'My hobby is chadfishing w**res': Meet the men standing women up on purpose.

“Chadfish: 40yr Aussie crack whore travels to hotel, wastes money on a 24 minute Uber ride each way.”

“Chadfish: 25yr Aussie tinder slut travels + waits 40 minutes for chad, GPS spoof my location and make her walk around. Block her with no explanation.”

These are the titles of two recent threads on incels.is, a disturbing online forum for self-confessed incels - involuntary celibate men who, essentially, hate women, and blame them for their lack of sex. 

The threads were started by an Australian user and are just two of dozens of similar posts that see him bragging about using fake dating site profiles to lure unsuspecting women, with the sole purpose of humiliation and rejection, and wasting their money and time.  

“I sent this 40-year-old Aussie whore to a hotel in an Australian capital city,” he writes to the global community of fellow misogynists. 

“She paid for an uber and it took her 24 minutes to get to the hotel. She handled it pretty well. She looked like a crack whore but the sad thing is this drug addicted roastie is valued higher than any male by society [sic].”

In another post, he brags about convincing a 25-year-old to free up her work schedule to meet ‘chad’. 

“After she arrived, I kept moving my GPS spoofer and making her walk a few hundred more metres, until she decided just to wait at this Asian tourist attraction thing. Total travel and wait time was at least 40 minutes.”

He then goes on to share his plans to stand up a “19-year-old becky slut at a bar”. 

The comments are met with adoring praise by fellow incels, whose hatred of women is jarring. As a woman reading, it’s terrifying. This is one of the less offensive comments. 

“Every single incel on this forum should be doing this. Hands (sic) off to you my friend! Make this knowledge accessible to all incels how to gps spoof and fool the tinder authentication system. Stand up women on dating apps (multiple times if you can) *Call up female hairdressers and book big money appointments and don’t turn up. *Make their lives unbearable as possible. This is a good response to a society that is full of looks discrimination and leaves men isolated and alone.”

The rest are filled with vulgar name-calling, mind-blowing derogatory, and violent language, as they virtually high-five the perpetrator. Truly scary stuff. 

It’s known as ‘chadfishing’, and this user goes on to explain in detail how he does it, targeting at least five Australian women per week, “beefing it up” by targeting women from other countries if he doesn’t meet his quota. 

Who are incels and why do they hate women?

Technically, the term, incel, refers to an involuntary celibate male, frustrated by perceived inability to find a sexual partner despite desperately wanting one, and resentful towards women as a result. 

Although some incels use the term simply as a description for their predicament, most blame women for their lack of sex, reducing them to objects driven by their sexual desire to reproduce with superior males, hence rejecting the incels.

"Although misogyny has been around forever, the rise of these, largely violent, female-hating, celibate men has become particularly problematic in the last couple of years," says registered counsellor and PhD candidate, Susan De Campo. 

A quick look at any incel dialogue and the dehumanisation of women is clear and confronting. Women are frequently described as ‘femoids’ (a contraction of the words female and android) and ‘roasties’ (in reference to a woman's labia after 'too much' sex - which, according to incels, is all women), and are deemed capable of only simple emotions, with few interests outside of sex and money. 

At the same time, incels believe men are superior to women, which is why they’re so angry that women aren’t having sex with them. 

"They believe that their views are the result of enlightenment about the intrinsically superior status of men," says De Campo.

"The number of incels, worldwide, has grown significantly courtesy of on-line forums and the opportunity to enact behaviour that is consistent with their views."

Are they dangerous?

It’s safe to say that any ideology based on hatred or entitlement is dangerous. We only have to look at the number of women who have been allegedly murdered by current or former partners this year to understand the magnitude of the danger that comes with entitlement. While domestic violence perpetrators are motivated by their perceived entitlement to their partner, incel behaviour is driven by their inability to attract a partner in the first place, and for this, all women are to blame.

"Sometimes, this behaviour includes straight out violence against women. Problematically, almost all incels support rape and sexual assault against women. There’s actual research that backs this up," says De Campo. 

Reading through the incel forum is frightening. That’s not to say all these men are dangerous, of course, but their ideology is. In fact, the terminology rose to prominence after self-proclaimed incel, Elliot Rodger, went on a killing spree in California - murdering six people, wounding thirteen more, then killing himself. 

The killer left a 140 page autobiography, referred to at the time as a manifesto, titled My Twisted World: The Story of Elliot Rodger, describing in disturbing detail the events of his life that led to his world-view. The document was laced with the misogyny and self-victimisation common among incels. 

