"LOVE RESEARCHER & SOCIAL MEDIA INFLUENCER" DR. ADAM BODE RESPONDS TO MY OPEN LETTER (OR, WHY I WRITE)

8:59 AM 9/30/2026 Wed

Yesterday you will kindly recall my coming across one Dr. Adam Bode and his video "Average number of sexual partners for women". It was about the incendiary topic of "body count" - how many previous sexual partners women have had - and the claim that "the Manosphere has been lying to you". As I noted in my open letter yesterday, that video has gone viral in less than 24 hours - amassing well over 300K views alone. To say that I was cut to the quick would be an understatement. 

My response was swift and sure, firing off a nearly 2,500 open letter making the case that Dr. Bode, respectfully, hardly made his case: He failed to specify who in the Manosphere made such mendacious claims in the first place - and that was just for starters. 

After I posted my open letter to the Black Manosphere website, made it a free post on my personal Patreon (which you should definitely be a member of, I might add) and posting it publicly to my Facebook fan page (Obsidian Radio Live - not at all hard to find there), I decided to send my open letter to Dr. Bode directly via Instagram Direct Messenger. That was shortly after high noon Philly local time:

"Good afternoon Dr. Bode, my name is Mumia Obsidian Ali, and I saw your viral video clip about how the Manosphere was supposedly "lying" about women's body count; I thought to hammer out my thoughts in response: 

https://blackmanosphere.com/blogs/news/an-open-letter-to-love-researcher-dr-adam-bode 

I'm very much looking forward to your response - I'd love to have you on my podcast to discuss! Thanks and looking forward to hearing from you soon!"

Shortly before 9PM local time yesterday evening, I received the following reply via Instagram Direct Messenger from Dr. Bode: 

"Tue, Sep 29, 2026 8.41PM - 10.06PM Australian Local Time

"Hey mate. Thanks for the engagement. I appreciate the opportunity to one on and discuss this issue. I'm gong to decline, not because of anything about your podcast or you, but because I tend not to perform well in debates, and I'' not prepared to put int he time to background myself sufficiently to put on a good performance. Look, I don't think that we necessarily disagree that much. I reported the median, which is more useful than mean for getting  a general understanding of a skewed population. The mean form the GSS is higher than the man (3.4 for 18-24; 6.5 for 25-34; 7.3 for 35-44, 7 for 45-54; 6.7 for 55-64; and 3.8 for 65+). The issue is that the mean is not meaningful, and at the very least, the trimmed mean should be used, which brings the numbers down a fair bit. I'm goin got do a series of video that address this issue in more detail accurately. I must not, I do regret giving the title I did to the video - I should have said, the manosphere is misleading, not lying. 

Thanks mate.

Tue 9:03 PM

Also, if you are into reading about mating, there is a cool book you should consider reading: Bonded by Evolution by Paul Eastwick.

Also, please check out my latest video."

The "latest video" that Dr. Bode is referring to, is called, "Getting Women's Body Count Right" and appeared yesterday evening (Tue, Sep 29, 2026). It can be viewed in its just under three minute entirety here: 

Getting Women's Body Count Right
https://www.instagram.com/reel/Dd5NjH2ygY8/

Because I'm OCD like that, I took the liberty of obtaining the text transcript of the video in question, which I present below: 

"Let's get women's body count right. I'm Dr. Adam Bode, interdisciplinary love researcher. No advice,
just science. For science-based insights into your sex life, I can write a report for you. DM me,
and I'll send you a link to a pre-launch on my sex life report. It's absolutely amazing, guys. So a
couple of days ago, I published a video about number of sexual partners by women in the US using
data from the General Social Survey. I got a lot of feedback, uh, a lot of it from men, but some of
it from women, uh, suggesting that what I was posting was nonsense. Now, I have to come clean. I
didn't handle that video very well. Look, I, I do a little bit of research, I get the data, I jump
in front of the phone and, and I record. Um, often I don't have the nuance, I haven't prepared, that
sort of thing. So I apologize if I've misrepresented anything or you think I haven't done a good
job. What I would say is that the two criticisms that I, I genuinely believe are, are fair in that
respect were my use of the title. I had the word average in the title. I shouldn't have used
average. I wasn't talking about average. I was talking about a median, which is different. Um, the
other thing I said was the manosphere is lying to you. Look, that was probably a bit clickbaity, and
I apologize to members of the manosphere for potentially misrepresenting your intentions. Uh, what
would have been more accurate to say was the manosphere is misrepresenting the data, and that's
because I said the median number was more informative than the average number. So the average takes
all the number of people people have slept with and, and finds... We know what the average is. The
median is the middle number. So you take a thousand women, and you take the five hundredth woman,
and that number, uh, is the median, and I think that's more representative. Now, everybody's saying,
"No, no, average, average, average. The average is higher." Yes, the average is higher, and so what
I'm gonna do is tell you the average, uh, for women in a number of age groups, but I'm gonna use the
five percent trimmed mean, which is the five percent average. Uh, so we cut five percent off the
very top and five percent off the very bottom 'cause those misrepresent the data a lot. So eighteen
to twenty-four, the five percent trimmed mean is three point four partners. Twenty-five to
thirty-four, six point five partners. Thirty-five to forty-four, seven point three partners.
Forty-five to fifty-four, seven partners. Fifty-five to sixty-four, six point seven partners. And
sixty-five plus, three point eight partners. So that is a lot higher than the mean, because like I
said, there's other people that gather towards the top. Um, but I don't think it's as, is as high as
many people are suggesting. Now, I don't wanna get too caught up on women's body count at this
stage. Um, I'm gonna do a video or two on men's body count, but then I will return to this topic,
where I wanna talk about the most common number of partners, uh, women have had, and also the skew,
how people who have slept with more people tend to locate on the edges."

