Ressentiment in the Manosphere: Conceptions of Morality and Avenues for Resistance in the Incel Hatred Pipeline

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The paper is interesting and buttressed by an impressive bibliography. 

I deem is certainly publishable, but it might be improved in a couple of ways.

First, ressentiment is not a commonly discussed emotion; reference to Nietzsche is appropriately complemented by several modern discussions, showing it to be close to what is generally referred to as the "grapes are green" phenomenon. But the word is used several times before ll. 60ff  where we come to a reasonably explicit characterization of its meaning here. It is then seen as rather more elaborate and specific than that what most readers can be expected to understand from its original use in Nietzsche.

As one not familiar with the use of cooccurrence networks, I found it hard to follow diagrams supported the text referring to them in the commentary on experiment 1. Perhaps a little more explanation, directed at philosophers like myself who are unfamiliar with that paradigm, would be useful in the context of a publication in Philosophies.

A few more small points might invite clarification: 

fn 1: “we do not focus on how shame and envy influence moral behaviour or decision-making, and therefore we do not treat them as moral emotions in this work.”  

I can see that it makes sense to focus on ressentiment, but as this paper interprets ressentiment, following Campelos and Salmela and other, is more of a process than an emotion. A themselves write that “ressentiment . . . transforms self-targeting emotions of envy, shame, and inefficacious anger into other-targeting moral emotions of hatred, contempt and resentment”  (60-61). Given that both envy and shame are implicated in process of transmutation (especially according to Brogaard who is also cited as adopting this notion),  So I don’t quite see the point of explicitly setting them aside in this way. 

In any case, it’s not clear what use A want to make of the category of “moral emotions” in the context of their study.

347  ”and drew 5 posts from each page — was that selection also random? if not, what was the principle of selection? 

528-30  “explains how Incels, unable to dissolve self-targeting negative emotions, transmute them into anti-social orientations and violent actions towards others and themselves.” 

Here ‘describes’ might be a better word than 'explains'.  It’s not clear how ressentiment, which is more or less  defined as a mechanism that does this, thereby explains its own occurrence. 

I noticed a couple of slightly odd or ungrammatical sentences: 

80 “as they evaluate the morality of hatred of HMFR content.” Since the H stands for hate, this seems to be redundant as well as hard to construe.

120 “ resent women for depriving those goods from 120 them.” —> ... depriving them of these goods

Author Response

Please see attached file 

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 2 Report

The paper is mostly clear. While not original by any means, it demonstrates the applicability of a rather generic concept to a particular domain/populaiton. Its innovative aspects are not so clear. I have no idea what sets the focus on 'psychological processes' apart from approaches that look at 'discrete emotional experiences' (p2). Moreover there is something weirdly tautological about simultaneously 'uncovering' ressentiment and relying on it as analytical concept for 'undertanding' (p3). If ressentiment has already been established as global sentiment of neoliberalism (p13, this could of course also be contested, but the authors have no such intentions), then why do we need case studies to prove that it applies to incels? The definition of ressentiment on p4 is extremely superficial. For example, do the values of incels really change? If Scheler's sour grapes diagnosis applies here, the change only covers up that values precisely do not change! It is also unclear how an anger differs from a 'moral emotion' such as resentment, and why the latter is more self-deluding or self-indulgent than the former.

However, my main concern with this paper is that, while it uses a concept with some philosophical connotations (Nietzsche, Scheler), it merely empirically applies this and takes no issue with all the various ways in which the uses of this concept have been problematized (as ideologeme (Jameson), as unworthy of investigation (Nietzsche), depoliticizing (Amery). It takes no case studies to immediately see that a certain mainstream understanding of ressentiment applies to the incel community. Thus empirical verification may be relevant to certain forms of social science, but it has no philosophical value. In the 'Discussion' the authors propose to expand their approach to 'femcels' or racialized contexts, but the empirical diversification of its applicability changes nothing in the concept. Instead, from a contribution to a philosophy journal one might expect a critical reflection on the question whether a catch-all diagnosis such as ressentiment is specific enough.

Finally, I recommend the authors take into account the pragmatics of their diagnosis of ressentiment. What should it achieve/contribute to, beyond understanding what is already understood? It is easy to resent the Manosphere for its culture of ressentiment. What change does this paper make and how?

Author Response

Please see attached file

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Reviewer 3 Report

This is an interesting piece of qualitative research that I think probably ought to be published, though I’m not entirely sure whether it’s in the scope of this particular journal. Methodologically, it seems to be a piece of empirical research with clear philosophical content, but it’s not clear that it’s a contribution to the philosophical literature rather than a demonstration of how moral emotions might be a useful area of study for the social sciences. If the journal’s mandate was squarely social scientific, I’d definitely recommend it for publication, but as it stands, I’ll just provide my assessments and then leave it up to the editors to decide, since I’m admittedly on the fence about it.

As it stands, I see the philosophical engagement in two different fields: feminist philosophy that focuses on women’s devaluation by men, and the moral psychology of ressentiment. The former isn’t especially cited, besides, I think, a mention of Manne’s Down Girl. This doesn’t have to be a feminist philosophy paper, but it would be worth at least some overview of how all that works. 

The trickier thing I think is that there doesn’t seem to be a lot of engagement with the philosophical literature on ressentiment. I think it’s ok if the authors don’t really want to get involved in a debate about what it actually is or get caught up in trying to give a definition. But I think there’s a genuine question in the intersections of moral psychology and empirical psychological research to be had here about the ways that emotions like ressentiment are characterized philosophically and the ways that they’re operationalized by researchers. As I read this paper, it seems to primarily implement a particular way to operationalize ressentiment in the coding process. But maybe this is exactly the right venue for considering how that’s done in more detail and with greater attention to how researchers who work more squarely in one field or the other treat ressentiment. 

I also think that more of a philosophical discussion could be helpful in considering the relationship between the two studies. After all, to examine the emotions of people in the manosphere, it seems like the people you’d want to talk to aren’t necessarily the people who engage with that material in certain ways (hate-watching it or criticizing it) but people who take it somewhat seriously, or endorse it at least in some limited fashion. Depending on one’s view of emotion, the reception of these incel sentiments will at least tell us something about what they are emotionally, but I don’t think read enough in the paper to understand why these two particular investigations are being put side by side, besides that they’re both investigations of incel material.

Author Response

Please see attached file

Author Response File: Author Response.pdf

Round 2

Reviewer 2 Report

n/a

Reviewer 3 Report

I think the authors have successfully addressed the concerns I had in my initial referee report, so I'm happy to recommend publication. One remaining suggestion might be to further clarify the scope of Study 2 when it's introduced on p. 2, since the framing had me thinking it might be a study of how people already along the pathway to inceldom might become further radicalized.