes she had taken the blue pill instead.