THE GENDER-IFICATION OF MEN
Recently we had in the news about the Gillette company ad
about making men a better. The ad depicts a series of “bad” behaviours of boys
and how and adult can correct them. This is another consequence of marketing
that is getting a lot of support by the “political correct” madness that is
formulating rules how we must behave. Men are the bad guys.
Yet, the most damaging consequence of the crusade against
masculinity is its corrosive influence on the psychological and moral
development of boys. From a very early age, they are told that they must curb
their boyish attitudes and behaviour. They continually are bombarded by the
message that they are not as emotionally intelligent, sensitive or as flexible
as their girl counterparts. When they learn that masculine behaviour is
considered by some of their teachers and other adults as something of a
cultural crime, they naturally become disoriented and uncertain about their
identity. (I have written about the emasculation of men in earlier blog post).
The Gillette ad now is a metaphor for the dichotomy that is
permeating all aspects of modern democratic cultures. What is the truth? We
ask. Had Gillette truly wanted to pave the way for actual change in gender
inequities, they could have taken a far bolder step. The men who
disproportionately figure in P&G’s U.S.’s executive (only nine of 30 are
women; its 13-member board of directors features four women) could have acted
“the right way” and in a truly radical way: by ending the absurd
gender-ification and price discrimination perpetuated in the marketing of
shaving products. That is, the men razor are blue in clour and defined by names
as: “Mach 3 Turbo,” the “Sensor 3,” and the “Fusion 5 Proshield Chill Razor
with Flexball Technology.” While women razors are defined as: The “Venus” that
offers the illusion of choice with little differentiation, unless you care
about how your razor smells when you’re shaving your armpits.There’s the
“Embrace,” the “Comfortglide Freesia,” the “ComfortGlide White Tea Scented,”
the “Comfortglide Plus Olay Coconut” and the “Swirl.” There’s also the “Cosmo
Pink” and so on.
The point of this is that even Gillette products are now
blaming men as negative and so the boys need a re-education. But if we’re going
to get there any time soon, we need to stop seeing men as inherently
problematic. We now talk about “toxic masculinity”, as though the Y chromosome
itself was a poison, the unfortunate by-product of biology. The implication of
the “MeToo” movement is that if all women have been victims, then all men have
been culpable. In progressive circles it is an accepted truth that simply being
male makes you part of the problem, an inevitable contributor to the status
quo.
Frank Furedi, a sociologist, makes a clear statement of this
invasion on manhood and the creation of a masculine psychological disturbance
that needs psychological counselling. He states:
“The APA’s (American Psychological Association) guidelines
are principally targeted at boys and young men. They warn that the bad habits
associated with masculinity, such as “suppressing emotions and masking
distress, often start early in life”. The APA contends that traditional
masculinity is “psychologically harmful and that socialising boys to suppress
their emotions causes damage that echoes both inwardly and outwardly”.
The medicalisation of masculine behaviour by the APA is
designed to devalue boyishness and alter the meaning of what it means to be a
boy.
That the guidelines are a political statement masquerading
as a scientifically informed document is highlighted by its stated ambition of
changing the world through changing men. One of the authors of the guidelines,
Ryon McDermott, declares that if “we can change men” then “we can change the
world”. From this standpoint, masculinity serves as the moral equivalent of a
disease that must be eradicated.
The APA’s opinion reflects the wider cultural project of
marginalising masculinity and altering the identity of boys and men. Our era,
which constantly celebrates people’s identities, finds it difficult to endow
the identity of the male with positive qualities.
On the contrary, masculinity has turned into what
sociologist Erving Goffman, in his classic study “Stigma”, has characterised as
a “spoiled identity”. Because of a constant barrage of criticism, masculinity
has become delegitimated and often is portrayed as a marker for pathological
behaviour.
A significant section of the psychological community has
become critical of masculinity because of its dislike for men’s supposed
aspiration for control and autonomy.
Since the 1990s, exposing the emotional illiteracy of men
has become a growth industry. There are thousands of publications that decry
the failure of men to acknowledge their vulnerability and refusal to seek help.
Back in the 90s, critics of masculinity applied the terms high masculinity and
hegemonic masculinity to those who refused to embrace the advice of
psychologists. Today, the term “toxic” masculinity is deployed to disparage
stoic men drawn towards autonomous behaviour and self-control.
Criticism of the “male desire for control” represents an
attitude towards emotional life in general. That’s why, ultimately, the APA’s
hostility to masculine values is not simply about men. Women who display
“masculine” characteristics such as self-control, rationality and strong
ambition also have come under intense suspicion.
