Netflix’s latest crime drama Adolescence reveals how teenagers use emojis as coded messages to spread incel ideology online.

The four-part series follows 13-year-old Jamie Miller, who is arrested for murdering his classmate, Katie, after being radicalised by misogynistic communities online.

One chilling scene highlights how oblivious adults are to this digital subculture. Detective Luke Bascombe misinterprets a string of emojis left by Katie on Jamie’s Instagram as flirtatious—until his teenage son, Adam, explains their sinister meaning.

Adam (played by Amari Bacchus) explains that the dynamite emoji represents an “exploding red pill”, a reference to the manosphere, an online space promoting radical misogyny.

“She’s saying he’s an incel, dad. She’s saying he always will be,” Adam tells DI Bascombe, exposing the belief that only a small percentage of men are desirable to women.

The series also sheds light on the ‘80/20 rule’, an incel belief that 80% of women are only attracted to 20% of men, represented by the 100 emoji.

Meanwhile, the kidney bean emoji is used to identify as an incel, linking to the coffee bean meme, a derogatory online symbol used to mock women.

What do you make of this?