I am pleased that the good doctor has retracted his core claim - that the Manosphere was "lying to you". He now says that we "misrepresent the data". Hmmm. Based on my open letter - now a matter of public record, per the above - if I were indeed misrepresenting the data he certainly didn't point it out in either his direct reply to me, nor in his publicly posted video. So while I appreciate and accept his mea culpa, the question remains as to exactly WHO he is talking about when he says "the Manosphere", other than Andrew Tate - the only specific name to date that he HAS identified. If indeed "Andrew Tate" is who Dr. Bode really means when he says "the Manosphere" he has a responsibility to say exactly that. Otherwise, he's kind of jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire here. I don't know if Australians are familiar with that phrase or not. 

In any event, there is a larger issue that the past day's events raises: That of the increasing publicity that the Manosphere is getting. Over the past five years in general and culminating in what Scott Galloway has gone on record in calling "The Manosphere Election" of 2024, where Donald J. Trump was reinstalled to the Presidency of the United States in a landslide Battleground State win over Democrat Party standard bearer Kamala Harris, the Manosphere has been the subject of intense media and academic scrutiny - Netflix documentaries, Wall Street Journal think pieces, a ton of Substack and Medium content, video essays on YouTube, and indeed academic studies and white papers, including non-governmental organizational efforts have amounted to an "all hands on deck" action to, on its face, "study, document and understand" the Manosphere. But, as we see with Dr. Bode here, in truth the goal seems to be more about dunking on and discrediting the Manosphere. Fair enough - but if that's what this is all about, then our erstwhile interlocutors need to just say that, and drop the Ivory Tower charade. 

And speaking of intellectual honesty and transparency, please allow me this indulgence: I have, at great personal cost and hardship, made moves that were, from a purely economic standpoint, ill advised. Social media can and has afforded earnings and lifestyles that many of us could only dream about even a decade ago. I know firsthand of what that life is all about. But social media, like anything else, has its limitations. When it comes to what the past day's events are about - getting the facts straight and naming names as to who said what when and where - social media has proven itself not to be so well suited. Sadly, there isn't as much fervor for a sober and thoughtful review of the facts; such things don't rouse the emotions and foment outrage, which social media is optimized to do. As a result, if one is committed such things, they can and very likely will, see a decline in their earnings. 

But I am committed not only to the facts and evidence, but I am also committed to the future. Social media is all about the immediate moment - it's here today, and gone a few minutes from now. I have a much longer time horizon. I am thinking five, ten, twenty YEARS from now. And I am very aware of the position that the Manosphere is in this present moment. Like I noted above, we have elected a President(!). If you think that hasn't gotten the attention of others, I've got a great bridge here in South Philly to sell you. 

This, is why I write - because I am keenly aware of all of these things, and many more. I understand that if we don't take ourselves seriously, no one can or will. I understand that history is written by its victors. I understand that no organization, or movement, will endure without its corps of scribes. And I understand that without a "minister of information" - a public relations and outreach arm - the Manosphere can and will be at the mercy of those who have an agenda, an axe to grind and gold in them there hills mentality, to do with us as they will. 

Dr. Bode makes it very clear that he is not making these videos for his health. In the several dozen that I've studied over the past 24 hours he has consistently made it clear that he intends to make a nice bit of coin to further his efforts. I do not begrudge his right to do so, as I consider myself a free marketer. Let whomsoever will, come. 

So, I hope he will be so kind as returning the favor as I know make a naked appeal to you, the reader: I have proven that the Manosphere CAN not only make our presence felt, our voices heard, and even our opponents come correct. But none of that comes for the free. That takes money to make happen. If you believe in the cause of the Manosphere - if you think that what I've achieved today is of any value - then by all means support me and the broader Black Manosphere thusly: 

1. You can become a paid member of my Patreon: www.patreon.com/MumiaObsidianAli 

2. You can drop me a generous gift at my CashApp: $ObsidianRadio

3. You can do the same at my PayPal: www.paypal.me/ObsidianTalkRadio

4. You can buy my books: https://blackmanosphere.com/collections/books

5. You can support my webinar series: https://blackmanosphere.com/collections/webinars

6. And you can join us at the Black Manosphere Conclave 7.0 in Los Angeles Sep 3-5, 2027! https://blackmanosphere.com/products/black-manosphere-conclave-7-0-tickets

Help me - help US - continue being a voice for Black men. 

And thank you!

Sincerely, 
Mumia Obsidian Ali
www.blackmanosphere.com