incel
/ˈɪn(ˌ)sɛl/
Word Rarity
Very rare
Frequency: Zipf frequency 1.99 in modern English
7
Scrabble Score
5
Letters
2
Syllables
5
Unique Chars
Meaning
noun
"Involuntary celibacy": the state of being not sexually active despite wishing to be.
Countable; Informal; Uncountable
noun
Someone (especially a man) who desires a sexual relationship but considers themselves unable to attract a partner; (often specifically), a member of an online subculture of people who identify in this way, often adopting resentful or misogynistic attitudes towards women as a result.
Countable; Uncountable
adj
Not having sexual relations despite wishing to.
Example Sentences
- "Though, involuntary celibates (or incels) shouldn't try to rationalize a dateless season or pass off sexual awkwardness as virtue; […]"
- "Another study by Donnelly of seventy-seven incels in marriages or long-term relationships in the Journal of Marriage and Family used a web-based questionnaire to ask people why they stayed in their sexless relationships (defined in this case as no sex for six months)."
- "It is not clear when the term incels was coined, but the link between misogyny and violence against women has emerged on sites where incel communities gather."
- "The incel ideology has already inspired the murders of at least sixteen people."
- "Who are the ‘incels’ and how do they relate to Toronto van attack?"
- "This report finds that the Wiki is a site of attempts to divorce the concept of being an incel from believing in the blackpill, and we argue that this is intended as a means of both expanding the category of incels to make them politically relevant, and dissociating the label ‘incel’ from violent misogyny."
Etymology
Etymology tree Proto-Indo-European *né Proto-Indo-European *n̥- Proto-Italic *n̥- Latin in-bor. Middle English in- English in- Middle English voluntarie English voluntary English involuntarysyl. abbr. Latin caelebslbor. English -ate English celibatesyl. abbr. English incel Syllabic abbreviation of involuntary celibate. Coined by "Alana" in 1997 on an online forum (originally as invcel). Came to widespread usage in the mid-2010s, chiefly online, but now more widespread.
Usage
Inflected Forms
Derived Forms
Phrases
Frequently Paired Words
Synonyms
incelibacy
love-shyness
fuckstration
AFCdom
AFCness
AFC
blue-baller
incel
incelibate
involuntary celibate
love-shy
permavirgin