Something I’ve always wondered is what kind of women were in the lives of incel men when they were young. Did they have a bad relationship with their mother? Did they lack sisters or other female family members? Or is their family situation irrelevant? Maybe some particular situation in their early years caused them to develop a complex around women?
Hypothesis: what matters here is a social toolbox for engaging with "attractive"/compatible women in a non-romantic/sexual way.
I.e. someone who, even as a teenager, had lots of female friends, is likely to have a learned how to deal with them as persons, beyond "I'd like to hit that".
(Paradoxically, such a person is more likely to find a romantic partner, because they might have lots of M-F acquaintances/friendships that can potentially become something more.)
Someone who never learned that, can only interact with (to them) attractive women through the lens of "I'd like to hit that", which has a much higher risk of ending in failure.
If someone in the second category was always raised on the values of romantic success being a requirement for a non-failed life, and possibly with a touch of chauvinism/misogyny, they might wind up caught up in a frustrating loop of failure.
This is how incels can happen.
Literally having a conversation down thread with someone who thinks like this. It just mystifies me. I'm single by choice. I'm not asexual, I'm reasonably attractive. But I'll tell you I learned the very hard way that romantic relationships will not just magically fill that empty hole in your heart. You gotta learn how to do that for yourself even if you're married.