To anyone confused by the title, my apologies. That’s what happens when I try to be clever. Anyway – as the title probably didn’t make clear – my post this week is about toxic masculinity. Essentially, what is it about being a man that can bring out the absolute worst in people? Let’s take a look.
Toxic masculinity is a difficult subject to talk about, not least because everyone will have a slightly different interpretation of what it means. Some of you reading this may have never even heard the term before. I’ll give you a recent example which I think is quintessential toxic masculinity at play:
A few weeks ago on Twitter, a woman posted a video. She didn’t caption the video in any way; all she posted was a video. The video showed her hitting a baseball very well. Now, I’m about as far from a baseball expert as you’re ever likely to find. But in my layman’s opinion, it was what I’d call a “good hit”; sweet connection, the ball went flying away from the woman. It was pretty cool, but not overly remarkable.
What was remarkable, however, was the negative comments men left in response to this. The amount of men (and it’s always men) who rushed to comment how it wasn’t that impressive, actually. Or how her technique needed a lot of work. Or that they could do better (without providing any video evidence of this of course). It was staggering. Even for someone like me, who spends a lot of time on Twitter and has seen trolls in action many times before. This was next level abuse.
And for what? Posting a harmless video. Had she captioned the video with something like, “Showing all the men out there how to actually hit a baseball. Those useless gimps aren’t fit to tie my shoelaces #girlsbetterthanboys”, then I would understand her getting a bit of backlash. But in this case (and in most cases), the abuse was completely uncalled for. It’s like women aren’t able to succeed without men clamouring to say that they could do better, or that it isn’t much of an achievement. Why is that?
I can almost hear people (men) screaming at their screens, saying, ‘Not all men…”. Just stop it. I obviously know it isn’t every single man on the planet. But it happens with enough men for it to be a problem.
I think I know why some men act this way. From childhood, boys are almost programmed into being a “Man”. Very early on, we’re taught things like, “Boys don’t cry”. Being compared to a girl was one of the biggest insults for boys in primary school. “You throw like a girl” or, “You have a girly haircut” were some of the savagest disses you could levy at someone. This translated to hobbies and interests too; boys playing with Action Man or playing football: fine. Boys with Barbies or into ballet: not fine.
To be fair, girls get this treatment too; any girl into football, for example, is often labelled a tomboy. So why is it that males are the ones most likely to develop toxic traits in later life? My theory is that the aspect of proving yourself to be a proper man never really goes away.
Let’s look at beer for a bit. Is there anything more stereotypically manly than drinking beer? I don’t know if it was like this for other boys, but when I was around 15, I’d have a sip of my dad’s beer. I absolutely hated the taste of it, but I pretended to enjoy it. And then when I got a bit older and started going out, I still didn’t like the taste of beer, but I didn’t want any of my friends to know. This led me to do one of two things.
- Drink beer anyway, but not enjoy it
- Drink cider instead, which was more agreeable to my palate
Looking back now, I can’t help but feel silly. Why was I so concerned about what I drank and what others would think? As a young lad on a night out, it would have been unthinkable to order a fruity cocktail, or an alco-pop. Though if we’re being honest with ourselves, lads, what tastes better? A strawberry daiquiri, or a *checks notes* bitter? There’s actually a drink called bitter! Whatever next? “I’ll have a pint of bland please”.
I should say that I enjoy beer now. I guess it was an acquired taste for me. URGH. Why did I feel compelled to qualify this? I’m 32 years old, and I still had a little voice in my head saying, “Make sure you mention that you like beer now. Otherwise people will think you’re weird.”
It’s not just that you drink beer either. To demonstrate how manly you really are, it is also important how quickly you can drink beer and how many beers you can drink. Whether it’s downing pints or bragging to friends about how much you had to drink the night before, men do love to turn things into a competition.
And it’s not just drinking. Observe a group of lads in a curry house and watch as it devolves into a who-can-eat-the-spiciest-curry contest. Though that might be hyperbole to a degree, I’ve certainly been mocked for ordering a korma before. Apparently you’re only a man if you can consume food that will make tears stream from your eyes and give you explosive diarrhoea.
Take a look around and you start to see this competitiveness everywhere. From gym guys: “How much do you lift, bro?”, to car guys: “My car is faster than your car.”, to DIY guys: “You don’t know how to use a drill?”. And the most fascinating thing? It’s virtually always men. Very few women compete over such trivial things.
And look, I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with enjoying beer, or spicy food, or going to the gym. But using these “achievements” as a yardstick to measure yourself against other men is unhealthy. It is this that leads young men to feel the need to put on a front. This bravado is a lie. But you know what they say; if you tell a lie often enough, it becomes the truth to the person telling the lie. We have a generation (likely multiple generations) of men who are ultra competitive and have been empowered to believe they have to be this way, lest they have their Real Man membership revoked.
Toxic masculinity – whether you like the term or not – is a very real issue. I haven’t even delved into the violent aspects of it. I have also skirted (not entirely intentionally) the psychological impact conforming to what men/society expects has on boys and men. Suicide is the biggest killer of males between 18-45. This of course can’t be fully attributed to toxic masculinity, but it must surely play a part. I’ll hopefully be able to commit more words to this very important issue in a later blog post.
So how do we solve this problem? I really don’t know. I don’t think there’s a silver bullet. But perhaps a start would be treating others with kindness and acceptance, regardless of whether they make different choices to us. And more importantly, treat yourself with kindness also. You don’t need to conform. Be yourself. Order a korma and a strawberry daiquiri. Go on, you know you want to.
Thanks for reading. I’m off to get a pint of bitter. I’ll be back next week. Take care.
A Rob Blog 