Toxic Masculinity Discussion Thread

[Sajidi Arabia]

I decided to open this thread because I saw the topic of toxic masculinity pop up in the On Sex-Related Stereotyping in Schools thread, and I think it might be an interesting discussion to talk about outside of the context of that one school program, as well as having a more clean conversation about it as that thread is starting to turn a little bit partisan.

I don’t really have a format people should use to reply to this thread with, but here are maybe some talking points/questions people could start with:
1. Does toxic masculinity exist / to which extent does it exist?
2. How did it come to exist according to you?
3. How can it be solved, if it has to be solved?

I’ll write a somewhat long reply which I’ll spoiler just to make the OP look less cluttered:

A little bit of info about me: I grew up in a conservative working class community where toxic masculinity is somewhat common. Besides that I grew up next to several immigrant communities (mainly the Afro-Surinamese, Moroccan and Turkish communities) in my neighbourhood with whom I had a relatively large amount of interaction with growing up. My experience is mostly from a Dutch working class perspective but I think it might apply to at least a lot of Europe and America as well.
I'm using two examples from minority communities. This isn't because I think toxic masculinity is better or worse amongst them, but rather that they offer some insights that the current debate around middle class white men doesn't.

I'm going to single out two of the many examples of issues we're currently facing with old masculine roles in a new and changing society that can't cope with it:

1. Masculine roles aren’t just enforced by other men, but women especially encourage this as well. The dating scene is a famous example already, but I’m going to turn this around by explaining a trend that is happening in Muslim communities in the Netherlands:
In general Dutch Muslim communities very much cling to the belief of men being the main provider of the household. However, Muslim men tend to underperform in education a lot in comparison to both Muslim women and the national average (there are a lot of issues behind this but I’d have to write an essay to explain them all). Add to that the issue of a job shortage for lower skilled workers and one ends up with a large unemployment rate amongst men. A lot of women in these communities, however, still hold the belief that the male partner should at the very least earn as much as them. Besides that a lot of women will still choose to opt for staying at home as housewives and expecting their potential partners to earn money in a country where those men can barely find a fullfilling job to keep themselves afloat. This has resulted in a lot of Moroccan/Turkish men having to find brides from other countries, growing resentment for their current status and trying to find a higher status through other means.


2. Another problem that is plaguing communities here is the lack of male role models within family units (such as in single mother households) or within the community itself. One group which is suffering from this issue especially is the Afro-Surinamese community, which due to some things in their past has led to a really high number of single mom households with no father present, or even any males present in the wider community as a whole. Unlike some weird ideas from America male role model is incredibly important for children as well at least in the Afro-Surinamese community. Luckily the Dutch government has been trying to implement neighbourhood coaches that can act as positive role models, and it has helped at least a little bit, but it’s still a huge problem.


I’ve singled these two groups out for a reason. We’re mostly used to the idea that toxic masculinity ends up leading to inceldom, MGTOW or general toxic ideas about women... which is true for the American white population. In these specific communities, however, the lack of “male status” as well as no positive male role models have been two of the driving forces behind ridiculously high crime, incarceration and criminal records amongst men of minority backgrounds*. I want to illustrate with this result that we are thinking about toxic masculinity the wrong way. We often believe that toxic masculinity comes from a position of power and that it has caused our current culture and society. However, I think it’s the other way around: our current changing society but stagnating cultural perceptions have been causing toxic masculinity to grow amongst a lot of young men from poor and disadvantaged backgrounds.

I don’t think some kind of heavy-handed approach targeted at men won’t change this. Instead, we need to tackle this problem from all possible directions: we need to change the perception of male responsibility amongst men, we need to tackle women’s (somewhat denigrating) view on men that don’t “succeed” under the old cultural norms, and we need to both tackle the entrenched societal ideals at the top and tackle them in poorer communities of both majority and minority background. The other options are making this problem worse, or somehow regressing back to the "good old days", which weren't exactly great for anyone who wasn't a succeeding male anyways.

(*Source: Jaarrapport integratie Sociaal Cultureel Planbureau, Nederland, februari 2012, it's a PDF source that I specifically used a while back to research this topic myself. This trend continues until the present day but with crime (luckily) dropping overall.)

