Femcel Culture: Why One YouTuber's Breakup Is Now Everyone's Problem

Wizard Liz, a prominent self-love Youtuber recently revealed that her fiancé Landon cheated on her while she was four months pregnant. The influencer with over 80 lakh followers also announced that she was donating $50,000 (roughly ₹40 lakhs) of her own money to support single mothers. Liz, whose legal name is Lize Dzjabrailova, quickly garnered massive support online, with fans applauding her strength in calling out the betrayal. 

The cheating scandal quickly went viral, mainly because it clashed with the "high-value woman" image Liz had built over the years. This wasn't just her personality, it was her masterfully-curated brand. Wizard Liz started her YouTube channel about three years, posting videos about self-worth, 'dark femininity', and setting high standards, especially in heterosexual relationships. 

Many social media users claim that Liz is a part of an online subculture called femcels, short for 'female incels', which focuses on women's hyper-independence, strong boundaries, and levelling up. These communities have grown rapidly in recent years, fueled by influencers who blend self-help advice with glamourised narratives of revenge and self-improvement.

While Liz herself has not identified as a femcel, her content has often overlapped with key femcel themes—romantic skepticism, emotional detachment, and the rejection of male validation as a source of self-worth. With videos titled "Stop dating broke guys" and "Understand how valuable you are," she reinforced the narrative of uncompromising standards.

'If it can happen to Liz...'

In October 2024, Liz posted a video titled 'I am getting married', with a thumnbnail of her and Landon looking happy and hopeful for their new life. However, just months later, the revelation of Landon's cheating came as a rude surprise to her online community. The very influencer who preaches setting unbreakable boundaries was betrayed by a man she trusted.

Fans could not help but ask, "If even Wizard Liz gets cheated on, can we ever trust a man?" The recent developments in Liz's life have in fact further strengthened femcel culture. Her heartbreak has reinforced the femcel culture's core beliefs about the unreliability of men and the importance of emotional self-sufficiency. And that's actually dangerous.

Men and women are no longer equal?

Lately, almost every post on social media seems politically motivated, in the most frivolous way possible. A post of a woman driving a fancy car would have comments reading, "Bet her boyfriend bought her that." Every other female podcaster says things like "He told me he has depression and that gave me the ick." Everything is gendered and divided.

Dr Jilly Kay, a Communication and Media professor at Loughborough University, coined the term 'femosphere' for the online communities for femcel discussions. “You might almost call this anti-feminist feminism. That’s what I see in the femosphere a lot,” she told The Guardian.

The femosphere is one such space where this hyper-politicisation of everyday life thrives. While the femosphere can provide much-needed solidarity and validation for many women, it mostly tends to amplify generalised distrust of men. Like the 'manosphere,' the femosphere too promotes the idea that the opposite sex is simply a commodity.

The manosphere believes that women are only good for sexual satiation or domestic convenience, while the femosphere believes that men are only good for financial gain. Emotional support and complexity are nil in either cultures. Ironically, while the ideologies are completely opposing, both 'spheres' are interdependent in upholding traditional gender roles.

This polarised atmosphere is breeding a host of "influencers" who propogate toxic dynamics and fuel distrust between men and women. They also encourage followers to adopt defensive, often cynical attitudes toward the opposite sex. Not only is such content heteronormative, but it also reducing complex real-life relationships to simplistic, adversarial narratives. 

Politicisation of Wizard Liz breakup

Wizard Liz’s story serves as a cautionary tale. Despite projecting strength and high standards, she too faced betrayal—showing that no amount of boundary-setting or self-empowerment can fully shield someone from the complexities of human behavior. Rather than inspiring empathy or a balanced conversation, her experience has been weaponised to validate extreme views.

Liz and Landon's separation should have been just another story of a social media couple breaking up but it has become a spectacle for creators, who have no connection to them, to milk content out of. Liz's situation should have been met with support and privacy but is becoming the hot topic in the femosphere, with many even ridiculing her for her "proximity" to a man. 

The saddest thing is that Liz is being reduced to a symbol of success, failure, or 'dark femininity' instead of being seen as a real person navigating a messy public breakup. Her situation reminds us that the world is not a binary; even the strongest of us face betrayal sometimes. With today's political climate, it is becoming increasingly important to shift away from our limited perception of gender and relationships. 

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Views expressed by the author are their own.