The toxic concept of toxic masculinity

Anyone who has passed through an education in the
past decade will have encountered the term ‘toxic masculinity’. It is one of
the many charming phrases that our age has come up with to pathologise ordinary
people. Brewing for some decades, the concept of ‘toxic masculinity’ was
brought into the mainstream in the last ten years by fourth-wave feminists
intent on portraying half of our species as ‘problematic’, to use another of
the delightful watchwords of our era.

The simple assertion of the ‘toxic
masculinity’ crowd is that specifically male behaviours are a problem. The most
extreme aspects of male misbehaviour are portrayed as though they are routine.
So young feminists insist that we live in a ‘rape culture’, in which men are
alleged to be allowed to rape with impunity. Likewise, male-on-female domestic
violence is portrayed as a kind of pandemic. And the answer to all these things
is essentially to feminise men – to tell specifically young heterosexual men
that they must curb their masculinity and subdue many of their most natural
instincts. In every direction their path is cut off. For instance, men who come
to the rescue of women are dismissed as ‘white knighting’, as though even the
wish to help a woman is proof of ‘toxic masculinity’.

Of course, the concept itself is toxic – quite
as much so as if our age decided to talk about women in a similar way. There’s
no reason why ‘toxic femininity’ couldn’t be made as popular a concept as its
opposite number. There are certainly plenty of grounds for talking about such
things. For if men are, for example, more prone to physical violence then the
data also shows that women are more prone to subtler methods of undermining
opponents, such as reputational destruction. There are behaviours that are more
male and behaviours that are more female, and the fact that some members of
each sex are quite capable of one or other, or both, does not negate that fact.

Nevertheless, we do not hear much talk of
toxic femininity. It is men who have been portrayed in recent years as a
problem. And if you don’t believe this, speak to any teenage boy. They will be
able to tell you some version of this.

Yet there must be consequences to
interventions this hamfisted. It is one thing to try to fine-tune our species;
quite another to attempt to do so while wearing mittens. And that is what
concepts such as toxic masculinity are. They are blundering, blunt, inept
efforts at rewiring – efforts that must have consequences.

In New York last week a woman sitting on the
subway was approached by a madman. Not a particularly rare occurrence in
itself. But this interaction was of the kind that sticks in the mind. For the
man sat down beside the stranger and when she got up he grabbed her by the hair
and yanked her back down, holding her in place in this way. Clearly terrified
and crying for help, there she stayed. Was this an example of ‘toxic
masculinity’? It would be a stretch to say so.

What was clear was that the answer should have
been a bit of good, decent masculinity. In such a situation the men in the
carriage (and there were many) should have stepped forward and sorted this guy
out themselves. Perhaps it would have just taken one of them to confront him,
or perhaps it would have taken several. The man in question was clearly
disturbed and violent. Still, the men present clearly ought to have done
something. I would say they should now hold their manhood cheap, but I suspect
they do already. One man filmed it on his mobile phone – the pinnacle of
present-day courage. Others stared into their devices in the hope that it would
all go away.

And in one way it is understandable. Everybody
has heard stories in which someone has stood up to some thug and been knifed or
shot for their troubles. And then there is the reputational risk of any bad
interaction in the age of camera phones. Since the offender on this occasion
was black, perhaps the other men in the carriage feared the possible racial
component of any resulting footage.

In any
case America had to confront this question on a far bigger stage this week.
After the initial shock over the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, the country
was shocked anew to learn that the police had been on the scene for a long time
while the gunman was shooting elementary school children in their classroom.
Every time there is a school shooting there is the inevitable discussion about
whether the answer to a bad guy with a gun isn’t a good guy with a gun. But on
this occasion it transpires that there were plenty of ‘good guys’ with guns.
Nineteen of them, in fact. One for each slain child. For the best part of an
hour and a half these policemen sat around in a corridor waiting for backup while
the bad guy had the scene to himself.

Those defending the police say the commanding
officer thought it was a hostage situation. But for 90 minutes phone calls were
coming from inside the school, including from children, begging the police to
enter. Until a Border Patrol tactical team finally made it to the scene, the
most action the police saw was in handcuffing and tasering parents who were
desperately trying to save their children.

Does this prove that masculinity is dead? Not
in itself, no. But it should remind us that society needs men to behave in
certain ways at certain times. In warfare masculinity is a very good thing, as
it is for the police, firemen and many others. It would have been good to see
some masculinity on that New York subway. It would have been good to have seen
some male heroism in Texas. But there must be consequences to telling men that
their instincts are wrong, that their behaviour is wrong, and that all their
intentions are tainted by dint of their chromosomes.