I'd like to ask people to be respectful towards each other. I get it that it's a very contentuous topic these days but I'd like everyone to be able to see this issue from other perspectives and learn from that :-)

Also, please avoid bringing in white supremacy into this. I get it that in the US racism and toxic masculinity amongst white men can go hand in hand, but I think this discussion has to be broader than that (which I illustrated in my two examples above). There's currently a White Supremacy discussion thread going on in case you want to bring toxic masculinity up in relation to white supremacy.

[Galloism]

Well, to start off with, it’s viewed as a gendered insult.

https://zenodo.org/record/3871217#.YIzupy33ahD

This study isn’t even a year old (published July 1, 2020) and hasn’t been replicated yet, but it is overwhelmingly showing that “toxic masculinity” as a term is toxic and hateful.

Psychologists also recommend not using it, as it is taken extremely negatively by the target audience, and actually results in impairing progress in addressing the issues facing men arising out of the male gender role, rather than progressing it.

We should be gender neutral and adapt the female term for the same thing to men: internalized misandry.

[Grinning Dragon]

TBH, whenever I hear the word "toxic masculinity" I just laugh, it's a stupid made up meaningless jumble of words that means nothing to me.

[Nolo gap]

all gender based behaviors are an act, i seriusly wish no one felt obliged to put on.

none contribute anything positive to the kind of world i would wish to live in.

(the toxic part is true, its the "masculinity" part that is meaningless)

[Sajidi Arabia]

Well, to start off with, it’s viewed as a gendered insult.

https://zenodo.org/record/3871217#.YIzupy33ahD

This study isn’t even a year old (published July 1, 2020) and hasn’t been replicated yet, but it is overwhelmingly showing that “toxic masculinity” as a term is toxic and hateful.

Psychologists also recommend not using it, as it is taken extremely negatively by the target audience, and actually results in impairing progress in addressing the issues facing men arising out of the male gender role, rather than progressing it.

We should be gender neutral and adapt the female term for the same thing to men: internalized misandry.

Alright, fair I guess, I haven't invented the term and it isn't really used in Dutch (where we stick to the terms "macho behaviour" and "rooster behaviour" instead, we're simple like that). However, does that mean you also don't agree with the concept either? I for one think that there definitely is at least some kind of negative behaviour that some disadvantaged (whether by economics, culture shock or even just looks) men end up showing in society, which I do consider as either toxic masculinity or whatever name we can come up with to illustrate it better.

TBH, whenever I hear the word "toxic masculinity" I just laugh, it's a stupid made up meaningless jumble of words that means nothing to me.

Why does it mean nothing to you?

[Grinning Dragon]

Well, to start off with, it’s viewed as a gendered insult.

https://zenodo.org/record/3871217#.YIzupy33ahD

This study isn’t even a year old (published July 1, 2020) and hasn’t been replicated yet, but it is overwhelmingly showing that “toxic masculinity” as a term is toxic and hateful.

Psychologists also recommend not using it, as it is taken extremely negatively by the target audience, and actually results in impairing progress in addressing the issues facing men arising out of the male gender role, rather than progressing it.

We should be gender neutral and adapt the female term for the same thing to men: internalized misandry.

Alright, fair I guess, I haven't invented the term and it isn't really used in Dutch (where we stick to the terms "macho behaviour" and "rooster behaviour" instead, we're simple like that). However, does that mean you also don't agree with the concept either? I for one think that there definitely is at least some kind of negative behaviour that some disadvantaged (whether by economics, culture shock or even just looks) men end up showing in society, which I do consider as either toxic masculinity or whatever name we can come up with to illustrate it better.

TBH, whenever I hear the word "toxic masculinity" I just laugh, it's a stupid made up meaningless jumble of words that means nothing to me.

Why does it mean nothing to you?

