I didn’t go on the “Whatever” podcast to be the titular “anti-male red hair feminist” who gets “DESTROYED” (yes, that’s an actual title to one of their videos). I went on the podcast because the Instagram DM they sent me made it sound like a discussion: “We’ll talk modern dating, red flags, gender roles and more!” They also offered me money and free food, and, as a broke student, that was enough to make me say yes.

Guest panelists from the Oct. 12, 2025 livestreamed episode of the “Whatever” podcast. Reporter Claire Kim sits in the second chair from the right.

What I got instead of a discussion was nine hours of questions, bizarre hypotheticals, a host who prided himself on being wildly misogynistic and a 2-inch wide slice of pizza. 

Early in the show, Brian Atlas, 35, the host, pulled up a clip of a woman bowing as the cameraman entered the house. She went on to run around the house, putting away his clothes and hastily preparing his food. He grinned as he played the clip and narrated: “Deep bow, submissive hand posture … love to see it …This is the expectation … I get home — I’m handling everything by the way — I just want a bow when I get home.”

Then he turned to me: “There is no circumstance under which you would bow? What if your husband said: “If you don’t do this, I’ll divorce you?’”

It sounded degrading and humiliating. “You say it’s degrading, disgusting and weird,” Atlas said. “How is it degrading, though?”

He compared bowing to chivalry: “It’s the willingness to do it up front … It’s just the temperature check, in the same way women have this temperature check when it comes to paying for the first date … My expectation is yes, you are going to be submissive, I don’t care what you have to say … You acknowledge that it’s completely benign, it takes no effort.”

Another woman a few seats down from me added: “Why is it attached to being lesser? It’s in so many cultures.”

That was when I asked him to clarify in what circumstance he meant. In my own culture, bowing is seen as a form of greeting or mutual respect and the gesture carries shared social meaning that is neither gendered nor hierarchical. Bowing is a gesture that shows politeness, rather than dominance and submission. He brushed it off. “No,” he said, “it’s just a weird white guy thing.” In American culture, bowing is not neutral or benign, and he even admits that: “Bowing has actually been used in Western cultures … to kings.” It has been historically associated with servitude, power imbalance and deference. What Atlas is really describing is a symbolic reinforcement of hierarchy, the patriarchy and dominance over women as a man. A woman’s physical act of lowering herself to affirm his authority. 

The women nodded along. One said, “If I’m married to a man, I’d want to please him. I’d want to make him happy.” Another said, “For the perfect man, I’d bark like a dog if that’s what made him happy.” 

Later, Atlas turned to what he clearly considers feminism’s biggest mistake: ambition. “Who here wants to pursue a career?” he asked. “For the perfect man — he’s wealthy enough to cover everything — but to be w

Claire Kim from the “Whatever” podcast livestream.

ith him, you have to stop working and take care of the home and kids. Do you give up your career?”

When I said no, I wouldn’t give up my career, he didn’t see any value in understanding why. He just told me I was wrong and said, “It’s the feminist programming that career should be exalted above all else,” as if a woman valuing her own goals is a sign of brainwashing rather than ambition. 

It is so obviously clear that the “Whatever” podcast isn’t a space for “conversation in good faith.” It’s a setup to make independence sound selfish and obedience sound natural. Each new version of his hypothetical is a trap, designed to corner you into self-betrayal. It isn’t about developing conversation; it was about wearing me down until I gave the “right” answer. 

What really got me, though, were the other women on the podcast. Most were in their 30s to 40s: mothers, wives, people old enough to know better. They weren’t paid to be there. They’d driven hours, fans of the show, excited to be part of it. They weren’t being manipulated — they couldn’t be, because they were already sold. 

When the women said things like “Ask her again in a couple of years,” with a tone meant to be maternal, it instead came off as patronizing. It suggests that wanting independence is something that you grow out of. The condescension is its own kind of control, which is how this show works. The pressure doesn’t just come from men yelling; it comes from women reassuring you that submission is wisdom. Watching them nod along, so eager to prove they weren’t like me, made the whole thing feel less like a discussion and more like an initiation.

Unfortunately, “Whatever” isn’t a stand-alone anomaly — it’s part of a whole network of “debate” shows like “Jubilee” and “Turning Point USA Live,” all built to monetize outrage. Every “gotcha” moment is cut into short clips and shoved into social media platforms like YouTube Shorts and TikTok, where the algorithm rewards conflict and humiliation.

This is what people mean when they talk about the alt-right pipeline — a system that slowly radicalizes people through content that feels harmless until it isn’t. The term “alternative right” was coined by white nationalist Richard B. Spencer, who wanted to create a subtler version of white nationalism that could fly under the radar while still spreading its ideas. Instead of hoods or torches, Spencer’s rebrand came with microphones, podcasts and algorithms. It rejected mainstream conservatism in favor of a worldview that blames progress for society’s problems and hides its extremism behind a veil of irony and “free speech.”

And unfortunately, the pipeline works exactly how it was designed to. It’s proven to work well, as exemplified by last year’s election. These kinds of videos gain their power from male grievances and algorithmic radicalization. They feed on resentment and a feeling that men have lost something, that the world owes them more than they are being given. They attract viewers through clickbait titles and “logical” debates that make misogyny sound like common sense.  In this universe, women, feminism and progress become scapegoats for resentment. 

Podcasts like “Whatever” are the softer, more personable faces of this ideology. When Atlas insists that women should bow down to their male counterpart, or when he calls ambition “feminist programming,” he’s repackaging the idea that equality is chaos and submission is order. 

Atlas likes to frame his arguments as rational, armed with statistics and facts, while the women on the panel are painted as emotional, loud and ill-informed. It’s a deliberate contrast meant to reaffirm the same old story: that women are illogical and men know better. 

These shows also work emotionally. The pipeline finds people who feel invisible or powerless and gives them belonging through anger. It empathizes with their pain and points to a target.

It’s a playbook we’ve seen before, even now with the 45th and 47th President of the United States, Donald Trump. Trump turned people’s genuine economic fears and insecurities into hatred of immigrants. The Department of Homeland Security ran Immigration and Customs Enforcement recruitment ads with the slogan “the enemies are at the gates,” framing the deportation of immigrants as heroism. They turn insecurity into identity and hate into purpose. 

The podcast does this same thing on a smaller, more intimate scale. It tells young men that women are the reason they feel lost. It tells them that feminism ruined relationships. It tells them that control will restore balance. It tells them that women wanting careers and independence are what’s destroying families. When my 14-year-old brother, the same brother who has asked me which character in “Sinners” is “Jim Crow” (spoiler: Jim Crow is not a character in the movie “Sinners”), repeats talking points about masculinity and feminism, he’s not just repeating words he hears from shows like these; he’s performing belonging. And when women on the panel echo Atlas, they’re performing survival within patriarchy, proving that they know their place.

Perhaps the radicalism we should really be afraid of isn’t feminism — it’s this. Slow, casual radicalization that teaches people to mistake cruelty for strength, hierarchy for harmony and submission for love. 

When filming ended, Atlas sent me a DM double-checking if I was single and asking if I wanted to get dinner with him. Obviously, I laughed, screenshotted it and posted it to my Close Friends story on Instagram immediately. “Oh yikes, absolutely not,” I replied. But, it proved what I suspected: the loudest defenders of traditional values don’t actually believe in them; they just want control. Atlas doesn’t want a submissive housewife; he just wants a dinner date. Maybe I should’ve told him I’d consider dinner … but only if he bowed to me. 

Claire Kim went on a misogynistic alt-right podcast so you don’t have to.