For almost a year now, I’ve been sat on my organisation's gender equality committee and helping to lead our men’s listening group. Being within that space has been a really interesting experience that has forced me to explore the concept of masculinity in a way that I never had done before.
Shame and Masculinity
As somebody who has spent a lot of his life in female dominant spaces, has studied feminism and the patriarchy (both through a politics degree and through the wonderful book ‘Invisible Women’ by Caroline Criado Perez) and generally keeps up with the news, I’ve learned to associate positively with femininity and negatively with masculinity.
Until this past week, I hadn’t realised the tension that this had produced within me. There was (and probably still is) a subconscious feeling of shame around my being a man. That shame - mixed with my admiration of stereotypically female traits and the women I’ve worked with - battled with my desire from a young age to be seen as a man.
I find myself in the paradoxical position of having shame for being a man and having shame for not being enough of one.
Like many others, I tended to socialise a lot more with the same sex when I was growing up, providing a limited perspective on who I could be. You pursue what the group admires and for me that meant being a man. And what did that teach me?
It taught me that you need to be good at sport, be the best/on top, be muscular, be mature, be able to fix things (both practical and personal), be independent, be confident, be tough, be able to grow a beard, be heterosexual, look good in a suit, fight to have your voice heard, be a man of your word, be reliable, be trustworthy, be there for your friends, don’t snitch, don’t cry. As I got older, there was then added competition about how much alcohol you could drink, how much weed you could smoke and how many women you’d slept with.
I identify with some of these things, but not all of them, and I find myself in the paradoxical position of having shame for being a man and having shame for not being enough of one.
...it’s so easy to believe that when people speak of toxic masculinity, what they are really saying is masculinity is toxic.
The Rise of Andrew Tate
I think that it’s really important to explore this idea of shame for being a man. We’ve all heard the phase “men are trash” and either rolled our eyes or seen others do the same at the retort of “not all men,” as well as the backlash against the concept of toxic masculinity. Whilst it doesn’t take much to recognise that many of the traits I listed under masculinity are toxic, this is a backlash that I understand.
Given that positive masculinity (I’ll explain what I mean by that further on in this post) is rarely spoken about, it’s so easy to believe that when people speak of toxic masculinity, what they are really saying is masculinity is toxic. That’s confusing to many men because they are getting judged for being what society told them to be.
In a world with so much uncertainty and young men being at a point in their lives where they’re not sure who they are, of course some end up listening to someone like Andrew Tate who came along and told them exactly who they should be.
Is Andrew Tate’s influence toxic? Absolutely. But why wouldn’t they listen when they have been told to identify as a man, might not have had a good male role model in their lives and society hasn’t taught them the ideas of positive masculinity?
[positive masculinity] provides a sort of framework so that you can work out who you are, without the pressure of expectation.
Toxic vs. Positive Masculinity
Now, I’ve committed a cardinal sin in writing, which is to not define the terms that I’m using. 1000 words in (roughly), that’s about to change. One of the definitions of toxic masculinity that I spotted was from a website called The Good Men Project, which says:
“Toxic masculinity is a narrow and repressive description of manhood, designating manhood as defined by violence, sex, status and aggression. It’s the cultural ideal of manliness, where strength is everything while emotions are weakness where sex and brutality are yardsticks by which men are measured, while supposedly “feminine” traits–which can range from emotional vulnerability to simply not being hypersexual–are the means by which your status as a [real] “man” can be taken away.”
The main part I’d like to look at here is the very first part of the first sentence. Whilst hard to create a perfect definition for, toxic masculinity as a concept is very restrictive and portrays masculinity as a single, monolithic experience. There is this undefined idea of the perfect man and then anyone straying away from that ideal is deemed to be less of a man.
Positive masculinity, on the other hand, is much more liberating. Again, there is no singular definition of positive masculinity, but one article highlighted three subconcepts that contribute towards the formation of a positive masculine identity:
“Being connected. To the self and others, forming interpersonal relationships based on respect, open communication, and non-violence.