[Odreria]

Toxic gayness

[Neu California]

I'll repost this from the other thread, for those who want to read through my sources

For fun I googled toxic masculinity suicide and found all these results on the first page:

three scholarly articles:
Toxic Masculinity and Mental Health in Young Women: An Analysis of 13 Reasons Why (Toxic masculinity and female suicide)
The Problem With a Fight Against Toxic Masculinity (not really what the title makes it sound like and ties nicely into the topic and suicide)
Toxic Masculinity as a Barrier to Mental Health Treatment in Prison (article about how toxic masculinity makes it harder to get prisoners the mental health care they need)

Several other articles of various definitions:
1 in 5 men will not reach the age of 50 in the Americas, due to issues relating to toxic masculinity (Eeyup, study finds toxic masculinity is just that nasty)
Expressions of masculinity and associations with suicidal ideation among young males (Another study, this one finding that conformity to traits associated with toxic masculinity leads to higher rates of suicide ideation)
World Suicide Prevention Day: Why we should redefine masculinity (ties into the previous two links nicely)
Toxic masculinity may be quadrupling the suicide rate for Canadian men (As much as certain people call it a slur, it's actually a very real, and problematic, phenomenon)
Depression in Men: The Cycle of Toxic Masculinity (I relate especially to this article because of the bullying I underwent as a kid)
The Dangerous Effects of Toxic Masculinity (key quote: Men tend to keep so much bottled up inside. This includes all the traumas and heart-breaking moments. Eventually there has to be a release. And too often that is in an explosive way.)
New Research Provides Evidence Toxic Masculinity Leads to a Higher Risk of Suicide (eeyup. I suspect I actually linked to the study above, actually)
Suicide Nation: How ageism and toxic masculinity are killing our men (opinion piece, take it with as much salt as you need)
In Zimbabwe, Toxic Masculinity is Driving Male Suicide Rates (Another opinion piece)
New Research Provides Evidence Toxic Masculinity Leads to a Higher Risk of Suicide (Repost of the article three links up)

All of this was on the first page of a google search.

Also, since some new posts came up, I'd like to point out that crying helps as a way to help deal with trauma and challenges and setbacks, due to helping release emotions that are best not left to fester (Harvard)

[Galloism]

Well, to start off with, it’s viewed as a gendered insult.

https://zenodo.org/record/3871217#.YIzupy33ahD

This study isn’t even a year old (published July 1, 2020) and hasn’t been replicated yet, but it is overwhelmingly showing that “toxic masculinity” as a term is toxic and hateful.

Psychologists also recommend not using it, as it is taken extremely negatively by the target audience, and actually results in impairing progress in addressing the issues facing men arising out of the male gender role, rather than progressing it.

We should be gender neutral and adapt the female term for the same thing to men: internalized misandry.

Alright, fair I guess, I haven't invented the term and it isn't really used in Dutch (where we stick to the terms "macho behaviour" and "rooster behaviour" instead, we're simple like that). However, does that mean you also don't agree with the concept either? I for one think that there definitely is at least some kind of negative behaviour that some disadvantaged (whether by economics, culture shock or even just looks) men end up showing in society, which I do consider as either toxic masculinity or whatever name we can come up with to illustrate it better.

Just like there are with women, there are gendered behaviors that are pressed onto men that are harmful to them. In that sense, men are victims of misandry by society and can even internalize that misandry - reinforcing these harmful behaviors themselves.

While the data suggests women are the primary enforcers of this today, it’s unknown if this was always so, and doesn’t matter overmuch anyway. We should face the problems in the here and now.

These harmful pressures hit men of every class, but they especially hit men of low class and minority men. That’s why, for instance, men make up 97% of those killed by police, and black men about 42%.

However, psychologists warn that by using the term “toxic masculinity”, you actually wind up driving men away from trying to address these behaviors, actually reinforce them, and harm them psychologically. So you should adjust your terms.

[Ostroeuropa]

I'll repost this from the other thread, for those who want to read through my sources

For fun I googled toxic masculinity suicide and found all these results on the first page:

three scholarly articles:
Toxic Masculinity and Mental Health in Young Women: An Analysis of 13 Reasons Why (Toxic masculinity and female suicide)
The Problem With a Fight Against Toxic Masculinity (not really what the title makes it sound like and ties nicely into the topic and suicide)
Toxic Masculinity as a Barrier to Mental Health Treatment in Prison (article about how toxic masculinity makes it harder to get prisoners the mental health care they need)

