On The Michelangelo Signorile Show, Media Matters' Justin Horowitz explains how “manosphere” influencers are embracing antisemitism
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On The Michelangelo Signorile Show, Media Matters' Justin Horowitz explains how “manosphere” influencers are "starting to embrace antisemitism"
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From the August 14, 2023, edition of SiriusXM Progress' The Michelangelo Signorile Show
JUSTIN HOROWITZ (GUEST): This manosphere, which is this online community of websites, bloggers, and influencers, they have a tendency to kind of radicalize young men into this very misogynistic worldview.
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So what I've been seeing in my research is that these manosphere influencers, like the Fresh & Fit podcast that you had mentioned, and a couple of others, are really starting to embrace antisemitism. So, really what I've seen is this kind of perfect storm of what nationalists appearing on these manosphere shows and pushing this really dangerous sort of like neo-Nazi rhetoric.
Figures who you may have heard of like Nick Fuentes, who made headlines for dining with Trump and the rapper Ye in 2022, he's been on a sort of tour of these manosphere programs getting the hosts, and the hosts really embracing him and his rhetoric that's extremely dangerous. He, just a couple of weeks ago, called for a holy war against Jews, just as an example.
MICHELANGELO SIGNORILE (HOST): Wow, and you talk about people like Hannah Pearl Davis as well, there are these women who also are part of this and we talked last time about how they also help to rationalize and justify this misogyny because these guys who are listening might think, well, a woman wouldn't be pushing misogynistic kind of stuff, they're now also pushing the antisemitism stuff too.
HOROWITZ: It's true, yeah, so, Hannah Pearl Davis is another one of these manosphere influencers I follow. She actually picked up some attention these last couple of weeks because she kind of, sort of, became a meme for wearing a shirt that says women shouldn't vote, and I think a lot of these men turn to influencers like Hannah Pearl Davis and they say well, if women can say it, I can say it too. And, specifically, when it comes to the antisemitism that she's spreading, she came out with a song called why can't we talk about the Jews?
She posted it, she was playing the guitar, an acoustic version of this song, which is her pretty much saying, why can't we talking about Jewish people without being canceled by the left and the right, and saying Hitler was a good guy, why can't you say that, you know, kind of playing dumb, like I don't really understand why you can't say these things without getting canceled.
SIGNORILE: What did she want to talk about Jews about? It's kind of like, what is their point? Right?
HOROWITZ: I mean, that's a great question. I really think that it was, you know, to get eyes. You know, extremism gets clicks, so coming out with a song called why can't we talk about the Jews, like, she is just trying to, I guess, piss people off? Maybe? But I also think that she is just trying to get an audience similar to Nick Fuentes' audience. So there is -- Nick has this almost, like, cult-like following, and I feel like, you know, when you have nothing else to turn to, what do you turn to? You turn to antisemitism.