| Pretty people has labeled all masculine traits as toxic, maybe not the same individuals but as a group they have. That is the problem with ill defined concepts, "toxic masculinity" is not a scientific term since people can interpret whatever they want as toxic. A men's rights advocate could say that chivalry and self sacrifice is toxic masculinity since it puts a lot of unfair pressure on men. A female feminist could say that locker room talk and objectification of women in games is toxic masculinity since it is hostile to women. A male feminist could say that boys rough play is toxic masculinity since it hurts or leaves out those who want to do calmer things. A pacifist could say that action games and contact sports are toxic masculinity since they promote violence. A body image advocate could argue that huge muscles, strength and body building is toxic masculinity since it hurts the self esteem of overweight or scrawny men. Divorced fathers could argue that traditional fatherhood as a money provider who aren't allowed to complain is toxic masculinity. Extroverted people could argue that the male geek culture which avoid social contact toxic masculinity since they ruin the social atmosphere. Introverted people could argue that male initiative taking for relationships is toxic masculinity since it bothers a lot of people who aren't interested. Politicians could argue that male intellectual stubbornness and bias for action is toxic masculinity since it leads to shootings and terrorism. So let me ask you, what part of masculinity can't be labeled toxic? I have seen all of the examples above in the wild. What are the examples of positive masculinity? Everyone has their own version of that as well. For example, many feminists thinks that positive masculinity is men helping women. But it is not healthy for men to be pressured to help women, so that masculine image is not very positive for men. Also I am pretty sure that there you can find people who would label any one of the above as positive masculinity. In other words, the term is meaningless as it is formulated today. |