Several other articles of various definitions:
1 in 5 men will not reach the age of 50 in the Americas, due to issues relating to toxic masculinity (Eeyup, study finds toxic masculinity is just that nasty)
Expressions of masculinity and associations with suicidal ideation among young males (Another study, this one finding that conformity to traits associated with toxic masculinity leads to higher rates of suicide ideation)
World Suicide Prevention Day: Why we should redefine masculinity (ties into the previous two links nicely)
Toxic masculinity may be quadrupling the suicide rate for Canadian men (As much as certain people call it a slur, it's actually a very real, and problematic, phenomenon)
Depression in Men: The Cycle of Toxic Masculinity (I relate especially to this article because of the bullying I underwent as a kid)
The Dangerous Effects of Toxic Masculinity (key quote: Men tend to keep so much bottled up inside. This includes all the traumas and heart-breaking moments. Eventually there has to be a release. And too often that is in an explosive way.)
New Research Provides Evidence Toxic Masculinity Leads to a Higher Risk of Suicide (eeyup. I suspect I actually linked to the study above, actually)
Suicide Nation: How ageism and toxic masculinity are killing our men (opinion piece, take it with as much salt as you need)
In Zimbabwe, Toxic Masculinity is Driving Male Suicide Rates (Another opinion piece)
New Research Provides Evidence Toxic Masculinity Leads to a Higher Risk of Suicide (Repost of the article three links up)

All of this was on the first page of a google search.

Also, since some new posts came up, I'd like to point out that crying helps as a way to help deal with trauma and challenges and setbacks, due to helping release emotions that are best not left to fester (Harvard)

This is a demonstration of you not understanding the difference between an objection to rhetoric and an objection to content. The second link you posted notes how the term is not actually helpful and serves to take issues unrelated to mens attitudes and blame mens attitudes for them.

An example for this is your first non-scholarly link, which blames the male suicide gap on toxic masculinity. Meanwhile, the gap has been closed in areas where MRA charities operate.

CALM is an MRA Mental health charity:
http://www.menandboyscoalition.org.uk/m ... miserably/
http://www.menandboyscoalition.org.uk/m ... n-daubney/
https://www.indy100.com/article/brexit- ... ic-8887686


Studies:

https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.10 ... 1yCwoH_LQ0

men, like all human beings, benefit from talking to someone who is genuinely able to connect with their world, and is authentically listening. This means that there is also an urgent need to change social and cultural attitudes to enable men to be responded to with greater empathy and gender-sensitivity.
When it comes to therapy, existing evidence suggests that some approaches work much better than others for men. For example, the charity Campaign Against Living Miserably (CALM) has over the past two decades been offering telephone and online support, along with community support programmes, targeted particularly at younger men who are vulnerable to suicide. CALM still remains one of the few help organisations that has deliberately set out to create a gender-specific and male-friendly ethos (Holloway et al. 2018).

+

There is additional evidence, however, that even our supposedly gender-neutral counselling and therapy services are inherently ‘feminised’ in that they offer a ‘talk-based’ approach based on direct face-to-face emotional exploration which is more congruent with evolved female patterns of communication than it is with male styles of emotional processing and functioning (Morison et al. 2014). The findings of Holloway et al. (2018) support this view: interviews with 20 experienced clinical psychologists, psychotherapists and counsellors found that, on average, male clients want a practical “fix” for their problems, whereas women want to explore their feelings.

+

It should therefore be acknowledged that the surface problem of men not talking or seeking help can also be seen as rooted in a deeper problem of therapy services, and society as a whole, not being receptive or empathic to the male gender. It’s perhaps not so much that men won’t talk, but that society isn’t listening. In this regard, Seager et al. (2014b) refer to the concept of ‘male gender blindness’ when describing how men’s needs are often implicitly overlooked, which also helps to explain why the question of whether men have specific needs from therapy is one that is seldom even asked (Golden 2013; Kingerlee et al. 2014).

+

in terms of gender, there is evidence that the professional help typically on offer is routinely blind to the needs and preferences of men,

+

However, our response to male distress reverts back to urging men to use the services that they are already avoiding rather than thinking of ways to design approaches that will connect better with men.

