My Friend, Max Hate

Client: White Ribbon

With toxic influencers rising in the “manosphere”—online spaces where young men are radicalized—White Ribbon urgently needed to counter how misogynistic content targets boys. The challenge: how to reach those who reject authority and turn to influencers for guidance.

The answer was My Friend Max Hate, a darkly entertaining short film that exposes how hate spreads online. Max, a puppet modeled on real manosphere figures, embodies the manipulative tactics used to recruit boys. But Max didn’t stay on screen—he became a TikTok personality, infiltrating the same feeds that fuel misogyny. The campaign earned millions of views and provoked heated backlash from manosphere trolls, while parents and educators rallied to defend it. Now adopted in schools across Canada, My Friend Max Hate is sparking vital conversations between boys, parents, and teachers about online grooming, empathy, and resistance to toxic male role models.