Toxic Masculinity: An Environmental and Societal Evolution
Written by Melissa Wells
It’s “boys will be boys.” It’s “man up.” It’s “the best a man can get.” From the Victorian era to the modern-day locker room, different environments and social changes have been crucial to how masculinity is perceived throughout history, and today.
Michael Kehler, a research professor and chair of the Masculinities’ Studies in Education program at the University of Calgary in Canada, defines healthy masculinity as “grounded in a respect for diversity, for gender equality… acknowledging the multitude of ways one can be a man.”
He is the first person in North America to hold a specialized research professorship in an expanding field of masculinities studies. “If you think about toxic masculinity, or unhealthy masculinity, that is grounded in a much more narrow definition of what it means to be a man,” Kehler said. His research draws upon both feminist research and masculinities scholarship to examine normative masculinity and how the intersections of power and privilege impact males in school settings.
Toxic masculinity refers to socially ingrained standards and cultural understandings of manhood that are both constraining and harmful. It is a neologism for rigid expectations that dictate boys and men should engage in normalized behavior harmful to men and women. It is not a modern phenomenon. “The rules and codes dictating this concept of masculinity did not happen overnight, they are cultural understandings that have evolved over time,” Kehler affirmed.
Many of the characteristics toxic masculinity prescribes — stigma surrounding male emotional vulnerability and mental health — can be traced back to the Victorian era. Domesticity influenced a shift in narrow standards of masculinity to maintain dominance and authority, among other patriarchal values. New cultural ideals were also created in reaction to the promotion of greater equality for women, which challenged traditional gender roles. These ideals were known as “hyper-masculinity,” until a new term emerged.
In the late 1980s and early 1990s, cultural shifts brought about by second-wave feminism forced men to acknowledge the role of the patriarch in that oppression. This crusade, known as the Mythopoetic movement, saw men use mythology to spiritually reconnect with their masculinity. This is also the first time the term “toxic masculinity” emerges, coined by Shepherd Bliss in his doctoral dissertation.
Throughout history, this specific model of manhood and the unhealthy attitudes it promotes have persisted. The only difference is that an umbrella term for it did not exist until recently. “The toxicity that comes from the traditional standards this sets and dictates to men maintains the hierarchy of men over other men, but also men over women. It ultimately boils down to issues of power and trying to exercise power over others who are perceived to have less cultural capital,” Kehler said.
As society evolves, so do its attitudes regarding gender and binary-rigid thinking. Toxic masculinity compels men to prove their “manliness” in social scenarios, often in violent and aggressive ways that can be racist, misogynistic, homophobic or transphobic. This defensiveness toxically masculine men engage in can prove harmful, not only to those around them but to their own mental health.
In a 2016 study conducted by the American Psychological Association, researchers Y. Joel Wong and his colleagues examined the effects sexism has on men’s mental health. Their meta-analysis identified 11 traits “generally considered by experts to reflect society’s expectations of traditional masculinity.”
They found men with higher rates of mental health difficulties — like depression, anxiety and stress — tend to be those who conform to traditional norms. Three of the traits found to be significantly harmful to “psychological maladjustment” included playboy behavior (sexual aggression), power over women and self-reliance. This finding suggests that men who abide by these sexist attitudes are less likely to demonstrate positive mental health, such as psychological well-being and self-esteem.
Along with the emergence of masculinities studies in the 2000s, “toxic masculinity” and “hegemonic masculinity” became interchangeable terms researchers and psychologists use. Acknowledgment and integration of “toxic masculinity” into conversation would come in the wake of the Women’s March movement. “This #TimesUp, #MeToo women’s movement has been fundamental, if not pivotal, in engaging the conversation around gender arrangement, around power, around renegotiations of our cultural understandings of equality,” Kehler said.
With this conversation comes a difficult task: creating a dialogue that recognizes the underlying issues that created the “locker room talk” of today. Within that discourse, Kehler implores patience from both sides of this conversation in a collective effort to “dislodge these preexisting notions of masculinity.” Understanding is the first step in shaping communities around inclusive environments that accept diverse views of masculinity.