[Neu California]

One study I linked above defines these traits in relation to toxic masculinity

(1) Primacy of Work (not really sure)
(2) Dominance (men should be dominant in all things)
(3) Risk-Taking (You're not a real man if you don't take risks)
(4) Heterosexual presentation (if you come off as at all gay, that's bad)
(5) Power over Women (Women must be subservient to men. Contrary to what some might say, I see this as pretty core to the topic)
(6) Emotional Control (only allowed to express two emotions: happiness and anger)
(7) Playboy (self-explanatory)
(8) Violence (fight back against the bully and all that nonsense)
(9) Pursuit of Status (again, self explanatory)
(10) Winning (Losing bad, losing is nothing more than failure, not an opportunity to grow)
(11) Self-Reliance (If you need a therapist to deal with your issues, then you're not a real man)

[Sajidi Arabia]

Why does it mean nothing to you?

Alright, but that doesn't actually explain why you consider it meaningless. Do you think the entire concept doesn't exist? Or is it just to do with the term being applied more as a buzzword instead of talking about the actual issues associated with it?

Alright, fair I guess, I haven't invented the term and it isn't really used in Dutch (where we stick to the terms "macho behaviour" and "rooster behaviour" instead, we're simple like that). However, does that mean you also don't agree with the concept either? I for one think that there definitely is at least some kind of negative behaviour that some disadvantaged (whether by economics, culture shock or even just looks) men end up showing in society, which I do consider as either toxic masculinity or whatever name we can come up with to illustrate it better.

Just like there are with women, there are gendered behaviors that are pressed onto men that are harmful to them. In that sense, men are victims of misandry by society and can even internalize that misandry - reinforcing these harmful behaviors themselves.

While the data suggests women are the primary enforcers of this today, it’s unknown if this was always so, and doesn’t matter overmuch anyway. We should face the problems in the here and now.

These harmful pressures hit men of every class, but they especially hit men of low class and minority men. That’s why, for instance, men make up 97% of those killed by police, and black men about 42%.

However, psychologists warn that by using the term “toxic masculinity”, you actually wind up driving men away from trying to address these behaviors, actually reinforce them, and harm them psychologically. So you should adjust your terms.

I did bring that up in the OP though.

The issue I'm currently seeing in this debate is that we have two sides that agree on the fact that it is an issue, but they disagree on how to solve it and who is "to blame". The term is pretty bad but I think we should be able to debate about at least the concept behind the term and figure something out. As for the latter, I think everyone is equally to blame when it comes to wider societal issues, but that every group is responsible in different ways.

[Neu California]

I'll repost this from the other thread, for those who want to read through my sources

This is a demonstration of you not understanding the difference between an objection to rhetoric and an objection to content. The second link you posted notes how the term is not actually helpful and serves to take issues unrelated to mens attitudes and blame mens attitudes for them.

And all the other links? Because I think I covered both topics you're talking about quite thoroughly here.

[Kilobugya]

I believe it does exist, and is neither insulting nor an attack against men in general. It's a specific form of masculinity, one that is rooted in macho attitude, aggressiveness, possessiveness, belief that men are "strong" and should show no weakness. It's toxic to women who are often victim of violence because of it, but also to men, especially boys, who are told they aren't allowed to express their fears or sadness, not allowed to cry, not allowed to ask for help.

As for how to improve things, it's mostly through education, both from teachers and from parents. But it's also about public discourse in general, when someone like Trump who exhibit lots of aspects of it is president (and cult leader) of course it encourages some to follow.

[Krasny-Volny]

The definition of "toxic masculinity" varies greatly from individual to individual, and reflects their unique cultural and regional background. As somebody who was not raised in an area or social circle where this terminology is common, I can say that in order for one to accept the concept of "toxic masculinity", it must first be preceded by various preconceptions which I think are reflective of class and cultural biases.

For example, the preconception that masculinity exists as a socially enforced construct, and the preconception that traditional aspects of this hypothetical construct are toxic emotionally or psychologically to individuals who are supposedly - according to your interpretation, anyway - acting it out.

