Brazil is seeing a rise in online Red Pill misogyny as violence against women increases, sparking concern, debate and new legislative action
Rio de Janeiro: Alana Anisio Rosa, 20, politely turned down the guy at her gym who kept sending her flowers and chocolates. A month later, he broke into her house and stabbed her about 50 times with a pocket knife.
His mother, Jadralus Anício de Oliveira, 53, encountered the scene in February after returning to her home in São Gonçalo, a city across the bay from Rio de Janeiro.
“He kept stabbing her again and again,” Oliveira told AFP. “I took it off me. My entire living room was covered in blood.”
As Alana emerged from the coma and recovered from multiple surgeries over the following weeks, videos on TikTok of men beating and stabbing mannequins went viral in Brazil with the slogan: “Training if she says ‘no’.”
Oliveira said her daughter’s attacker “followed this specific type of content” on social media.
In Brazil, there is growing concern about a rise in misogynistic “Red Pill” content online, which experts warn could contribute to crimes against women in a country already struggling with high rates of gender-based violence.
In January, after a 17-year-old girl was allegedly gang-raped by five teenagers in Rio, one suspect presented himself to police wearing a T-shirt that read “Regret nothing” – a phrase linked to major “Red Pill” influencers.
Two months later, a military policeman was arrested for allegedly shooting his wife, who wanted a divorce. In text messages published by local media, he describes himself as an “alpha male”, saying she must be the “obedient, submissive, beta female”.
Daniel Cara, a professor at the University of São Paulo (USP), who has researched “red pill” culture – an international phenomenon – said it “legitimizes and encourages” violence against women.
‘Radicalization of men’
Brazil recorded 1,568 murders of women in 2025, the highest number since femicide – a specific, serious form of homicide – became a crime a decade ago.
President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva recently said that “men are becoming increasingly inhumane and violent.”
Estella Bezerra, head of Brazil’s office on violence against women, told AFP she believed online misogyny plays a big role.
“This ‘Red Pill’ material is, at its core, hate speech. It promotes a set of values that threaten to take our society … back to an era of barbarism.”
The term comes from the 1999 hit film “The Matrix,” in which taking the red pill reveals a hidden and often uncomfortable truth.
A study by the Federal University of Rio de Janeiro showed that 123 YouTube channels that spread hatred and promoted control over women had 23 million subscribers in March 2026.
This number increased by 18 percent in two years.
Flavio Rolim, head of the police cyber hate crimes unit, told AFP that although not everyone who consumes such material turns to violence, there is a “process of radicalization” among men.
It begins with exposure to the ideology of “hidden violence” in which men victimized by feminism promote a return to traditional gender roles and male dominance in relationships.
Some men then turn to online communities that “share videos of women being physically assaulted. All day long, content depicting the rape of women circulates there.”
‘Dehumanization of an entire gender’
This content, once hidden in the dark corners of the web, is now easy to find.
A quick scroll through a Telegram group by AFP showed memes about videos of women being raped or beaten. On some platforms, it has become common to describe women as “rapeable” or not.
Rolim said, “This gives rise to a phenomenon that goes beyond mere insensitivity: it is the dehumanization of an entire gender.”
In February, a police operation targeted Brazilian men involved in an international network who drugged and raped women and shared videos of the abuse.
Some conservative commentators argue that the “Red Pill” movement is primarily about male self-improvement and has no connection to femicide.
“They’ve just scapegoated the Red Pill movement and held them responsible for it, even though this kind of thing has been going on for years,” Raem Santos, a Brazilian influencer who frequently engages with the community, said on YouTube.
Experts are particularly concerned about how this content has seeped into young people’s algorithms.
Rolim said police found a group of 15 or 16-year-olds in a chat group saying: “Why would I date a girl when I can rape her?”
Ana Elizabeth Barcelos Barbosa, 13, at a school in Rio de Janeiro, told AFP that influential people were pushing the idea that “the sole purpose of women is to serve men” which was reducing girls’ self-esteem.
“We begin to wonder: Are they really telling the truth?” He said.
Growing concern over this phenomenon has led to a spate of recent legislative proposals.
Lawmaker Reymont Luiz Ottoni Santa Barbara has introduced the “Red Pill Bill”, which aims to criminalize content that promotes violence against women.
Another bill approved by the Senate last month aims to classify misogyny as a crime, similar to racism.
