Seduction, Post-Capitalism, and Sexual Asceticism: The Far-Right Transmutation of the “Manosphere” Among U.S. Eastern Orthodox Online

The so-called digital manosphere has been an object of scholarly analysis for several years; this paper extends the conversation by analyzing how manosphere elements in online venues interact with both specific religious traditions and forms of political authority in order to produce discourses, technologies, and self-improvement regiments related to Orthodox masculinity. By “manosphere,” we are referring to a constellation of pro-men or pro-masculinity groups and individuals that create content and find community through digital platforms, particularly social media (Ging 2017). As a networked collective, the manosphere includes participants with a wide range of social and political affinities or affiliations, although, as criminology and information studies scholars have noted, the overarching themes of misogyny, homophobia, and conspiratorial ideas tend to position U.S-based actors in the movement at the far-right of the American political spectrum (Ging 2019; Farrell, Araque, Fernandez, and Alani 2020). Research on the manosphere typically focuses on incel culture, fathers’ rights advocacy, and pick-up artists, highlighting power anxieties, shifting social demographics, and depictions of women as consumers and consumable products in late capitalism. Crucial, but often missing, in the assessment of manosphere content and aims is the role of religious belief and moral framings about the gendered body and body politic. 

Drawing on three years of digital research, and utilizing discourse/media analysis, this paper intervenes through a case study of online Eastern Orthodox manosphere influencers. In doing so, we argue that this particular mode of masculinist discourse unites reactionary religious currents with affective energy borrowed from, and recognizable to, participants within the manosphere. Thus, analyzing the transmutation of affective energy from the manosphere to religious practice (and, perhaps, vice versa) sheds light on important developments within reactionary masculinity today that are part of the larger traditionalist, anti-democratic turn we see in 21st century American politics. Our paper will utilize anthropological frames related to "worldbuilding" and "trad futurism" to make the case that this particular mode of masculinist discourse is not a nostalgically oriented reverie for some failed Americana sociality, but rather a future-oriented project founded in apocalyptic rigorism - all against the backdrop of the perceived failures of capitalism and the need to establish localized religious economies bolstered by far-right ideologies.

Manosphere Orthodox men who utilize both mainstream platforms (Youtube, personal websites, X.com, and podcasting platforms) and more fringe venues (e.g. Rumble, closed Patreon meetings) create communities around discourses of producerist masculinity, "quality man" themes, and apocalyptic spirituality. Be it the “Church of the Eternal Logos,” whose founder, David Patrick Harry, reimagines (with credit given) manosphere themes around “quality manhood” to portray marriages durable enough to withstand suspected conspiracies by the government, or content producers who fetishize and spiritualize alternative health products (CBD, essential oils, and natural hormone therapies) in a reactionary move against the American health system, the examples of this phenomenon are readily apparent to those who consume their Orthodoxy on the internet. The result is a hybrid of "manosphere" elements indexed to Eastern Orthodox ascetic traditions that provides veneers of authenticity, venerability, and spiritual authority to new configurations of patriarchal authority, and perhaps even a new wave of “muscular Christianity” (Putney 2003).In order to better understand the paradoxical embrace and refusal of normative manosphere ideas, we focus expressly on emerging debates over martial sexual practices and virility. 

Specifically, we examine content produced around the concept of “martial fasting,” that is, the notion that Orthodoxy contains specific canonical prohibitions on marital sexual activity during fasting periods. This theme, historically marginal within the mainstream of Orthodox teachings on fasting, has found traction in the Orthodox manosphere world as a way to contend with concerns about indulgence, consumerism, and bodily control. In other words, a relatively esoteric fasting practice has found new relevance as a sort of prescription for reinscribing patriarchal control as commendable restraint. Recently, a video interview clip of an Orthodox priest suggesting that Orthodox couples should practice martial fasting during pregnancy went viral with 138k views on X.com alone. The clip generated furious conversations and debates across X.com, YouTube, Instagram, and Facebook, with posters arguing both for and against this teaching. Some male social media users drew on early Christian texts to support the priest’s argument, while others argued chastity on the basis of human dignity.  As one X.com user questioned, “What animal would have sex with a pregnant woman?” 

Throughout our presentation, we will use audio-visual data to highlight the tension surrounding this debate, arguing that this new focus on masculine restraint both reinscribes misogynistic understandings of female sexuality and the pregnant body, while also drawing out morals-focused conceptions of seduction in which asceticism maketh the man through “alt-virilities” (Vandiver 2020). The podcast interviews, live stream debates, social media posts, and memes from Orthodox men online show how the advice for sexual dominance and seduction so characteristic of the manosphere is transmuted into ascetic and rigorous forms of monogamous patriarchal marital practices, including (ironically) a greater degree of sexual rigor than is characteristic of Eastern Orthodoxy as a whole. In doing so, we argue that manosphere culture, focused on social debate as a normative form of corrective instruction, helps Orthodox men craft vernacular theologies of the body that are inspired by Orthodox theology and manosphere culture but are arguably at odds with both.