The first problem with this mode of thinking is that masculinity does not have a universal definition as a construct. It just does not, not even within the same country. How masculinity is perceived by people of different races and cultural and class backgrounds varies greatly in the US, for example. If everybody has a slightly different vision of what masculinity is, there can be no one concept to criticize as inherently toxic. To you, somebody may not be acting in a masculine fashion at all, but in their minds they are because it's how they understand it in their culture. Or they may have certain characteristics which you personally consider masculine, but others which don't jive with your narrative of what masculinity is at all. See how that's problematic?

The sheer subjectiveness of masculinity - and by extension, the sheer subjectiveness of what constitutes "toxic masculinity" is too much to proclaim that "toxic masculinity" exists or that it is a problem.

[Ostroeuropa]

This is a demonstration of you not understanding the difference between an objection to rhetoric and an objection to content. The second link you posted notes how the term is not actually helpful and serves to take issues unrelated to mens attitudes and blame mens attitudes for them.

And all the other links? Because I think I covered both topics you're talking about quite thoroughly here.

Which links deal specifically with the rhetoric? I'm reading through them but it's pretty poor form to just dump a dozen links like that in a gish galloping fashion.

The second link you posted notes how the term is not actually helpful and serves to take issues unrelated to mens attitudes and blame mens attitudes for them.
An example for this is your first non-scholarly link, which blames the male suicide gap on toxic masculinity. Meanwhile, the gap has been closed in areas where MRA charities operate.

CALM is an MRA Mental health charity:
http://www.menandboyscoalition.org.uk/m ... miserably/
http://www.menandboyscoalition.org.uk/m ... n-daubney/
https://www.indy100.com/article/brexit- ... ic-8887686


Studies:

https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.10 ... 1yCwoH_LQ0

men, like all human beings, benefit from talking to someone who is genuinely able to connect with their world, and is authentically listening. This means that there is also an urgent need to change social and cultural attitudes to enable men to be responded to with greater empathy and gender-sensitivity.
When it comes to therapy, existing evidence suggests that some approaches work much better than others for men. For example, the charity Campaign Against Living Miserably (CALM) has over the past two decades been offering telephone and online support, along with community support programmes, targeted particularly at younger men who are vulnerable to suicide. CALM still remains one of the few help organisations that has deliberately set out to create a gender-specific and male-friendly ethos (Holloway et al. 2018).

+

There is additional evidence, however, that even our supposedly gender-neutral counselling and therapy services are inherently ‘feminised’ in that they offer a ‘talk-based’ approach based on direct face-to-face emotional exploration which is more congruent with evolved female patterns of communication than it is with male styles of emotional processing and functioning (Morison et al. 2014). The findings of Holloway et al. (2018) support this view: interviews with 20 experienced clinical psychologists, psychotherapists and counsellors found that, on average, male clients want a practical “fix” for their problems, whereas women want to explore their feelings.

+

It should therefore be acknowledged that the surface problem of men not talking or seeking help can also be seen as rooted in a deeper problem of therapy services, and society as a whole, not being receptive or empathic to the male gender. It’s perhaps not so much that men won’t talk, but that society isn’t listening. In this regard, Seager et al. (2014b) refer to the concept of ‘male gender blindness’ when describing how men’s needs are often implicitly overlooked, which also helps to explain why the question of whether men have specific needs from therapy is one that is seldom even asked (Golden 2013; Kingerlee et al. 2014).

+

in terms of gender, there is evidence that the professional help typically on offer is routinely blind to the needs and preferences of men,

+

However, our response to male distress reverts back to urging men to use the services that they are already avoiding rather than thinking of ways to design approaches that will connect better with men.

[Krasny-Volny]

One study I linked above defines these traits in relation to toxic masculinity

(1) Primacy of Work (not really sure)
(2) Dominance (men should be dominant in all things)
(3) Risk-Taking (You're not a real man if you don't take risks)
(4) Heterosexual presentation (if you come off as at all gay, that's bad)
(5) Power over Women (Women must be subservient to men. Contrary to what some might say, I see this as pretty core to the topic)
(6) Emotional Control (only allowed to express two emotions: happiness and anger)
(7) Playboy (self-explanatory)
(8) Violence (fight back against the bully and all that nonsense)
(9) Pursuit of Status (again, self explanatory)
(10) Winning (Losing bad, losing is nothing more than failure, not an opportunity to grow)
(11) Self-Reliance (If you need a therapist to deal with your issues, then you're not a real man)

Looks like to me this says more about the inherent biases of the authorship of that study than what constitutes "toxic masculinity".

