Even though it’s been two weeks since Adolescence dropped on Netflix, people are still analysing scenes, unearthing clues, and looking for hidden meanings in the critically-acclaimed four-part series. ICYMI, the show explores the online radicalisation of teenage boys via the story of 13-year-old Jamie Miller (played by Owen Cooper), who’s accused of murdering his classmate Katie (Emilia Holliday) after she rejects his advances and calls him an incel.

One element that’s been particularly poured over is the revelation that a bunch of innocuous-looking emojis — which Katie commented under Jamie’s Instagram posts — actually have a variety of hidden meanings.

Among them is the 100 emoji (💯), which, in episode two, student Adam (Amari Bacchus) tells his police officer dad is code for the so-called 80/20 rule. As he explains it: “80% of women are attracted to 20% of men. Women, you must trick them because you’ll never get them in a normal way. 80% of women are cut off… she’s saying he’ll always be an incel.”

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Jamie himself later expands on this in a conversation with psychologist Briony Ariston (Erin Doherty) after his arrest. “She’s saying I’m part of those truth groups that say women don’t want us and don’t care,” he says in episode three, referring to incel groups. Jamie goes on to claim he’s not an incel, but looked into it because “everyone kept going on about it”. That’s where he came across the 80/20 rule which, he tells Briony, he thinks incels “are right about”.

Many self-identifying incels believe their lack of success with women comes from the fact that they never had a chance in the first place. Most women, they say, want the ‘top’ 20% of men, AKA the most attractive, most masculine men (many incels even try to ‘looksmaxx’ to edge closer to this coveted position). Women, then, are to blame for incels’ lack of romantic success because they’re ruling them out without getting to know them.

Except, obviously, this is total BS. This belief allows incels to maintain a victim mentality, rather than interrogating what they might be doing to repel romantic prospects (hint: it’s often their misogynistic beliefs) or acknowledging that it might just take time and effort to meet someone they’re compatible with. It’s also just a major oversimplification of how attraction works.

“Who we find attractive is totally arbitrary,” says sex and relationship coach Lucy Rowett, “and it’s not just about looks. It doesn’t matter if you’re the most physically handsome man in the world — if as soon as you open your mouth, nasty things come out, women are going to back the hell away from you. Attraction is about looks, sure, but it’s also about attitude, energy, and personality. It’s about chemistry, the feeling a person triggers in you, or things they unconsciously remind you of. Human desire is so complex.”

Beyond that, the 80/20 rule just doesn’t make any sense in a dating context. “Look around you,” continues Rowett. “Look at people you know who are in relationships. I’m not saying you should judge people by their looks, but [you don’t just see] women dating models.”

This idea is actually a misinterpretation of something called the Pareto principle, which suggests that 80% of consequences come from 20% of causes. It’s often applied in business and work (e.g. 80% of a company’s output is produced by 20% of its workers), but can also be applied to society (80% of the wealth is owned by 20% of the population) or the individual (80% of family problems are caused by 20% of issues). The principle is often used to boost productivity by enabling employers, employees, or people in their personal lives to manage their time better.

It makes sense that a business principle used to boost productivity, efficiency, and ultimately success has bled into the manosphere, which encourages self-betterment (with the goal of attaining wealth and social status) above all else. Self-betterment in this context, though, tends to rely on adhering to a toxic and archaic form of masculinity (men don’t cry; men should be breadwinners; men should have lots of sex).

“People are always looking for hacks or rules that are easy to remember, and the manosphere is very good at making these super simple,” says Rowett. “It’s easier [to digest] that the reason you’re single is because women hate you and feminism is bad.”

In reality, this kind of thinking is only doing harm — both to the young men who believe it and the women they blame for their plight. “This belief can feed into pre-existing self-esteem issues and could potentially lead someone to develop things like body dysmorphia or eating disorders,” Rowett continues. “Even if you did completely change the way you look, it wouldn’t change your dating outcomes because satisfying relationships are based on so much more than looks. You’re just setting yourself up for unhappy dating and relationship patterns.”

She concludes: “There are no upsides to following this bullshit, made-up rule that doesn’t exist.”