Young conservatives' anger at women is taking a nihilistic turn

[marmar]

For Gen Z Republican men, sex is solitary
Young conservatives' anger at women is taking a nihilistic turn

By Amanda Marcotte
Senior Writer
Published March 20, 2026 6:45AM (EDT)


(Salon) James Fishback is almost certainly not going to win the GOP nomination for governor of Florida this year, but he’s become an object of media fascination all the same. In part it’s because Fishback holds such bigoted views that he makes the frontrunner, Rep. Byron Donalds, look moderate by comparison, even though the congressman said Black families were more stable under Jim Crow. Fishback peddles antisemitic conspiracy theories and hurls racist taunts at Donalds.

But what is really drawing attention to the 31-year-old Fishback is how he, while running far behind with older Republican voters, generates real enthusiasm with young conservatives. Michelle Goldberg of the New York Times described the packed audience at a Fishback event as “very young,” writing, “several attendees told me they were in high school.” Vanity Fair’s Dan Adler wrote that the long-shot candidate “has captured the most extreme attitudinal aspects of the Gen Z online right.” Fishback is polling at 32% with GOP voters aged 18-32, and his campaign events are larger and growing.

While he is drawing huge crowds, his audience is mostly young men and boys. A key to Fishback’s appeal merits only a fleeting mention in most profiles: his proposal to pass a 50% “sin tax” on OnlyFans creators.

....(snip)....

“Say what you want about Saudi Arabia,” he added. “There are no women hoeing out on the internet in Saudi Arabia.”

....(snip)....

“Gooning” — slang for excessive masturbation — has colonized the discourse of Gen Z Republican men, and it’s a subculture so consumed by misogynist anger that their conception of sexuality has become onanistic. ................(more)

https://www.salon.com/2026/03/20/for-gen-z-republican-men-sex-is-solitary/

[617Blue]

1. These dudes are dangerous. Many potential Elliot Rodger's out there.

[Ocelot II]

2. "Gooning"? I just learned something I wish I hadn't learned.

Ultra-wanking, I guess. Masturbation as a hobby where sad little men can get off and hate women at the same time?

[Ray Bruns]

7. Same here.

You know, in my day as a young man, we had to work hard to get laid. Paying for dinners, movies, and acting like a gentleman seemed to work.
Doesn’t sound like these guys want to put in the effort.

[Ocelot II]

9. If the only sex you get (or want) can take place in your parents' basement

in front of your computer, at least you don't have to take a shower and get dressed. You probably don't do that anyhow.

[IbogaProject]

15. Also the porn is designed to make them feel inadequate

That is on top of there being nothing in how two people csn get to know each other via converstation. Pornography is set up to be addictive just like gambling anf alcohol and does this by playing on adverse psychology. So scary, Reich wrote about how sexual repression was a core element that feeds fascism.

[CaptainTruth]

20. When I was a kid Goonies was a movie.

[MustLoveBeagles]

44. A good one too

Now it's been appropriated by a whining incels.

[BComplex]

31. Maybe they're fantasizing about angry men?

I don't get it.

[Wednesdays]

37. Well, one good outcome out of it

...is that it vastly reduces their chances to reproduce.

[Dave says]

48. Made me laugh! But, yeah. Silver lining.

[OnionPatch]

50. Natural selection at work

😁

[valleyrogue]

3. Women aren't things to be bangmaids.

Many if not most men think they are. THAT is the problem. They think women are their function, to be used by men.

It is a point of view by men all across the political spectrum and exacerbated by social media.

[ananda]

39. Totally agree.

Just about every tv show these days
completely sexualizes women as though
playing out male fantasies all the time.

[Skittles]

58. yup

and all those so-called "left behind" young men are pathetic morons who just cannot handle the world not revolving around them

[BlueWaveNeverEnd]

4. There is a subset of these idiots on youtube. Movies featuring women in action roles

Sends them into hysterics.

They can only accept the save_the_earth figure as a white male.

[MustLoveBeagles]

12. They ruin discussion boards

Last edited Fri Mar 20, 2026, 11:08 AM - Edit history (1)

With their neverending whining about woke.

[BlueWaveNeverEnd]

23. They lose their minds if a side character is a Black woman or lgbt

[MustLoveBeagles]

25. Or if a white character has any flaws 😉

I've seen classic movies that they would accuse of wokeness.

[yardwork]

5. The internet amplifies these attitudes.

There have always been nihilistic violent resentful people. The internet lets them find one another and wallow in their resentments. Their online communities justify and reinforce their unhealthy attitudes about life.

It's very difficult to turn off. I don't know what the solution is.

