Is there actually such thing as a femcel

Femcel chapter 1

They say there are no femcels because women who struggle finding a partner, romantic or sexual, aren’t really involuntary celibates like incels are. Femcels are actually volcels, meaning if they really wanted to they could, and they would.

This argument bespeaks a lack of understanding of women’s sexualities, but I won’t go over it, simply because it’s too obvious in my opinion to understand how, even if the desires of incels are different or have less terms and conditions attached, both their and femcels’ situations are similar, precisely in how involuntary they are.

The thing though is, the desires are different but not that much; both incels and femcels actually do have access to sex, the former via sex work, and the latter because many men don’t mind having sex with women they’re not attracted to. What’s the problem then. The issue is obviously one of desirability, not of access to sex, or of free sex for incels. Just like sex with a prostitute doesn’t fix the incel’s issue, sex with a man who wouldn’t mind fucking you even if he isn’t attracted to you doesn’t fix or soothe the femcel’s issue.

I’m what they call a “rare true femcel”, or I was, until I turned into a volcel like the rest of us women who just “can’t find a good guy”. I’m not so sure anymore, but I think even using and being aware of the existence of a term such as volcel supports the argument that I might indeed be a true femcel. I don’t think a normal grass-touching, date-going, sex-having woman would use such an unemployment-coded term.

Anyways, like Virginie Despentes said in the the femcel bible KingKong theorie, chapter 1, I am - for reasons that keep changing- one of “all those girls who don't get a look in the universal market of the consumable chick.”

What shall I start with ?

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I was born and raised in a moderately religious family, in an patriarchal society of a country I’d place between 2nd and 3rd world. Erudite authoritarian father, but not the pious type. My mother was more religious, but less tyrannical, at least compared to my father. We lived in a large and enclosed house, my sister, my parents and I.

Highly competitive schooling, no fun, no games, no going outside appart from school or accompanied, by mom or dad. Thank god that house was big. I started losing my natural capacity to make and keep friends around age 13, as I could never go to any birthday party, nor the movies, and always had to invent excuses, or just say my parents said no. Unless that friend’s dad was a friend of my dad, in which case I was occasionally allowed to spend an afternoon at the friend’s house.

My mother was a paranoid social anorexic who hated the idea of intimate or close-knit friendships. She’d reprimend me for hours when she’d find out about anything that indicated I was developping one with someone. Especially if it’s a girl who isn’t too shy and studious. As to home life, mom was overworked and unloved, so she’d find relief in yelling at us for hours, or beating us regularly. We were lazy, untidy and ungrateful children. On Sundays, during holidays, after school, on our way to school, on our way to our grandmother’s house, we were always lazy, untidy, ungrateful. As to my dad, I was scared of him. He wouldn’t beat us or yell at us with the same frequency that my mom sustained, it was more like a bi-annual wrecking of everything in his periphery, screaming like a monster, and us hiding under or behind the nearest piece of furniture, waiting for it to end, holding our breaths and expecting the worse. Is he going to grab a knife and just stab one of us, or himself ? Or is he just going to finish smashing all the plates and cups he finds until our eardrums shatter too ? It would last for two hours on average, and every year, by September, I’d start apprehending the eruption of the crater, if it hadn’t already happened some time during summer.

Summer was spent locked at home, because mom’s exhausted, it’s too hot outside, or too dangerous, and where would you go anyways. Covid quarantines threw me back to those times. So evidently, thank god for the internet; I don’t know what or who I would’ve become without it. My home actually, was the internet. The living room was Youtube, where I got into Nicki Minaj and started learning her rap verses phonetically, as English wasn’t our first language. But I got so fascinated by American pop culture world it propelled me to a decent level in learning english, impressing teachers and informing my peers of the all the lore MTV France didn’t dub. It was the time when we'd watch The Vampire Diaries on streaming websites, and watch X-Factor clips of 11-year-olds belting Whitney Houston's 'I Will Always Love You,' or 'I Have Nothing.

School was hard, tonnes of pressure from my parents to be the best, all-nighters at age 15, unending school days, but I had a few good friends, and though I wasn’t a pretty girl, I wasn’t bullied much for it, and many of us at school were too absorbed by grades and the viability of the road to reproduce our parent’s middle class status to care about teenager things anyway.

For some reason I’d always have a very cute bestfriend. And we’d love each other so much. BFFs. And with them I’d get to understand and witness how pretty girls are spoken to, how simpler it is to make friends, how their confidence and attitude would progressively solidify on the firm grounds of regular and varied external validation.

My journey was diametrically opposed, as I was growing up, more and more puberty related unpleasantnesses would colligate in my face and body, turning clothes and hair into layers of fig-leaves I’d hide under, and confidence into something I’d have to “work on”. To be fair, I didn’t really need to. My parents imposed a strict no beautification protocol that I struggled to talk about with my peers at school; in our elitist bubble, strict conservative parenting was seen as a indicator of low socio-economic status.

The unibrow had to stay absolutely intact, no braces, no skirts, no dresses, no nail polish, hair had to be tied up neatly at all times, no makeup of any sort, no shaving, waxing but only exceptionally, when my mom was in the mood to take me to the aesthetician. As a result, my uniform became jeans, cardigans, and a claw-clip so I could let my hair down and clip it back up when I got back home, and extra large earrings to compensate for the femininity I wasn’t allowed to explore.

I didn’t care too much about it, as none of the boys at school were cute anyways. Except for one or two, for whom I'd develop a secret crush. I’d create romantic fantasies in my mind of impossible scenarios, mostly incomplete and deformed by shame; feeling creepy for being such an unattractive girl, wanting such a beautiful boy. I would try to divert the shame with guilt; the knowledge that at the end of the day, my parents would kill me if they found out, so I wouldn't have risked it anyway. Also, my crushes at the time were mostly the 30 year old American actors who play teens with supernatural powers, or one of my teachers, charismatic 50 year old with a 5 o’clock shadow who’d pay us no mind, but that’s also what made him so charismatic.

And most importantly, I was the funny and studious one. Me with a boy ? Grotesque. Everyone, including myself, agreed on this. I had male friends at some point, it was a good time, I loved the camaraderie and the laughter. Until I realised, they mostly befriended me for homework, and because my company felt to them like they were putting all the chances on their side to succeed academically.

I got bitter about it, but again, it’s not like I wanted them anyways. I was into Beyoncé’s new eponymous album, and would channel my burgeoning femininity when I’d dance in my room with my headphones on, when my parents were out. I’d fantasize about fancier worlds, cuter boys, a prettier face, flatter tummy, a hairless body and of course, Victoria’s secret wings and a fitspo thigh gap. I was content with my current life though, as long as I was able to picture and see a better one not too far into the future. One in which I was beautiful, and free. This aspiration and the light I’d see in my brown eyes when I’d put on some of my friends’ mascara in the schools’ toilets were enough to keep me sane as I waited for hours in the rooms I was consecutively locked in at school or at home. I patiently waited to finally get to leave this jail after highschool, and leave all the bad and ugly there too.

• Femcel pt. 2