Dear reader,
“Toxic masculinity” is tricky. It’s a phrase that – misunderstood – can seem wildly insulting, even bigoted.
In psychology, toxic masculinity refers to traditional cultural masculine norms that can be harmful to men, women, and society overall; this concept of toxic masculinity is not intended to demonize men or male attributes, but rather to emphasize the harmful effects of conformity to certain traditional masculine ideal behaviours such as dominance, self-reliance, and competition.
Toxic masculinity is thus defined by adherence to traditional male gender roles that restrict the kinds of emotions allowable for boys and men to express, including social expectations that men seek to be dominant (the “alpha male”) and limit their emotional range primarily to expressions of anger.
In a psychoanalytic context, Terry Kupers (psychiatrist and author) describes toxic masculinity as “the need to aggressively compete and dominate others” and as “the constellation of socially regressive male traits that serve to foster domination, the devaluation of women, homophobia and wanton violence.”
According to Kupers, toxic masculinity serves to outline aspects of hegemonic masculinity that are socially destructive, “such as misogyny, homophobia, greed, and violent domination.” He contrasts these traits with more positive aspects of hegemonic masculinity such as “pride in one’s ability to win at sports, to maintain solidarity with a friend, to succeed at work, or to provide for one’s family.”
The American Psychological Association has warned that “traditional masculinity ideology” is associated with negative effects on mental and physical health.
Men who adhere to traditionally masculine cultural norms, such as risk-taking, violence, dominance, primacy of work, need for emotional control, desire to win, and pursuit of social status, tend to be more likely to experience psychological problems such as depression, stress, body image problems, substance abuse, and poor social functioning.
The effect tends to be stronger in men who also emphasize “toxic” masculine norms, such as self-reliance, seeking power over women, and sexual promiscuity or “playboy” behaviour.
Toxic masculinity has been blamed for numerous recent (violent) events, such as the Nicholas Ninow case and the recent spate of femicides that claimed the lives of Meghan Cremer, Leighandre “Baby Lee” Jengels, Janika Mallo and many others.
Abroad, toxic masculinity has often been the scapegoat for mass shootings and blatant terrorism.
And who’s more masculine than our beloved “Bokke”?
On September 21, our most boyish of “Bokke” will be facing off against the equally manly All Blacks.
And while the world mourns all of the female lives that were lost to murder at the hands of men this year, we’ll be behind our “boys” in Japan all the way.
That’s not to say that any of the Springboks are toxically masculine simply because they’re traditionally manly.
I don’t know any of them well enough to make that judgement call.
They could all be amazing men with hearts of gold.
That’s not the point.
We’re a society that is constantly urging our boys to be more “boy-ish”; to fight, to tackle, to say no (and not to back down), to compete, to be physical.
Yet at the same time we’re a society that loses another woman to murder every three hours due to the very same masculine traits we so foster in our own children.
Perhaps it’s time to take a step back.
Anxiously yours,
Aimee