[travelingthrulife]

11. Banning algorithms? I don't know if that is possible, but someone sets them up

so we should be able to dismantle them.

Normal people are maliciously being directed in very toxic rabbit holes where they are manipulated with false information and turned into MAGA types.

[Hey Joe]

46. This here 👆

If only there was a way to do this.
Unfortunately there is waaaay too much money in mindfucking people with algorithms which degrade and destroy society to outlaw them.

[chowder66]

16. Most of guys I knew started bands, got into art, interacted with other humans, took up a hobby/sport,

focused on studies, loved women, supported women and most importantly tried....they just tried... and had pretty good coping skills if they were rejected. Some coped better than others but they wouldn't give up trying and those that did have trouble had enough friends, both male and female that would help set them up with someone.

[yardwork]

26. Yes, this.

[Danascot]

6. Japanese sex robots

Problem solved.

[Wednesdays]

38. Their reaction:

"Japanese?? Ewww!"

[peppertree]

43. True. Right-wingers prefer automated Barbie dolls.

[travelingthrulife]

8. You just know this guy is a perv.

Who are those women 'hoeing' out to? Men? Maybe men who visit Only Fans regularly and then feel guilty? So guilty you blame the women instead of facing your demons.

[Scrivener7]

10. I just watched Louis Theroux's doc on the manosphere. These men are just dripping with stupid.

And the ones who follow them are pitiful, sad cretins.

[niyad]

13. KNR and bookmarking for later. It is too early to start drinking.

[PCIntern]

14. I'm getting ads on FB

For a sophisticated mechanical battery-powered male masturbation device.

1. This is troublesome
2. Says something about my Fb algorithm. 🥺

[EdmondDantes_]

18. That could be that their algorithm sucks.

Instagram keep giving me ads for sports bras and I don't require those being a guy. Maybe I'm supposed to buy them for my friends.

[PCIntern]

19. Well...

I gotta confess that I’m or entirely innocent of transgressions-of -purchasing over the years.

[DBoon]

32. I set up a Facebook account for my dog years ago

She kept getting ads for lesbian dating sites.

[PCIntern]

34. That is very funny....

“You wouldn’t like her…she’s a dog.”

[3catwoman3]

55. Best laugh I've had all day.

[malthaussen]

33. One accidental misclick and you can pay for it for weeks.

I've accidentally clicked on a video or advertisement while trying to scroll down (it only takes a slight slip of the cursor), and the algorithm on You Tube or Facebook immediately and persistently floods my feed with related content. Since some of those things on the sidebars are really marginal in more than one way, the results can be hilarious.

-- Mal

[Wednesdays]

40. Years ago, when Google was just getting started,

I had a puppy that I was trying to housebreak. So I asked Google for "solutions for dogs that poop in the house."

Well, for weeks afterwards, Google gave me sidebar ads for "Pooping Dogs."

[leftstreet]

17. I need a shower after reading that article

Worth the read though

DURec

[CaptainTruth]

21. Once again, toxic masculinity.

[lonely bird]

22. Well

I certainly have no use for their nonsense but I will say that the American society has damaged plenty of people. From exceptionalism to ridiculous so-called gender roles to hyper macho bullshit spewed by “influencers” to politicians that pander to religionist nut jobs we have a cesspool of dangerous idiocy that can and has washed over many.

We have a mental healthcare crisis in this country. I would put the percentage of the population that needs help at 80% minimum. This would be for a range of different things but including young men who we see like the guy in the OP.

[ToxMarz]

24. There are no women hoeing out on the Internet in Saudi Arabia?

Let's talk about what the men of Saudi Arabia are up to.

The best news here is that these losers aren't passing on their DNA.

[Shipwack]

27. Men always try to regulate professions...

… that are dominated by women.

1) Prostitution
2) Midwifery
3) Only Fans

I’m sure I’m forgetting others.

[Dan]

28. Are you serious, this is a thing?

[Maru Kitteh]

56. By the time you see it on DU it's BEEN a thing. Long time.

This really started with 4chan. That’s ancient internet history now.

[Sane1]

29. January 6th Goon Squad

This gives a new meaning to the Goon squad that stormed DC on January 6th!

[bucolic_frolic]

30. For some reason he seems well-informed on the subject /nt

[dlk]

35. When Republicans support a leader who is a serial rapist

And refuse to prosecute any of the traffickers and rapists in the Epstein files, they are a clear danger to the women of America.

This goes far beyond being a party of women-haters.

[Mblaze]

36. Take off the virtual reality goggles and live in the real world.

[Exp]

41. They got sum kinda problum.. nt

[peppertree]

42. His mother is Colombian. Most on the Right would consider him an Anchor Baby.

The irony, however, is no doubt lost on young James.

