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From Incels to Pickup Artists: The Truth about Extreme Misogyny and How it Affects Us All
by Laura Bates
A groundbreaking book that pulls back the curtain on the terrorist movement no one is talking about.
Women's rights activist Laura Bates has been the target of many misogynistic attacks online: from hate-fueled Twitter rants to vivid descriptions of her own rape and even death threats. At first, the vitriol seemed to be the work of a small handful of individual men... but over time, the volume and consistency of the attacks hinted at something bigger and more ominous. As Bates followed the thread of online misogyny farther into the corners of the internet, the spiral of hateful and toxic rhetoric deepened until she found an unseen, organized movement of thousands of anonymous men wishing violence (and worse) upon women—the terrorism no one is talking about. Men Who Hate Women examines the rise of secretive extremist communities who despise women as Bates traces the roots of misogyny across a complex spider web of groups extending from Men's Rights Activists to trolls and the incel movement.
Drawing parallels to other extremist movements around the world, including white nationalism, Bates shows what attracts men to the movement, how it grooms and radicalizes boys, how it operates, and what can be done to stop it. Most urgently of all, she follows the pathways this extreme ideology has taken from the darkest corners of the internet to emerge covertly in our mainstream media, our playgrounds, and our government. Going undercover on and offline, Bates provides the first comprehensive look at this under-the-radar phenomenon, including eye-opening interviews with former members of these communities, the academics studying this movement, and the men fighting back.
By turns fascinating and horrifying, Men Who Hate Women is a broad, unflinching account of the deep current of loathing toward women and anti-feminism that underpins our society and is a must-read for parents, educators, and anyone who believes in equality for women.
What are you reading this week? (5/1/2025)
I've begun "The Great Divide" by Christina Henriquez, a novel of the creation of the Panama Canal. (Reviewed in BookBrowse.) Just turning the cover on "Men Who Hate Women" by Laura Bates. (Reviewed in BookBrowse.) Also working chapter by chapter on "Forgeries and Counterforgeries", a scholarly wo...
-Robin_G
"A leading women's rights activist explores online misogynistic communities and how they are increasingly infiltrating the real world...An astute, shocking exposé that also offers practical solutions." - Kirkus Reviews
"Though Bates offers little new information about who these groups are and how they operate, her argument that extreme misogynistic ideas are entering the mainstream is well-documented and persuasive. Readers will come away from this viewing the manosphere as a more serious threat." - Publishers Weekly
"Well-researched and meticulously documented, Bates's book on the power and danger of masculinity should be required reading for us all." - Library Journal
"The threat of online misogyny must be treated as a terrorist threat, [Bates] argues in this sobering read that is both illuminating and necessary." - Booklist
"The killing of women because we are women is not only the most common crime in the world, it is also the single biggest indicator of whether a nation is violent in its streets and will use violence against another nation. Laura Bates is showing us the path to both intimate and global survival." - Gloria Steinem
This information about Men Who Hate Women was first featured
in "The BookBrowse Review" - BookBrowse's membership magazine, and in our weekly "Publishing This Week" newsletter. Publication information is for the USA, and (unless stated otherwise) represents the first print edition. The reviews are necessarily limited to those that were available to us ahead of publication. If you are the publisher or author and feel that they do not properly reflect the range of media opinion now available, send us a message with the mainstream reviews that you would like to see added.
Any "Author Information" displayed below reflects the author's biography at the time this particular book was published.
Laura Bates has become something of a spokeswoman for an increasingly hot phenomenon: the fourth wave of feminism. She writes regularly for many leading periodicals; has given TEDx talks; spoken to universities--including Harvard--and even to the House of Lords. Laura has received the 2015 British Empire Medal in the Queen's Birthday Honours; the WMC Digital Media Award from the Women's Media Center (founded by Jane Fonda, Robin Morgan, and Gloria Steinem), the Georgina Henry prize; has been named in the BBC Woman's Hour Power List 2014 Game Changers, and in 2013 she won Cosmopolitan's Ultimate Woman of the Year Award. She was also named CNN's 10 Visionary Women List. She is the founder of the Everday Sexism Project.
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