In contrast, men who act like women are clearly preferred to
women who act like men. According to the emotionally correct hierarchy of
virtuous behaviour, feminine women come out on top. Feminine men beat masculine
women for second place. And, of course, masculine men come last.
The weaponisation of the term “toxic masculinity” is one of
the most significant accomplishments of the culture war that has raged in the
US in recent years.
Gillette’s cautionary tale about men is widely echoed in US
institutions of education. Many universities have launched anti-toxic masculine
initiatives designed to resocialise male undergraduates. The term has become
an all-purpose weapon wielded against male targets.
However, since the term implicitly equates masculinity with
toxicity, virtually any assertive and self-confident boy or young man can
become a recipient of this label.
The term toxic masculinity, like any other cultural
stereotype, has no scientific value. But that has not stopped the Australian
Psychological Society from stating that although the term is sociocultural and
not medical, it is useful for exploring “poisonous” behaviours. As the APS’s
use of the word poisonous indicates, it is not merely a sociocultural but a
moral term of abuse. It is unlikely the APS would ever dream of linking the
term toxic to femininity.
The term toxic masculinity is often used to draw attention
to different forms of destructive and damaging behaviour such as sexual
aggression, violence, homophobia and violent behaviour. No doubt these are
malign and dangerous types of behaviour.
However, the representation of such negative traits as the
normal feature of masculinity is motivated by the imperative of propaganda
rather than a dispassionate view of human relations. Unfortunately, many
policymakers have embraced this prejudice and are promoting campaigns against
the moral authority of masculinity.
The Australian government’s recent campaign against domestic
violence offers a textbook example of the casual manner with which a conceptual
leap from violence to boyishness is made. Like the Gillette ad, the target of
this campaign is to explicitly focus on the “boys being boys” attitude in
society.
As someone who still remembers his mother’s reactions to her
son’s mistakes and achievements with statements such as “Boys will be boys”, I
find a campaign directed against her attitude deeply disturbing. From my
mother’s standpoint, “being a boy” meant being a little bit rough, assertive,
single-minded and ambitious.
The government crusade against this attitude signals the
conviction that boys who misbehave in school grow up to be abusers of women.
A widely distributed video titled “Stop It at the Start”
depicts a father sitting in his car by the school gate, incredulous that his
son received a detention for “flicking up a girl’s skirt”. In the back seat,
the offender’s young brother pipes up and asks why the teacher does not
understand that it’s “just boys being boys”. Sitting next to him is his little
sister, who casually remarks, “Yeah, I mean, I’ve already accepted that as I
grow up I’ll probably be harassed and even abused.”
The sight of a young girl fatalistically acknowledging that
her life will be plagued by little male monsters such as those sitting in the
car is likely to instil any responsible individual with a sense of unease if
not horror.
Fortunately, this fantasy display of anti-boy animus bears
little relationship to reality. The project of targeting children “at the
start” will do nothing to curb anti-social adult behaviour. Its main outcome is
to confuse children, especially boys, and reinforce the confusion surrounding
the meaning of male identity.
The most damaging consequence of the crusade against
masculinity is its corrosive influence on the psychological and moral
development of boys. From a very early age, they are told that they must curb
their boyish attitudes and behaviour. They continually are bombarded by the
message that they are not as emotionally intelligent, sensitive or as flexible
as their girl counterparts. When they learn that masculine behaviour is
considered by some of their teachers and other adults as something of a
cultural crime, they naturally become disoriented and uncertain about their
identity.
Not surprisingly, a lot of young men find the transition to
adulthood particularly difficult because values that are associated with being
a man receive little cultural validation. In the absence of any clear cultural
guidance of what it means to be a boy or a man, many are confronted with an
identity crisis inflicted on them by the campaign against masculinity.
The corrosive effect of the war against masculinity is not
simply confined to the world of boys and young men. Society suffers from the
loss of validation for the values that are wrongly attributed to men.
The virtue of courage, the value of autonomy and risk-taking
have played a significant and positive role in the moral development of
humankind. Even, the much-derided ethos of stoicism has helped humanity deal
with the threats and challenges it faced in difficult circumstances.
Whatever its intent, the campaign against masculinity is
much more than a crusade designed to change men. Our version of what it means
to be a human will truly diminish if society becomes inhospitable to so-called
male values such as courage, self-control and risk-taking.
I trust that you will have your own reflections on the
important subject. Feel free to comment here.
PS: here are some research facts on men:
https://www.chatelaine.com/survey-define-masculinity/#men-manliness