[New Breed Leader]

45. Women make a LOT of money on OnlyFans in a SAFE environment that's different from the pron industry

that's why this incel wants to dismantle it

[genxlib]

47. I hate to say it

But the COVID lock down was not kind to some people.

Most of GenZ was somewhere between 10-20 years old when they went into the bubble.

Social media and modern politics are to blame for this. But Covid made them sitting ducks for the manipulation that comes from algorithms praying on loneliness.

I offer no excuses or sympathy because plenty of people went through it without becoming assholes. But it certainly had to be a factor. There is just too much symmetry that self-isolation is the preferred outcome for somebody who's pathology was baked in isolation.

[pat_k]

49. What's happening with so many boys and young men is very, very troubling.

https://www.profgalloway.com/notes-on-being-a-man/

Back in November, Scott Galloway wrote a piece with some truly frighting numbers.

...
Five years ago my advocacy for young men sparked a hostile response. Today society is ready to have a productive dialogue, rejecting the far right’s attempts to send non-white people and all women back to the 1950s and the left’s belief that young men don’t have problems but are the problem. This isn’t a zero-sum game. We can build on the gains women have registered over the past three decades and ensure there’s room for boys and young men in the conversation. Democrats are starting to tackle the crisis, but we can’t rely on prominent party leaders to drive the change. We can count on the tech industry, however, to keep supporting their massive valuations by connecting profits with the sequestration and enragement of young men. Men ages 20 to 30 now spend less time outside than prison inmates.

...
. I wondered why what was happening to boys and young men was in fact happening and how I could raise my sons in a world where they — and males of any age — thrive.
...
The data around boys and young men is overwhelming. Seldom in recent memory has there been a cohort that’s fallen farther, faster. Why? First, boys face an educational system biased against them — with brains that mature later than girls’, they almost immediately fall behind their female classmates. Many grow up without male role models, including teachers — fewer men teach K–12 than there are women working in STEM fields — with Black and Hispanic school instructors especially underrepresented.
...
People under the age of forty are 24% less wealthy. The deliberate transfer of wealth from the young to the old in the United States over the past century has led to unaffordable and indefensible costs for education and housing and skyrocketing student debt, all of which directly affect young men. It’s why twenty-five-year-olds today make less than their parents and grandparents did at the same age, while carrying debt loads unimaginable to earlier generations. Neither the minimum nor the median wage has kept pace with inflation or productivity gains, while housing costs have outpaced both. As the costs of college have soared beyond the reach of most families, many of the manufacturing jobs that didn’t require a college degree and were often a ticket to the middle class for (mostly) men have been offshored. A prohibitive real estate market is a contributing factor to why 60% of young men between the ages of eighteen and twenty-four live with their parents and 1 in 5 still live with their parents at age thirty. Stuck and unable to afford greater economic opportunities in nearby cities, they find the same crush and collision of density, stimulation, humanity, creativity, eroticism, and conversation that urban areas offer on their phones instead. In Manhattan, a four-hundred-square-foot apartment costs $3,000 a month. In its stead is a seventeen-square-inch mobile studio apartment costing roughly $42 a month, served up by AT&T, T- Mobile, or Verizon

Meanwhile, algorithmically generated content on social media contributes to—and profits from—young men’s growing social isolation, boredom, and ignorance. With the deepest-pocketed firms on the planet trying to convince young men they can have a reasonable facsimile of life on a screen, many grow up without acquiring the skills to build social capital or create wealth. The percentage of young men aged twenty to twenty-four who are neither in school nor working has tripled since 1980. Workforce participation among men has fallen below 90%, caused by a lack of well-paying jobs, wage stagnation, disabilities, a mismatch of skills and/or training, and falling demand for jobs traditionally held by prime-age men.
...
Here’s a terrifying stat: 45% of men ages eighteen to twenty-five have never approached a woman in person. And without the guardrails of a relationship, young men behave as if they have … no guardrails.

...

[John1956PA]

51. In S.A., a wife is stoned after the husband alleges she committed adultary.

Our military personnel were exposed to such public stonings during the First Gulf War.

Such a barbaric world.

[sop]

52. "A subculture so consumed by misogynist anger that their conception of sexuality has become onanistic."

Put simply, a bunch of pathetic angry little boys enjoying a circle jerk because no woman will have anything to do with them.

[MorbidButterflyTat]

53. Poor incels

Sin tax, how quaint.

[3catwoman3]

54. With their shitty attitudes, solo sex will be the only...

…kind they can hope for.