[Grinning Dragon]

Alright, but that doesn't actually explain why you consider it meaningless. Do you think the entire concept doesn't exist? Or is it just to do with the term being applied more as a buzzword instead of talking about the actual issues associated with it?

Just like there are with women, there are gendered behaviors that are pressed onto men that are harmful to them. In that sense, men are victims of misandry by society and can even internalize that misandry - reinforcing these harmful behaviors themselves.

While the data suggests women are the primary enforcers of this today, it’s unknown if this was always so, and doesn’t matter overmuch anyway. We should face the problems in the here and now.

These harmful pressures hit men of every class, but they especially hit men of low class and minority men. That’s why, for instance, men make up 97% of those killed by police, and black men about 42%.

However, psychologists warn that by using the term “toxic masculinity”, you actually wind up driving men away from trying to address these behaviors, actually reinforce them, and harm them psychologically. So you should adjust your terms

I did bring that up in the OP though.

The issue I'm currently seeing in this debate is that we have two sides that agree on the fact that it is an issue, but they disagree on how to solve it and who is "to blame". The term is pretty bad but I think we should be able to debate about at least the concept behind the term and figure something out. As for the latter, I think everyone is equally to blame when it comes to wider societal issues, but that every group is responsible in different ways.

A meaningless buzzword that gets thrown around to address people acting like a jackass.
I understand where Gallo is coming from and agree with that position, however if it were to be directed at me it wouldn't affect me.

[Ostroeuropa]

There's also the fact that the only reason feminists are attached to the term is so they can discuss mens issues without breaking the coalition between feminists who categorically deny that misandry exists, and those who accept it does but nonetheless want to stay in coalition with people who deny it does.

In itself this informs the history of the term and strengthens the case for it being a slur. Absent a term that demonizes men and blames masculinity for problems, they would be forced to either once again neglect mens issues and return to the erosion of their legitimacy that has occurred over recent decades, or begin to talk about misandry in society and acknowledge that it harms men.

At that point we have to discuss "What causes people to view men in such a negative fashion" and one of the first culprits named would be the feminist movement itself.

Given this dynamic, and given the offensiveness of the term, "Slur" is not actually a reach. The power dynamic behind its usage and its usage being to shield and sustain sexism against men is important to evaluation of it.

[Muzehnaya]

(5) Power over Women (Women must be subservient to men. Contrary to what some might say, I see this as pretty core to the topic)

Could you elaborate on this? About it being core to the topic I mean.

[Galloism]

Alright, but that doesn't actually explain why you consider it meaningless. Do you think the entire concept doesn't exist? Or is it just to do with the term being applied more as a buzzword instead of talking about the actual issues associated with it?

Just like there are with women, there are gendered behaviors that are pressed onto men that are harmful to them. In that sense, men are victims of misandry by society and can even internalize that misandry - reinforcing these harmful behaviors themselves.

While the data suggests women are the primary enforcers of this today, it’s unknown if this was always so, and doesn’t matter overmuch anyway. We should face the problems in the here and now.

These harmful pressures hit men of every class, but they especially hit men of low class and minority men. That’s why, for instance, men make up 97% of those killed by police, and black men about 42%.

However, psychologists warn that by using the term “toxic masculinity”, you actually wind up driving men away from trying to address these behaviors, actually reinforce them, and harm them psychologically. So you should adjust your terms.

I did bring that up in the OP though.

The issue I'm currently seeing in this debate is that we have two sides that agree on the fact that it is an issue, but they disagree on how to solve it and who is "to blame". The term is pretty bad but I think we should be able to debate about at least the concept behind the term and figure something out. As for the latter, I think everyone is equally to blame when it comes to wider societal issues, but that every group is responsible in different ways.

Personally, I largely disagree that using terms widely regarded as gendered insults crafted in a manner to blame the victim (when the concept already had a perfectly acceptable term for women) is done in any way in a good faith manner.

