Teenage Fury And Misogyny: Netflix's Adolescence Shone A Light On The Toxic Manosphere

Netflix’s Adolescence has become the toast of the television world, sweeping eight Emmys this year, six Primetime awards and two Creative Arts honours.

Owen Cooper, at just 15, made history as the youngest-ever male Emmy winner for his haunting portrayal of Jamie Miller, a teenager who kills his classmate. Stephen Graham, playing Jamie’s troubled father Eddie Miller, added to the show’s triumph by winning Best Actor.

The accolades affirm what audiences already knew: Adolescence is more than a drama. It is a disquieting reflection of a cultural sickness — one rooted in the dark alleys of the online “manosphere,” where influencers like Andrew Tate feed boys and men a steady diet of grievance, misogyny, and rage.

In April 2025, Outlook’s issue “Adolescence” unpacked the real-world anxieties that shaped the series. At its heart was Katie — a girl we never see on screen but never forget. She is 13, she says no, and she is punished for it. Her rejection fuels Jamie’s violence, violence nurtured not only by his loneliness but by a digital ecosystem that insists women deserve retribution for exercising choice.

Katie is not just a character; she is every girl who has been mocked, dismissed, or endangered for daring to live on her own terms. She is us.

The manosphere thrives on painting women as inferior, selfish, or manipulative, and boys as victims who must reclaim lost ground. Though research into its impact is still limited, its influence is unmistakable — shaping mental health, politics, and pop culture alike. What we once believed was hard-won equality now feels fragile in the face of this backlash.

Adolescence doesn’t let us look away. It takes the anger simmering in forums and videos and places it in a small town, a family, a schoolyard. It shows us the cost when boys like Jamie internalize these messages, and when girls like Katie pay with their lives.

This is why the series resonates — and why it matters that it has been recognized on television’s biggest stage. Awards cannot undo the pain or the cultural fractures that inspired the show, but they can remind us to keep looking, to keep listening.

This replug is for Katie, for Avnita, for every girl who grows up in a world that still makes her fight for dignity. It is also for boys like Jamie, caught between vulnerability and indoctrination, anger and isolation.

It is our story, retold in fiction, and now decorated with gold. But beyond the trophies lies the uncomfortable truth: the manosphere is not just a subplot on screen. It is out there, shaping lives, right now.

In the issue, Priyali Sur wrote about the struggles to raise a son in a toxically patriarchal society. We need to create safe spaces at schools and homes where frank conversations can happen without judgement, she wrote.

Dr Manjula Pooja Shroff wrote about the dangers of children excessively using smartphones, saying it will disrupt their sleep patterns and increase the risk of depression, self-harm and suicidal thoughts. Outlook's Managing Editor Satish Padmanabhan, too, pointed out the dangers of over-reliance on screen time calling smartphones and teenage angst a lethal combination.

Avantika Mehta went down the Manosphere rabbit hole undercover as a teenage boy and discovered that beneath the toxicity and anger were young men without a clue about understanding, empathy, and friendship.

Tatsam Mukherjee wrote about how the show Adolescence deals with a parent’s worst fear—What if we’ve given birth to a criminal? There’s no real manual to parenting. How does one keep an eye on their child, without suffocating them and pushing them away, he asked. Meanwhile, Apeksha Priyadarshini reviewed the show from a technical standpoint. Adolescence exposes the deepest, darkest corners of incel culture, male rage, masculinity, manosphere, teenage violence and social media … one long shot at a time, she wrote.

Avnita Koshy-Sukhija explored whether society rewards subjugation and how Adolescence left most of its viewers shocked and schools and news channels are amplifying the conversations that the series managed to start.