9:14 AM 4/4/2025 Fri
NOTE: The following open letter is in reference to an interview conducted by Steven Bartlett of the "Diary of a CEO" channel on YouTube, which was posted on Mar 31, 2025.
Hello Steve,
My name is Mumia Obsidian Ali and I'm a podcaster, author and one of the founding fathers of the Black Manosphere Conclave, an annual gathering of Black men from around the world united in the purpose of excellence, achievement and self-improvement in all areas in life. Since launching in 2021, we've put over 700 Black men through our STEM course with the bulk of them getting high paying jobs in that sector, having generated upwards of $10M USD in salaries. Moreover, since the conclave of 2023 in Atlanta, five conclave brothers have gotten married, all to African women in Africa itself, from Morocco to South Africa. Fathers now bring their sons and vice versa, making the conclave a truly family affair. We convene again in Miami September 5-7, 2025. We would be delighted if you could join us!
Second, I want to praise you and your "Diary of a CEO" team for your hard work and achievements, contributing to the discourse surrounding men's issues in our time; I have been following your work on YouTube for quite some time now. Much continued success to you!
I am very familiar with Prof. Galloway's and Ms. Ury's work and have followed them for sometime now as well. Your recent in-depth interview with them shed much light on quite a few things that I wanted to address in this letter.
First, NO, I do not believe that "dating apps are causing/creating Incels". My reasons for saying this is twofold: One, because that isn't what the research has revealed to the best of my understanding - and here I am drawing primarily on the superlative work of Mr. William Costello who has specialized in the Incel phenomenon. Per his researches, the primary drivers or creators of Incels seem to be them having marked mental illness, being "NEET" (Not in Education, Employment or Training), and living in economically depressed areas of the country (Costello's work mainly covers the USA and the UK). To be sure, social media has played a role to the degree that it has allowed Incels to form up communities of likeminded men to commiserate, trade notes and share stories - but that wouldn't be any different from any other online community that has formed in the years since social media has been invented. Again, I am not aware of any researches he has conducted where he suggests that dating apps have somehow contribute to the rise of Incel culture.
Second, and this is more personal answer, I do NOT believe that ANY app - dating or otherwise - can "make" anyone do anything. At the end of the day, we all are adults with the ability to engage or not to engage with apps, social media or the wider internet. If one is having difficulties in dating, chances are that dating apps have relatively little to do with it, and one's problems are to be found in other areas that are largely within their power to control, at least to some degree. One of the areas Prof. Galloway and I are in full agreement on is that men have a lot more power and personal agency than they give themselves credit for, and the onus is on them/us to reclaim that power and agency.
With that said, and going back to Galloway in particular, I DO agree with his assessment of the realities of dating apps for the rank and file man today - my problem with Galloway is that he is only cosigning what we in the Manosphere have been saying FOR YEARS. For example, he agrees with us when we talk about the 80/20 Rule - that women online gravitate to a small number of men who are in their view sexually attractive. Galloway has slapped a new label on it calling this "Porsche Polygamy" but the result is all the same.
Another example: Galloway's sage advice about "getting fit, getting money and getting a life" is something the Manosphere, Red Pill and Pickup Artist communities have been saying for several decades at this point in various online settings and iterations. No one in the Manosphere, no matter how you define it, has ever demurred away from the importance of men doing what they need to do in their lives to move the needle.
Yet another example: Galloway's point about the power of male humor in the female calculus of mate value assessment and attractiveness is again, something that has long been known among the Manosphere's denizens. There is no disagreement here.
What there IS a very large degree of disagreement between Galloway and the Manosphere, is how the latter talks about women and their behavior. In fact, Galloway and his fellow travelers - Richard Reeves, Chris Williamson, Macken Murphy, Alex Datepsych and Rob K. Henderson - collectively dubbed the "Intellectual Manosphere", have an "argument" that simply boils down to this:
"We don't like what you say about women; we don't like how you talk about women".
Note that they never actually address the arguments being made; all of them will make attempts to do so, often appealing to their own authority (a Class A logical fallacy, I might add). But, as I've demonstrated with Galloway above on your show, they really don't disagree with the observations the Manosphere has made about their behavior; they just don't like that 1. That we actually TALK about women as major agents in the mating dance; and 2. That they don't like HOW we talk about women's behavior. That's really about it.
Galloway and his cohorts are attempting to do what Filipino Martial Arts practitioners call "defanging the snake" - they're trying to strip out what they see as the Manosphere's objectionable commentary about women and their behavior, from what they simply cannot deny is the Manosphere's core message about the "Three G's" I referenced above. My personal view is that this approach is doomed to fail, for several simple reasons:
1. Because the Manosphere already has these "Three G's" bases covered, and has a longer track record of achievement and accomplishment in doing so;
2. Because Galloway in particular is trying to appeal to his fellow travelers on the American sociopolitical Left to "Save The White Males" and evidence on his own social media strongly suggests that it's a nonstarter among White women in particular;
3. Because men will rightly see Galloway and others as merely pandering to what women want to hear, instead of taking a truly "fair and balanced" approach, like my late friend Kevin Samuels did in his work on YouTube (I assume you're familiar). They will see it as attempting to dodge some painful truths about the behavior of a not insignificant number of women in our time - and worse, Galloway, Reeves and others are in fact adopting a rather low view of men: That they cannot hold two ideas in their heads at one time. It IS possible to work on oneself, improve oneself, get fit, make money and be more interesting, AND call out the bad actors among women on the mating Savannah. The two need not be mutually exclusive at all. So long as this is the case, Galloway will have limited real world impact in my view.
For Ms. Ury's part, only one thing really leapt out at me regarding her remarks, and that was her notion that men begin reading fiction books written by and geared to women, as a way to better understand them. Indeed, educated Black women are documented in being the most well read Americans in the country, but the books they read are largely either fictional works like "The Color Purple" by Alice Walker, or "Their Eyes Were Watching God" by Zora Neale Hurston. While I will concede Ms. Ury's point about some informational points about the worldview of women can indeed be gleaned by perusing the fictional works they like to read, I also am personally of the view that I can and do glean much more real time information about the lives of Black women, their behavior and why they engage in it, from nonfiction works like "A Billion Wicked Thoughts", "Why Women Have Sex", and "The Evolution of Desire". Thus far, I haven't gone wrong in taking this approach - but again, that's only me, and I've always been one to respect the individual approaches of other men and their ability to decide for themselves.
All in all, your long form interview "Masculinity Debate: Are Dating Apps Creating Incels?! Lonely Men Are More Dangerous Than Ever!" on YouTube was not only interesting, it was confirmation that the Manosphere was onto something all along after all. I am very proud that we have made our concerns not only a cause celebre'; but that we have made it rise to the top of the national social agenda. That, is something to celebrate!
Sincerely,
Mumia Obsidian Ali
Black Manosphere Conclave
#diaryofaceo #scottgalloway #loganury #incels #masculinity