The sad truth about ‘Manosphere Mums’: It’s not just HSTikkyTokky’s mother living it up in Dubai… No one else will dare say what I’m about to: AMANDA GOFF

Let me tell you a story. Years ago, some boys – no older than 13 – were running amok at Bondi Beach late one night, where I was living at the time.

They were hurling traffic cones at passing cars, yelling sexist slurs at women, stealing from shops, smoking joints and swigging Jack Daniels.

A relative of mine watched it unfold, grabbed one boy by the collar, marched him home and told his mother exactly what he’d been up to – the drinking, the stealing, the harassment.

‘Oh, my darling!’ she gasped, smothering him in kisses.

‘Are you okay?’ she then asked him, before promptly slamming the door shut.

Recently, I bumped into that same boy in a supermarket in Bondi. Yet again, he was behaving atrociously, stealing meat, mouthing off, causing trouble.

Except this time he was 18 – legally an adult – and it suddenly hit me: he was completely lost. No one had ever clipped him on the ear, let alone made him face real consequences.

And no one had taught him how to respect women, property and people. (I can assure you, if that were my son, he’d be getting more than a gentle lecture…)

It was clear nothing had changed. No one – least of all his mother – had ever taught him how to behave. 

Earlier this week, I watched Louis Theroux’s latest documentary, Inside the Manosphere, which exposes the grotesque world of online ‘alpha male’ influencers.

I’ve got a lot to say about it – but it might not be what you think. 

You see, I can’t stop thinking about that Bondi boy and his mother.

Because while there’s been nothing but outrage, disgust and mockery directed at HSTikkyTokky and his fellow toxic influencers – who claim women are ‘dishwashers’ and belong in the kitchen, and believe in ‘one-sided monogamy’ – nobody is asking the most obvious question: where are their mothers?

In the case of HSTikkyTokky – who I’ll refer to by his real name, Harrison Sullivan, because I refuse to indulge childish social‑media handles – we meet his mum, Elaine Sullivan, now 60, a peroxide blonde with a permanent tan, who seems to live a charmed life thanks in part to her son’s online notoriety.

If his tall tales are to be believed, he bought her a plush Dubai marina apartment, gives her $10,000 a month and bankrolls her now‑lavish lifestyle.

‘Of course there are things I don’t agree with,’ she says to Theroux of her son’s money-spinning online misogyny. ‘But he knows that.’

Does he really, though? And more tellingly, does he actually care?

Let me be clear: I’m not blaming women for the behaviour of their awful sons. I know young men like Harrison often grew up with absent fathers – in Harrison’s case, his dad is former England rugby player Victor Ubogu, who ‘wasn’t in the picture’ for much of his childhood.

Instead, Harrison was raised by his single mum Elaine, who worked six days a week to put him through private school in Brentwood, Essex. 

And for what? For her son to turn out to be a vile, women-hating, ranting twit, who targets impressionable young men with unregulated trading advice?

It’s no secret that men need strong male role models in their lives – fathers, uncles, brothers, coaches, teachers – anyone they can look up to and emulate. 

But boys also need mothers to teach them how to treat women. They say if you want to know what kind of partner a man will be, watch how he treats his mum – the first woman he ever learns to respect.

Here’s the uncomfortable truth: far too many mothers simply look the other way. From Double Bay to Brighton, I see women who will defend their sons no matter what.

Their son cheated on his girlfriend? She drove him to it.

He mouthed off online about a woman being ‘low value’? He was only joking. 

Their son behaved like a spoiled brat in public? He was under a lot of pressure.

He gambles too much? Well, all his mates are doing it. 

Too many mums refuse to admit their sons might be little turds who desperately need a lesson in accountability.

Disturbingly, I’ve seen criminal cases in Australia where the mothers of the accused seem more concerned about their sons ‘throwing their futures away’ than the women whose lives have been shattered.

In courtrooms and across the toxic corners of the manosphere, the pattern is the same: some mothers will twist themselves into knots to shield their sons, even in the face of serious wrongdoing.

As a mother to an adult son myself, I understand it – that fierce love and adoration is real. Accepting the worst would break me – it’s true what they say: a son is a woman’s last true love.

But it raises an uncomfortable truth I can’t ignore: where does maternal loyalty end and accountability begin?

If a mother can’t tell her son his behaviour is wrong, how can any other woman expect to be taken seriously by him?

That’s the heart of it. Sure, I can join the chorus dissecting these young male influencers and their toxic behaviour – it’s obvious, revolting and dangerous.

But almost no one is asking where they came from: who raised them, who perhaps turned a blind eye, who told them they were perfect when they were very far from it. 

The mothers of the manosphere need to look in the mirror. Because while they wrap their sons in cotton wool, the rest of us are left to deal with the men they become.

The reality is most of them don’t become Dubai millionaires. But they do treat women like lesser beings and smirk through life thinking the rules don’t apply to them – because they never really have.

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