Music is losing a generation of young men

• Netflix’s hit Adolescence has renewed conversation around the radicalisation of young men, particularly in online spaces
• MIDiA’s research highlights that all entertainment is becoming increasingly gendered, with social media platforms displaying a growing gender gap amongst young users
• However, this issue also extends to music, with live music attendance amongst young men plummeting and their spending on video games overtaking music (including live)

Over the past year, there has been increasing attention on the flailing state of young men in Western societies. While many conversations have centred on the radicalisation of young men through misogynistic influencers like Andrew Tate (as outlined by the BBC), there is an emerging evidence base around the declining salaries, participation in higher education and the workplace, and life outcomes of young men (per the Financial Times). According to the Centre for Social Justice, this has even led to the reversal of the gender pay gap amongst young men in the UK.

Into this context has come the timely release of Netflix’s Adolescence, a story about a radicalised 13-year-old boy accused of murdering a girl in his school. The show became the first from a streaming service to top the UK TV ratings (per Variety) and is a statement on a concerning topic that is becoming increasingly pervasive in society. It is also one that the music industry cannot afford to ignore.

Although this is a complex issue with many systemic factors, the spotlight has been shone on social media platforms. In particular, those that are enabling and amplifying the voices of ‘the manosphere’, which is essentially an algorithmic rabbit hole that parades misogyny, violence, and exploitation as a glorified strain of masculinity (as explained by NBC).

So what is actually going on with young men and social platforms? In past years, MIDiA’s global quarterly survey data has reflected relatively consistent platform usage between genders, and this is still true for most age cohorts. However, the past year has seen a growing divide between young men and women aged 16-24. 

Entertainment is becoming increasingly gendered

In Q4 2023, the percentage point gap between 16-24-year-old men and women using Snapchat and Instagram weekly stood at 2% and 5%, respectively. In Q4 2024 that gap is 22% and 17% in favour of young women. TikTok typically skews towards young women and had a gap of 13% in Q4 2023, but this gap has almost doubled and is now at 22%. Conversely, X, which has been derided by mainstream media for its lack of moderation and pandering to the far right, has grown by 32% amongst young men over the past year, with almost a third of 16-24-year-old men using the platform in Q4 2024 compared to a quarter of 16-24 year old women.

It would be far too reductive to pin a single platform for the issues affecting a generation of men. However, research published in the Journal of European Public Policy highlights that young men are gravitating to the far right and platforms – and online content has a role to play in that. Ultimately, this is merely a symptom of a societal crisis among young people overall. As the story of Adolescence shows, young women are sadly too often the victims of young men’s crises. 

What cannot be ignored is that entertainment influences behaviours, and the reality is that some forms of entertainment have done a better job of capturing the attention of young men. Gaming, social media, and podcasting, in particular, have been on the receiving end of the scorn directed at entertainment platforms for pushing a generation of boys into spaces that glorify violence and misogyny. 

However, music deserves some attention not for how it is engaging young men, but for how it is failing to. This is especially the case when we have seen the monthly engagement of 16-24-year-old men with live music decline over the past year, whereas engagement has slightly increased for young women. This is particularly stark for men in the US, where live music engagement has more than halved, not only for young men, but for men under 35.

Streaming is also facing a battle for attention as one in six young men did not stream any music in the past week, whilst gaming and watching videos on social media have become near unanimous behaviours. We are also now at a point where the amount of money spent each month by 16-24-year-old men on games and in-game purchases has eclipsed the amount spent on music and live music.

How music can turn it around 

Music is clearly facing a disengagement trend amongst a generation of young men. The opportunity for the music industry is to ask how it can provide scenes and role models for young men that offer a more compelling take on masculinity than the manosphere behind Adolescence.

To be clear, the absence of positive role models is not necessarily the cause of the issue. The deeper problem is the challenge of music in competing for attention with toxic online spaces. A key reason for this is that music has been pushed further online when so much of its value exists offline. This encompasses wider issues of the breakdown of music education (highlighted by the Ed Sheeran Foundation), the decline of music venues (via Music Venue Trust), and the general inaccessibility of building a music career for the young working class (per NME). 

Music needs to do more to reestablish its social value and appeal in the real world through scene-driven social spaces, particularly for young working-class men. If it can, then it may do a better job in capturing attention and providing purpose for a generation of young men than toxic influencers and online spaces.