The internet is a scary place for women. The average user doesn't see internet misogyny on a regular basis as their use is limited to Facebook or Twitter, talking to people they know in real life. However, this phenomenon becomes more obvious when you step into the more anonymous zones of the web. People who post to forums like Reddit and 4chan are identified only by a username or post number, and as a result are free to post anything without fear of consequence.
There have a been a number of recent examples that highlight the dangers of anonymity. Many of these concern women's privacy and internet presence: the massive-scale celebrity nude photo leak of 2014 (dubbed "The Fappening"), the widespread harassment of female gamers and internet feminists in 2014-15 (dubbed "Gamergate") and the existence of men's rights forums that decry feminism and believe men are the real victims of discrimination.
Some communities shut women out entirely, or provide horrible conditions to be accepted. The most famous example is 4chan's classic line "tits or gtfo", meaning that the female user must post a picture of her chest or be rejected. To this day, this is posted without exception any time a female admits her gender on the most popular boards of 4chan. Some users would argue that this is a running meme or joke that everyone is in on, but it still works to turn away most female users who stumble upon the site.
This rejection of women can run deeper than just idle comments. Many users have become so entrenched in the subculture of misogyny and fear of women that they have chosen to reject the entire gender. Some aspects of this are tongue-and-cheek and just designed to poke fun at the lonely nerd stereotype of internet users, such as the designation of "Wizard" that is achieved when a man remains a virgin until the age of 30. In other cases this rejection of women can take on a darker tone and may blur the line between joke and reality. This is easiest to observe on the 4chan board for Anime and Manga, known as /a/.
/A/nons, the self-styled title for posters, often post about their girlfriends and love interests in a way that would seem bizarre to the average onlooker. These wives and girlfriends are not people they speak to in real life at all. Rather they are referring to their "waifu", a Japanese pronunciation of the word "wife" that essentially means an imaginary anime girlfriend. The /a/nons pick a girl from their favorite show or comic and engage in a pretend (or real, depending how you look at it) romance with their object of affection.
"Object of affection" really is the best term to describe a "waifu". She is quite literally an object, a plastic figurine or still frame of animation that a man has grown attached to. This is a relationship that is free from the trappings of consent and the stress of balancing another's needs with your own. She is a woman with a perfect figure who is always loyal and never complains, one who only exists on the man's terms.
This may seem like a harmless channeling of lonesome frustration but it can form a darker mentality. Pictures of real women are called "3DPD" standing for "Three Dimensional Pig Disgusting" to describe the imperfections of people in real life. People with "waifus" may completely give up on real world romance as it cannot live up to the expectations created by a perfectly proportioned, submissive girlfriend who only speaks up in their own imagination.
This is a very extreme example that only exists in a small sub-community of a larger image board and shouldn't be taken too seriously, but it does stand as an example of how dangerous this type isolation can become. What happens when this mentality is adopted by a sociopath who channels the resentment toward women into hatred? The UCSB shooter Elliot Rodger concluded his pre-shooting manifesto with the following statement: "All I ever wanted was to love women, and in turn to be loved by them back. Their behavior towards me has only earned my hatred, and rightfully so! I am the true victim in all of this."
