Adolescence and the irrational power of ‘incel’ ideas | Letter

Wed, 19 Mar 2025

We need to hold up extremist lines such as ‘80% of women are attracted to 20% of men’ to wider scrutiny, writes Adam Fletcher

In his interesting piece about the Netflix drama Adolescence that he co-wrote, and the issues it raises (18 March), Jack Thorne says: “One of the central ideas [of ‘incel culture’] – that 80% of women are attracted to 20% of men – would have made adolescent me sit up and, frankly, nod.”

I think this is one of the easier ideas to respond to – most simply that you could perfectly properly gender-switch this and it would make perfect sense. It’s very likely that 80% of men are attracted to 20% of women – it’s every bit as obvious as the usually quoted idea.