The Internet Gave Everyone Main Character Syndrome.

Sophie Maskell

1 day ago

3 min read

Updated: 3 hours ago

The Bean Soup Theory, also known as whataboutism, has existed in various forms since pre-Socratic Greece and was utilised by the Soviet Union during the Cold War. Humanity is no stranger to replying to a challenge with a “what about…” statement. However, with the rise of individualism, supported by the popularity of social media, this has effectively been dialled up to 11 in recent years.

Today, it’s hard to open a comment section without seeing at least one “what about…” statement, usually used to criticise the original creator. Similarly, the male loneliness epidemic has been massively accelerated by social media, mostly owing to the rise of incel communities and insecurity related to others’ success.

While it is nothing new, Bean Soup Theory upholds a certain level of ‘rage baiting’ commonly seen on social media at the moment. Commenters and creators alike purposely push inflammatory content in order to increase engagement. This draws on traditional marketing methods often used by celebrities: “any attention is good attention”, first coined by Robert Greene. With the intense oversaturation of social media, particularly TikTok, many influencers have reverted to this method in order to gain any attention and engagement possible. Ultimately, it reeks of desperation in today’s social media landscape.

The male loneliness epidemic, and its attempts to enforce itself on the next generation of boys, relies on individualism and a lack of emotional support for young men. Creators who align themselves with this way of thinking use similar tactics to ‘Bean Soup Theory’ commenters. They emphasise extreme misogyny and teach this as the norm rather than the exception. This encourages those they indoctrinate to see themselves as the most important individual and any women in their lives as lesser. In turn, this isolates them.

Likewise, those who employ Bean Soup Theory when commenting or creating content are often ridiculed by other users in a form of public shaming reminiscent of the medieval era.

As with most things on the internet, individualism has been pushed to the extreme of its original meaning. The idea that an individual’s interests and independence should be protected is not inherently bad, but it has been pushed into a more extreme form, in which those who follow it display an immense lack of care for anyone else.

Both whataboutists and incels subscribe to this way of thinking, with the former often in disbelief that someone on social media hasn’t considered their unique situation or circumstances before posting something. In the same way, incels often blame women for not desiring them romantically, rather than considering that their own misogynistic behaviour may be off-putting to the majority of women.

Not every man affected by the male loneliness epidemic is an incel, but the wording alone implicates an outside force to blame rather than addressing the real root of the issue. It can be seen as an extreme version of Bean Soup Theory, with many men considering their lack of romantic and sexual success to be someone else’s problem.

While Bean Soup Theory is often joked about online and blamed on the rise of anti-intellectualism, an arguably problematic term in itself, it does highlight some of the real issues associated with our extreme global connectivity. Similarly, much of the male loneliness epidemic is caused by men seeing the romantic success of others: the lifestyles we desire but haven’t achieved are often shoved down our throats by algorithms.

Much as Tantalus was punished by the gods in Tartarus, social media algorithms have learnt that constantly feeding us aspirational content, while keeping it just out of reach, fuels our desire and engagement, regardless of the detrimental effect this has on our mental health. Arguably, if incels had never seen the extreme romantic success of other men on social media, they may never have desired it to the point of the extreme misogyny we see in society today. Similarly, if someone allergic to beans hadn’t been shown the original bean soup recipe video by her algorithm, the trend might never have taken off.

Unfortunately, continued negative engagement is seen by algorithms as just engagement, meaning this niche of content is increasingly pushed towards those it is impacting. Influencers have cottoned on to this, utilising it as a form of rage bait, as mentioned earlier.

There has always been a human desire to want what you can’t have, and social media has effectively commercialised this desire in order to make a profit.