We live in a world cluttered with outdated ideas of how men and women should be. Society often resorts to pasting labels onto different kinds of people in an attempt to simplify human behavior and make uncomplicated explanations for things that are often difficult to understand.
We see this time and time again: people create categories and rules about how others should look and act so that they themselves feel more comfortable.
This allows individuals to live in an untouched reality that molds itself solely to their opinions and affirms only their beliefs — a reality they can control, make sense of and define in their particular terms. Meanwhile, they remain firmly unreceptive to new ideas or experiences alternate to their own.
Toxic masculinity is a direct product of this phenomenon, and rests on a rigid, fixed construct of how men should look, think and act. It is rooted in the notion that emotions are weaknesses, men must maintain an appearance of hardness, violence is an indicator of power, and sex and brutality are measurements of conquest and worth.
Toxic masculinity suggests that traits like stamina, resilience and ambition belong exclusively to the male gender. It claims other characteristics, such as self-awareness and empathy, are feminine and therefore unimportant and feeble — these are ideas fully wrapped in gender stereotypes and sexism.
It should be noted that masculinity alone is not a problem, but toxic masculinity absolutely is. Without context, the term “toxic masculinity” can initially sound insulting, even a little aggressive. Far too often, it is completely misunderstood as an assertion that all men are naturally violent.
“Toxic” is not meant to denote masculinity or any other kind of self-expression. The phrase is used to analyze a form of gendered behavior that results from repressive ideologies of what it means to be masculine in society.
Although heterosexual males can take credit for the development of this dangerous brand of masculinity, it is not exclusive to the heteronormative community. The effects of toxic masculinity span across all kinds of contexts, including the gay community.
Due to the identity boxes that categorize heterosexual men, queer men are subject to an overwhelming list of stereotypes defining how their sexuality should look to others.
A common example of this can be seen through one of the double standards that separates bisexual women from bisexual men. While women who have sex with both men and other women may be approached with a level of acceptance and are often viewed as just experimenting, queer men often battle an assertion that they must be fully straight or gay.
This comes from a place of associating hyper-femininity with homosexuality among men.
The traditional gender construct that fuels toxic masculinity makes no space for men to also experiment. It suggests that if men are attracted to both women and men, they are simply gay or confused. Society often rejects the concept of bisexual men in its entirety, yet accepts that of women — this is heavily rooted in the hyper-sexualization of females.
These culturally appropriate versions of manliness and sexuality are extremely problematic. They can feel absolutely suffocating for those who do not fall directly in alignment with those standards. The traditional masculine ideology denies people the freedom to actually explore what it means to be male.
Each of us is much more than just one single thing. In terms of sexual beings, the way we view ourselves is dependent on our own individual journeys and relationships with ourselves and the world around us — it is no one’s concern, nor place, to say what that should look like.
Toxic masculinity demands conformity at the risk of judgment. When it comes to self-identity, there is nothing more personal, undefinable and individualized than our sexuality. Just like all the aspects that piece together our sense of self, sexuality is flexible, evolving and self-conceptualized.
