In the Words of Will Adolphy: Allyship as a By-Product of Empathy

On the way to the gym one day, I was listening to a podcast. The voice I heard had me spellbound. The influencer was speaking to the pain I was feeling inside, in a way that was more validating than anything I’d ever heard, not from my parents, not from school, not from the media. He said things like, “There is nothing less valued than young men,” and “Masculinity isn’t toxic.” Hearing this was deeply relieving. He gets it, I thought. I had found my tribe. Where I belonged.

At the time, I was struggling to leave my room. Panic attacks had become part of daily life. I wasn’t earning money, I didn’t have a girlfriend, and most days I felt trapped in my own head. I was failing, failing to be a man. I wanted to feel better, and online voices gave me direction when nothing else did.

My world soon filled with masculinity influencers offering clear rules on how to live, think, and act. Suddenly, I had purpose. I was reading self-help books, smashing business goals, working out, and in my first relationship. It felt good. For the first time in years, I wasn’t drowning. But something else was happening, and I couldn’t see it.

I was becoming more connected to influencers but more disconnected from myself. My worldview hardened. Everything became binary, right or wrong, strong or weak, us versus them. And I found a convenient enemy to blame in the form of feminism.

I had fallen down a rabbit hole, and I didn’t know it.

What helped me out wasn’t argument or debate. It was empathy. When I finally found spaces where I trusted I could speak without being judged, I began to share what lay beneath the performance I’d carried for so long, the fear, the shame, the loneliness. In those rooms I met people I’d once demonised. At first the conversations felt terrifying, but they became deeply healing.

Within that safety, I started to see how different the real world is from the online one. I realised that, beneath all the noise, we all want the same things: to be seen, to be heard, to belong. Once I felt empathy for myself, I could extend it to others. My worldview began to widen, and I could stay in dialogue with people whose perspectives once felt threatening. That’s the heart of progress.

We have to change the way we speak about masculinity. Too often it’s framed as a problem to be fixed, and that pushes away the very boys we’re trying to invite in. 

Rigid worldviews fester in isolation. 

Without spaces where boys and men have permission to express what they think, feel, and watch online, it becomes impossible to gain perspective on what we’ve internalised.

Support for boys and men means creating spaces of belonging that allow for honesty and openness. The invaluable work that’s already happened in the gender equality space now needs to engage boys and men, because everyone benefits when a boy or a man goes through healing and joins this conversation.

I’ve seen it first-hand. When boys feel validated, their faces light up. Their guard drops. They’re desperate to be engaged, to be seen, to be called in. And once they are, I’m always struck by how much capacity they have for empathy.
That’s why I can’t stress enough the importance of inviting boys in. When the mask drops and we meet, human to human, we all grow.

Allyship is a by-product of empathy.

Will Adolphy shared his story as part of Movember’s research into young men’s experiences online. Movember is a member of the HeForShe Alliance. 
Discover the full insights in the report, Young Men’s Health in a Digital World.