16/1/26

The manosphere is going into business

Online influencers are targeting young men with tips on how to walk, talk and breathe

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This article is republished from The Financial Times.

Online influencers are targeting young men with tips on how to walk, talk and breathe

Mike Skrypchyk wants you to walk more like a man. Skrypchyk, a “body transformation expert”, has also perfected a method for the correct, manly way to retrieve a folder and sit down on a chair.

In one of the videos he has uploaded to Instagram he instructs his near 50,000 followers to maintain eye contact rather than looking at the ground.

“Look effortless. Make that chair service you,” he says, staring straight at the camera.

The manosphere is growing up.

Once the sole purview of misogynists and trolls, a new type of business influencer has appeared on the websites, accounts and online forums aimed at men.

Styling themselves as professional coaches and productivity hackers, they target young men looking to get ahead in the world of work by improving their “male confidence”.

In its browbeating adherence to ritual, this advice could easily find itself at home in a Victorian-era etiquette guide.

Take Grant Mitt, a square-jawed influencer whose videos touch upon time-tested male paranoia (“How to catch a gold digger”) and professional guidance (“Never drink at work events”).

The sector’s latest fixation is vocal training.

Men are advised to watch the timbre and pitch of their voice during professional meetings and encouraged to follow the authoritative vocal cadence of a former FBI agent named Joe Navarro.

Across this online business advice industry there is a surprising diversity of male aesthetic.

Tai Lopez is a nerdy looking investor who dabbles in matters of the heart with YouTube videos titled “Why rich guys still fail with women”.

There are also laid back LA streetwear life coaches, well-groomed influencers demonstrating hyoid bone facial exercises; salt-and-pepper middle-aged men telling you to stop sitting cross-legged and start buying jeans that have at least 2 per cent spandex content, and reformed prison inmates offering the dos and don’ts of exchange trade funds and what to do when a woman is approaching your table.

Yet despite the range of male archetypes, this remains a community devoted to strict bodily standards.

Looksmaxxing, which emerged as an offshoot of the incel movement, has turned into a vibrant cottage industry geared towards men hoping to improve their physical attractiveness.

Influencers use ChatGPT to create apps that score and analyse each other’s faces and boast of having “built the empire, sculpted the jawline”, thanks to hard, tacky (and scientifically dubious) facial fitness gum.

The business manosphere even has its own accessory: nasal breathing strips, which are meant to help mental alertness and physical stamina by improving air flow and limiting mouth breathing.

Academic research has concluded they have little impact on sleep quality or athletic performance, but that hasn’t stopped business guru Alex Hormozi from making the adhesive anti-snore pads central to his brand of fitness and marketing content.

The fixation on “peak performance” can become scolding.

Hyper-masculine sales coach Andy Elliott promotes classes that involve making men take off their shirts and then, in certain cases, berating them for being out of shape.

His obsessive individualism and view of the world as a cold, cruel place comes across as more sadistic than practical.

But the followers who watch these videos in search of body language training, elocution lessons and tips for “dealing with disrespect” aren’t all misguided teenagers.

The fantasy of being able to transform your life is a kind of entertainment for many men trying to navigate the ordinary turbulence of adult life.

What a lot of the videos have in common, however, is a complete humourlessness.

“Laughs don’t build families, leadership does”, says Paul Serra, a beefy New Jersey ecommerce owner who offers consultations on dating app profiles.

His counsel for those going through a break-up?

Start an online business that can occupy the mind and put them in a “fire headspace to be successful”.

In the manosphere, there is nothing that cannot be solved with a fitness routine, a nasal strip and a goal.

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