Being motivated. Intrinsic motivation to engage with and contribute effectively to society beyond social pressures.
Being authentic. Comfort in enacting commitment to one’s values. Capacity to adopt flexibility around the emotional restriction and stoicism in help-seeking.”
You’ll notice here that unlike toxic masculinity, positive masculinity doesn’t tell you who you should be. Rather than being prescriptive, it provides a sort of framework so that you can work out who you are, without the pressure of expectation. If you want to adopt some of the traits that are more stereotypically masculine, then go for it, but choose it because it suits you, not because of who you think others want you to be.
...it’s so powerful for me when I see men, especially friends, be emotional: it gives me permission to do the same.
Vulnerability Doesn’t Have to be Strong
When you are working out who you are, one of the things you’ll need to do is to be honest with yourself and that requires vulnerability. Vulnerability is challenging, but it’s incredible and once embraced becomes crucial to growth and to feeling confident in being authentic (and therefore feeling truly accepted). With vulnerability being as important as it is, it’s rightly something that we promote.
One slight worry I have, however, is that we encourage men to be vulnerable by saying “it’s strong to be vulnerable.” I get why we do it, but it reinforces the trope that men have to be strong, even in our weakest moments, when it’s simply not true. Sometimes vulnerability comes from weakness, from when you are so mentally exhausted that you no longer have the ability to hide what’s going on inside of you anymore. That is okay.
I realise now that that my expectations of what it means to be a man is why I’ve tended to look to women to have more emotional and vulnerable conversations. I thought for a while that it was that men my age simply weren’t mature enough to understand what I was going through, but I was just scared of being seen as less of a man and I knew that a woman wouldn’t judge me for opening up. That’s why it’s so powerful for me when I see men, especially friends, be emotional: it gives me permission to do the same.
...the truth is that there are no masculine, feminine or intersex behaviours, they’re just behaviours.
The Limit of Labels
As part of my job, I’m currently sat within our Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) team and I’m fortunate enough to have been placed on a course on Managing Equality and Diversity. Something the teacher has raised a few times is the idea that “labels are for soup, not people.” He has caveated that by saying that if we are going to assign people to categories/groups, it has to be for a reason (e.g. gathering data to identify trends, recognise problems and identify solutions).
In our everyday interactions with people, however, those labels are best left on tins. Whilst I’ve spoken a lot about masculinity, the truth is that there are no masculine, feminine or intersex behaviours, they’re just behaviours. Whilst I don’t think we should ignore difference, the problem with labels is that they place people into boxes.
I identify as a man, but given that women are the ones considered to get emotional, the suggestion is that if I show my more sensitive side, I will be perceived as less of a man and this restricts my ability to be myself. What a strange conclusion to come to just because my reproductive organ happens to hang out into the world.
For me, the more I do express myself - especially to others - the more my confidence grows and my shame dissipates.
You’re Not Alone
If there’s one thing that being in the men’s listening group has taught me, it’s that a lot of men are in pain and for far too long we have been hiding it because we falsely believe that we’re alone in how we’re feeling. The only reason we think that we’re alone, however, is because we don’t speak about these things and in doing so let the shame of not being who we’ve been told to be fester.
Let’s do our best to not hide how we feel. Instead, let’s find healthy ways to express ourselves, whatever that might mean for us as individuals. For me, the more I do express myself - especially to others - the more my confidence grows and my shame dissipates.
How do you express yourself? Let me know in the comments. And if this post resonated with you, please share it with others because [I hope] it will help in creating a more inclusive environment.
*Disclaimer: I wrote this post after watching an event from Men’s Health Week and whilst finding last little bits and pieces, a colleague shared with me a fantastic article by Caitlin Moran discussing these same things, but from a female perspective. Definitely worth checking it out. I promise I didn’t steal the article!
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