Negotiating extremism: Thematic engagement capacity for red pill conversations on Reddit

This study examines thematic and engagement dynamics within r/PurplePillDebate, a Reddit community for deliberation between supporters and critics of anti-feminist “red pill” ideology. We utilize the Analysis of Topic Model Networks (ANTMN) and Content Engagement Capacity (CEC) frameworks to analyze 330,008 posts and comments, identifying 37 topics grouped into themes—Gender Dynamics and Socioeconomic Issues, Relationships and Gender Norms, and Attraction: An Exact Science Versus a Social Construct. We examine themes’ ability to sustain engagement, showing that sexual behavior and market-value topics generate the most replies, while attraction-focused content and deliberative topics generate the fewest. Gender- and norm-related discussions tend to self-reinforce, whereas attraction-related threads diffuse into broader debates. Findings inform the potential and limits of deliberative online spaces to foster cross-cutting engagement, with theoretical and practical implications for facilitating digital conversations and interventions aimed at countering extremist narratives and selective exposure.