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Let’s Celebrate Masculinity!
I couldn’t help grinning as I watched Donald Trump enter the arena in New York for the UFC competition last night. The crowd roaring at his entrance and his retinue of Donald Trump, Jr., Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., Tulsi Gabbard, Elon Musk and others was fascinating. You could smell the power and masculinity, and Trump grinned and waved to everyone. It was great fun to watch the joy and enthusiasm as he entered the room.
But after watching this wave of masculinity, I made the mistake of looking into the Left’s insistence on the dominance of toxic masculinity. I was enraged, especially at how they blame Trump for exacerbating the problem. I hadn’t investigated toxic masculinity in the past, and now that I have, I am heartbroken at how we have denigrated both men and boys in our times.
Quite frankly, my research claimed that if you are a man, you must suffer from toxic masculinity:
Toxic masculinity is the result of a set of strict rules that prescribe what being a man should be. These toxic “man rules” include:
- A man should suffer physical and emotional pain in silence.
- A man shouldn’t seek warmth, comfort, or tenderness.
- A man should only have the emotions of bravery and anger. Any other emotions are weaknesses. Weakness is unacceptable.
- A man shouldn’t depend on anyone. Asking for help is also weak.
- A man should always want to win, whether in sports, work, relationships, or sex.
We don’t have to look far to see traces of toxic masculinity in many men. [Italics are mine]
Did you notice the description of “strict rules” and “what being a man should be”? In other words, we see these men everywhere in our own lives—and Donald Trump is the ultimate example:
The president-elect represents a particular type of masculinity: he is seen as brash and straight-talking, and can appear domineering or patronising around women – for example when he famously lurked behind Hillary Clinton during a debate in 2016. For some women who voted for him, this might be a familiar personality that they’ve seen in their fathers and husbands.
This statement makes me want to gag. Who thinks Trump is patronizing toward women, particularly his own wife, Melania? How often has he spoken about women with admiration? And did anyone see him “lurking” behind Hillary Clinton?
But Trump’s point about protecting women really drove some women over the edge:
This kind of ‘protective masculinity,’ and the idea that women need to be protected by men has had a resurgence in US society over the past few decades. This was identified by political scientist Iris Marion Young in the early eighties.
‘The stance of the male protector … is one of loving self-sacrifice, with those in the feminine position as the objects of love and guardianship,’ she wrote in a paper on the subject. ‘Chivalrous forms of masculinism express and enact concern for the wellbeing of women, but they do so within a structure of superiority and subordination.’
She almost got it right. Most women I know love the idea that men want to protect them; this motive suggests a special and intimate caring. But the admiration of women has nothing to do with the men being superior, except usually having superior strength. Nor do the men subordinate women when they take on this role. For some of us, chivalry has not died.
It’s outrageous that we live in a time when all men are subject to intense societal criticism and negative judgment. That those who opine think they have the right to conflate healthy masculinity with toxic masculinity demonstrates that we continue to develop hatred and condescension of the opposite sex:
For men, Trump represents ‘hegemonic masculinity,’ the exalted position of men at the top. In this view, aggression, control and dominance are all admirable traits and highly socially valued.
To make this general statement about men is absurd and demeaning.
I look at the men selected by Trump to be in his administration, and I admire so many of them. Most of them speak with admiration about their wives; most of these women are accomplished in their own right.
We must find a way to reverse this general condemnation of manhood, hold bad actors accountable, and celebrate men and their relationships in the coming years.
Published in Culture
I got to a door and proceeded to hold it open only to receive a “down with the Patriarchy” broadside from some green-haired slip of a Millennial “female.” I held the door open slightly wider to let the lady of some years who was behind us both get through. She had heard the exchange so far and said “thank you” perhaps a bit louder than she might have otherwise
I then went through the door myself, saying over my shoulder “It’s not about who you are. It’s about who I am.”
Agree.
I deplore what I think is a tendency to equate “chivalry” with the natural order of manhood. It’s not. C.S. Lewis’s short essay, The Necessity of Chivalry (published in the collection, Present Concerns) makes this clear.
I can’t find a print version of Lewis’s essay on the web, but there’s a reading of it here (about eight minutes):
I appreciate understanding that if men, “en masse” or whatever, get sufficiently fed up with “feminism” to decide it needs to end, it will end.
When we moved to Texas six years ago I had to learn a whole new level of politeness if I were to fit in!
I’ve told the story before, but it’s a fun one. A friend of ours here in Texas (mother with four small children) says she has to pay attention when she visits her parents in upstate New York that she doesn’t walk into closing doors. She is so used to having doors held open for her here that she forgets that not everywhere is that going to happen.
I shouldn’t laugh but that is a funny image. Hopefully she’ll remember next time!