It’s like a person who insists on calling Brazil nuts “nigger toes”. Yes, that’s a colloquial name for Brazil nuts. It actually used to be really common. But if someone tells you “you know, that’s really offensive, you should call them Brazil Nuts”, and you keep saying it, you’re not acting in good faith.

And while everyone shares the blame, to assert it’s “equally to blame” is probably not true in the current day (although it once might have been) when it comes to misandry, even internalized misandry. Men largely recognize that the majority of their “no weakness” social shame comes from women. That’s why they are less likely to hold to the gender role amongst their male friends.

[Kilobugya]

There's also the fact that the only reason feminists are attached to the term

... is because it's a very appropriate term to design a real problem and there is no better one.

is so they can discuss mens issues without breaking the coalition between feminists who categorically deny that misandry exists, and those who accept it does but nonetheless want to stay in coalition with people who deny it does.

Where do you fetch such ideas so utterly disconnected from reality ? There is no "coalition", there is no binary split because those who deny and those who don't, and except a few fringe circles most just accept a variety of "sure it can occasionally exist but it's rare and in a systematic form like oppression of women", which is actually the truth.

[Ostroeuropa]

This is a demonstration of you not understanding the difference between an objection to rhetoric and an objection to content. The second link you posted notes how the term is not actually helpful and serves to take issues unrelated to mens attitudes and blame mens attitudes for them.

And all the other links? Because I think I covered both topics you're talking about quite thoroughly here.

Having gone over your links, No, you did not in fact cover the topic of the difference between rhetoric and content. Here, let's see if this gets through to you:

(Self-demonstrating example: See the "Feminist subhuman qualities" problem; The majority of society understands the problem with terms like toxic masculinity and the nature of rhetoric being a different matter from the idea being communicated. If we take the average level of this understanding as the human average, we can conclude that feminists who use terms like toxic masculinity are sub-human in their understanding and awareness, as polling demonstrates, quite literally in the bottom 10% of the population, comparable to 70 IQ folk. The problem of these feminists having subhuman qualities permeates their lexicon and behavior, and does harm to themselves and others.)

Such a term describes a real phenomena that is measurable and provable as in the study on views on whether the term "Toxic masculinity" is abusive/offensive, which shows 90% of both sexes agree it is abusive and offensive even after given definitions of what it means.

Do you object to such a term to describe this trait in feminists, and if so, on what grounds? Is it that You just don't understand the definition behind the term 'feminist subhuman qualities'? I'm not saying feminists are subhumans. I'm talking about the subhuman qualities many feminists seem to exhibit as a result of Subhuman Feminism.

[Galloism]

There is no "coalition", there is no binary split because those who deny and those who don't, and except a few fringe circles most just accept a variety of "sure it can occasionally exist but it's rare and in a systematic form like oppression of women", which is actually the truth.

By “truth” you mean “categorically a lie”?

I mean, men are killed over 30 times as often by police as women. It’s probably not because they love men and are killing them with kindness bullets.

[Ostroeuropa]

There's also the fact that the only reason feminists are attached to the term

... is because it's a very appropriate term to design a real problem and there is no better one.

is so they can discuss mens issues without breaking the coalition between feminists who categorically deny that misandry exists, and those who accept it does but nonetheless want to stay in coalition with people who deny it does.

Where do you fetch such ideas so utterly disconnected from reality ? There is no "coalition", there is no binary split because those who deny and those who don't, and except a few fringe circles most just accept a variety of "sure it can occasionally exist but it's rare and in a systematic form like oppression of women", which is actually the truth.

It's highly inappropriate and comes with a number of drawbacks that we've pointed out to you.

As for the "Utterly disconnected", no. It's fairly straightforward.

You yourself are tipping your hand here by basically admitting the term toxic masculinity allows you to rationalize how misandry is "rare and not in a systemic form". This is similar to if I just talked about "Toxic blackness" but said "Racism against black people is rare and not systemic", then whenever someone pointed it out, i'd say "That's toxic blackness". This is what your acceptance of the term of toxic masculinity has caused in you and your perspective on the world.

Incidentally, i'd say that makes you the type of feminist who denies misandry exists, since I'm of the opinion that sexism requires systemic causes to be sexism, though i accept reasonable people disagree on that point in particular.