This article is pretty shoddy. It acknowledges that “red/blue pill” comes from the Matrix but then acts like incels were the only ones using it and pushing its evolution as a suffix. When in reality it developed across the whole internet, not just within incel communities. Oldass encyclopedia being out of touch.
“Blackpilled” specifically basically just means pessimistic, doomer, etc. I see it used in this context on a regular basis with no association to incel, rightwing, or misogynist ideologies.
It certainly has its own unique meaning within those communities, but it’s very clear that’s not how OP was using it. To argue they were misusing the term you’d have to prove that most people here associate “x-pill” terminology with incels, rather than directly with The Matrix and/or how the terminology is commonly used on social media by regular people.
I can’t argue the current usage as I’m not terminally online enough anymore to have that knowledge but the original online usage of red-pill and ‘redpilling’ somebody was absolutely intrinsically connected to far-right and incel online spaces.
When you say it “developed across the whole internet, not just within incel communities” this is evidentially wrong. Early use was based around 4chan and manosphere/MRA ‘gender-truths’ and then increasingly co-opted by the alt-right pipeline to invoke a rejection of what they saw as the liberal status quo. Redpilling in its early use was basically slowly radicalising somebody to extreme alt-right viewpoints.
It’s one of the phenomena of linguistic appropriation (matrix redpill & trans-identity notions -> right-wing appropriation, gender standards and conservative values -> wide-spread normalization also outside strictly political contexts) by the right that words like woke, privileged also went through.
I acknowledge it was used within rightwing spaces, even that they had influence over its evolution. But your model implies “pilling” was ever wholly appropriated by rightwing culture, which would require it to have died out in other contexts. And I’m arguing it never did, that it maintained regular usage outside of that context and thus can’t be assumed to be a rightwing signifier.
Even during the blip in time where specifically redpill was associated with manosphere pickup culture, bluepill’s meaning evolved as the counter to it (for those that were exposed to the trend; both terms’ general meanings never entirely vanished), and shortly after there was the ironic/postironic re-appropration of the new form of red pill. So even then one couldn’t assume a person’s ideology solely from usage of x-pill terminology.
But regardless of whether right-wing culture actually successfully appropriated the terminology a decade ago, it since has maintained widespread usage and evolved on its own in quasi-mainstream online spaces. So to claim the OP is mistakenly signaling some sort of incel ideology is questionable at best.
“Woke” is somewhat similar in that its common definition was renegotiated by rightwing appropriation. But in this case the word largely lost any original meaning as it became a floating signifier for rightwing rage. And even in this case, it’d need to be usage of the term as a pejorative to be considered rightwing signaling, usage of the term itself isn’t necessarily so, per se (e.g. people reclaiming the word as pro-woke or using it ironically like dark-woke).
This article is pretty shoddy. It acknowledges that “red/blue pill” comes from the Matrix but then acts like incels were the only ones using it and pushing its evolution as a suffix. When in reality it developed across the whole internet, not just within incel communities. Oldass encyclopedia being out of touch.
“Blackpilled” specifically basically just means pessimistic, doomer, etc. I see it used in this context on a regular basis with no association to incel, rightwing, or misogynist ideologies.
It certainly has its own unique meaning within those communities, but it’s very clear that’s not how OP was using it. To argue they were misusing the term you’d have to prove that most people here associate “x-pill” terminology with incels, rather than directly with The Matrix and/or how the terminology is commonly used on social media by regular people.
I can’t argue the current usage as I’m not terminally online enough anymore to have that knowledge but the original online usage of red-pill and ‘redpilling’ somebody was absolutely intrinsically connected to far-right and incel online spaces.
When you say it “developed across the whole internet, not just within incel communities” this is evidentially wrong. Early use was based around 4chan and manosphere/MRA ‘gender-truths’ and then increasingly co-opted by the alt-right pipeline to invoke a rejection of what they saw as the liberal status quo. Redpilling in its early use was basically slowly radicalising somebody to extreme alt-right viewpoints.
It’s one of the phenomena of linguistic appropriation (matrix redpill & trans-identity notions -> right-wing appropriation, gender standards and conservative values -> wide-spread normalization also outside strictly political contexts) by the right that words like woke, privileged also went through.
I acknowledge it was used within rightwing spaces, even that they had influence over its evolution. But your model implies “pilling” was ever wholly appropriated by rightwing culture, which would require it to have died out in other contexts. And I’m arguing it never did, that it maintained regular usage outside of that context and thus can’t be assumed to be a rightwing signifier.
Even during the blip in time where specifically redpill was associated with manosphere pickup culture, bluepill’s meaning evolved as the counter to it (for those that were exposed to the trend; both terms’ general meanings never entirely vanished), and shortly after there was the ironic/postironic re-appropration of the new form of red pill. So even then one couldn’t assume a person’s ideology solely from usage of x-pill terminology.
But regardless of whether right-wing culture actually successfully appropriated the terminology a decade ago, it since has maintained widespread usage and evolved on its own in quasi-mainstream online spaces. So to claim the OP is mistakenly signaling some sort of incel ideology is questionable at best.
“Woke” is somewhat similar in that its common definition was renegotiated by rightwing appropriation. But in this case the word largely lost any original meaning as it became a floating signifier for rightwing rage. And even in this case, it’d need to be usage of the term as a pejorative to be considered rightwing signaling, usage of the term itself isn’t necessarily so, per se (e.g. people reclaiming the word as pro-woke or using it ironically like dark-woke).