I found that being called “sir” all the time, was a bit… jarring. But I think it also helps motivate people to actually live up to that.
Boss Mongo always addressed me as “ma’am,” and I would tease him about it. I finally got clear that it was important to him to address me that way, and I accepted it.
I was already “adulting” better than I’ve seen many people do over the course of my years, so for me it was more just an unaccustomed form of address or something, which seems to have been the case for you as well. I was already in the habit of, for example, picking up pieces of broken glass when I found them, even though it “wasn’t my fault” (which is why some people asked me why I bothered to do it) so that people or pets wouldn’t encounter them “badly.” A subset of the “broken window” principle, I suppose. Many people seem to just ignore such things, if they notice them at all, as being someone else’s responsibility.
I’ve noticed and reported numerous safety issues and other problems, partly because of the fact that I walk a lot and so notice things – and have better options to deal with them – than people just driving past. I report malfunctioning street lights and traffic signals, I remove hazardous debris from roadways, I notice and report water leaks from main pipelines that could otherwise go unnoticed for days or weeks resulting in greater damage and cost to repair… I’ve noticed (because I apparently have an unusually acute sense of smell) and reported natural gas leaks that could have been Bad… People driving have fewer options in those situations. They can’t just stop to pick up something in the road.
I always call 911 when I see or hear a collision, because if everyone figures that someone else will call, then NOBODY calls. For one particular incident in Phoenix late one night, I found out that I was indeed the only caller. The result of which was that a little girl who had been in the back seat got what might have been life-saving immediate attention.
The “ma’am” bit may have seemed odd to you as well because you were already living up to that. But I think treating people more adult-respectfully is beneficial to do from early on, for the individuals involved as well as society in general, and young men perhaps especially might take it to heart and live better than they might have otherwise, if they understand what’s expected of them, and that there are, indeed, benefits from living up to it.
I’m impressed with the civic responsibility you take, ke. Very nice. A very thoughtful comment.
It’s on an individual level too. Once in Phoenix, I was with a small group of people at a Denny’s having lunch, and the waiter – a pretty big guy, maybe in his later 30s or early 40s – kept addressing the 18-year-old-or-so daughter of one of the people there, as “sweetie.” Which might be acceptable from a “matronly” waitress or something, but I thought was inappropriate from him.
I didn’t make a fuss about it at the time, but afterwards I called the restaurant manager to mention that, and that in such situations their staff – perhaps even the women – should address young-adult female customers as “miss.” The manager agreed, and said the waiter would be so advised.
And I’ve mentioned this other one in the past, and saved a copy so I wouldn’t have to retype it all now.
To put it more briefly than I probably did last time, When I was living in Phoenix, for a time there was a family across from me who had I think 6 kids. There were often inter-sibling squabbles, with shouts of “I hate you!” etc. And one of the daughters started having kids when she was 15 or 16, as I recall. Two of her younger siblings, a boy and another girl, were thinking it was pretty much just fun: enjoying playing with their sister’s babies, etc.
At some point when things were calmer, I reminded the two younger siblings that at some point in the future, their parents would be gone and they would essentially have only each other. At that point, remembering those “I hate yous!” would be regretted.
I also pointed out that while playing with their sister’s babies might be fun, it also meant they themselves had two new roles: Auntie Denise and Uncle Daniel. Their expressions were unforgettable. But I think – and I hope – it brought some deeper thoughts to them and helped them in the future.
It’s like wearing your Sunday church clothes every day of the week.
Depending what you wear to church, standards have slipped in that department as well.
I want us to return to a time when men are men and women are glad of it. I married a real man and am glad of it. Yes, I could open my door but it is nice having a man, a gentleman, who respects me enough to open a door for me. OK. Sometimes I am too quick but he would have opened the door if I had let him. I enjoy the added security I feel when he is around.
I couldn’t agree more! And like, you I’m sometimes too fast for his gesture, but that’s okay, too. It’s nice to have a real man in one’s life!
At this point I’d like to find a real woman to share my life.
In Arizona we always wore the good flip-flops. Girls wore modest Daisy-Dukes and a tasteful tank top.
Oh, Seawriter, such a woman would be truly blessed to have you.
I agree with both of you. And yet. In my professional life, it often happened that I was with someone on my team, and one or the other, or sometimes both of us, were carrying a heavy piece of computer equipment. After several rather inelegant attempts to figure out the door-holding rules, I laid down the law: Whoever got there first and could, or whoever had a hand free when we both got there at the same time, was the person who held the door. Sometimes, these dear men who worked for me had to deal with the fact that I held open the door, because reason. Problem solved.
Other, more social, situations might have been different. I always appreciate a man holding the door, walking on the wet and dirty side of the street, or acting chivalrously towards me. Because reason.