Since then, several dozens of terror attacks have been linked to incels in America, the UK and Canada. There have been no documented reports of incel violence in Australia. 

What is chadfishing?

Similar to catfishing - where a person lures another into a relationship using a fake online persona, usually for the purpose of scamming them for money - chadfishing is a term created by the incel community, to describe a similar course of action, but for a vastly different reason. 

Chadfishers create fake dating site profiles using images of attractive men - commonly referred to as ‘chads’ among the community. They then use those profiles to lure women in, only to ultimately humiliate them, after arranging an in-person date, and sending them on a wild goose chase.  

"In effect, it is a tactic designed to punish, humiliate, and shame women," says political sociologist, Associate Professor Josh Roose. 

"They believe women are only interested in a man's attractiveness, so seek to punish them for this by creating false dates and then not showing up. They share chat records as they string the women out and gaslight them."

Chadfishers will often arrange to meet at locations that require lengthy Uber or Taxi rides, then pretend to be confused about the meet-up spot, convincing their targets to walk hundreds of metres trying to find them. 

Eventually, they'll arrange a video call — covering their own camera with tape so they can't be seen — and once the call is answered, they'll take a screenshot before hanging up and blocking their 'date'. 

The chadfish will then post the image of the woman, along with screen shots of their conversations, to incel forums, not only to only brag, but engage in a horrifying pile-on about the victim’s appearance. 

And they do it with misogynistic glee, justifying their actions by their belief that the women they target deserve what they get, given they wouldn’t give a ‘non-chad’ the time of day. 

How do they get away with it?

With a bit of tech savviness, incels create fake dating app profiles with images they’ve stolen from the internet, using graphic design techniques to get around the verification process. For example, Tinder requires potential users to take a selfie in real time that matches a pose shown by the app. Incels will find another image with a similar pose on a separate device, or take a photo of themselves in that pose, then superimpose that image to the profile image. 

“I verified the Tinder account by Photoshopping the hand gesture onto his picture, enlarging it on my computer screen and taking a picture of that with my phone. It was instantly verified kek (lol) [sic],” explained one user on the incel forum.  

"Verify your accounts on bumble, and tinder using the photoshop, and phone camera of computer screen method. You can create a fake instagram account and upload chad pics over say a month. Call it a fan page in your bio. Then link that fan page to your tinder or hinge account so it displays the picture stream on your dating profile. Women cannot see the name of your insta page nor do you give it to them if they ask [sic].

"Hinge is very easy as it doesn't require verification. Snapchat mods exist so you can send pictures from your camera roll as live snaps. But I mainly use a whatsapp account with a chad profile pic. That is enough for most whores as they're fucking retarded [sic]."

Once they’ve matched with someone, the incel will engage in some lengthy banter, disarming their target, and eventually arranging to meet. Once the woman has travelled to the location (while the incel reamains at home, often in another state or even country), the chadfisher will feign confusion, using fake GPS maps to prove their location, forcing the woman to waste both time and money trying to find them [sic]. 

How to protect yourself? 

There are a few things you can to protect yourself from chadfishes. The first, is to do a little digging before you agree to meet someone. 

Firstly, do a quick Google search of their name and location. If nothing comes up, that’s a red flag. More than likely there will be social media profiles to match though so check these carefully. Is there more than one account under the same name? If so, that's another red flag. Ask yourself: are the images too professional? Do they have any followers/friends? Does the account appear active? 

Next, do a reverse Google image search of their profile image. This will alert you to anywhere else the image has been used. If you find it on an advertisement, a portfolio of models or even another social media page, it’s time to bow out. 

If you’re satisfied with all of that, arrange a video call before meeting your match. 

Two incels illustrate why:

Incel one: LMAO another epic threat bro, you are literally the chadfish king. I was wondering after all those years of chadfishing, what surprised you the most about roasties in general? [sic] 

Incel two: That women are easily manipulated. You can stand them up multiple times as chadfish and they usually don’t learn. They will rarely demand a video call before meeting. [sic] 

"I would also recommend being alert to an individual requesting that they change meeting places more than once, as these interactions are often drawn out for the amusement of the incel on the other end," says Associate Professor Roose.  

"Finally, trust your intuition."

And always remember that whatever you put in writing or on screen can be shared, and in the case of chadfish, most likely will be.

Feature image: Getty

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