Toxic Mansculinity

Grand Canyon, View from Phantom Ranch
(📷: Me)

As I progress through my healing journey, I've vowed to not just shove down my feelings but rather address them and say them outlaid, thereby releasing their power over me. I know that sounds like some hippie shit, but it works. While I still maintain my mantra, that I love my brother and that he loved me; that what he did was his decision and not my fault, I still often think about the things that I could have done better and how I can do better for others with the knowledge I currently have. One topic that repeated comes to mind, and not exactly in the way one might think.

Now despite having a male significant other, and a number of close male friends, I am usually the first to say that men are trash. I hate the double standard for men and women, the mansplaining, the entitlement, the overtalking, the slut shaming and the idea that they are more rational beings. I think that even the most "woke" male has some of these traits, these toxic ideals of what it is to be a manly man. So it is with this in mind that I ask, what have I done to contribute to this ideal?

The question first arose after listening to a TedTalk by Brene Brown, Listening to Shame at one point, she discusses how at a book signing she spoke with a husband and father who was getting an autograph for his wife and daughters and posed the question,

"For men, shame is not a bunch of competing, conflicting expectations. Shame is one, do not be perceived as what? Weak. I did not interview men for the first four years of my study. It wasn't until a man looked at me after a book signing, and said, "I love what say about shame, I'm curious why you didn't mention men." And I said, "I don't study men." And he said, "That's convenient."

And I said, "Why?" And he said, "Because you say to reach out, tell our story, be vulnerable. But you see those books you just signed for my wife and my three daughters?" I said, "Yeah." "They'd rather me die on top of my white horse than watch me fall down. When we reach out and be vulnerable, we get the shit beat out of us. And don't tell me it's from the guys and the coaches and the dads. Because the women in my life are harder on me than anyone else." 

And I think that I am incredibly guilty of that. For so long Manuel was the backbone of our family, but when he was vulnerable and sick, I took me a while to really adjust to that. And I feel like that was my own brand, as a women, of toxic masculinity at work.

One afternoon, after a mountainous hike and several beers, my friend and I start in on the discussion of "men are trash" and toxic masculinity. It was my friend who pointed out that women are just as capable of toxic masculinity as men. We often tell men they are weak for crying or heaven forbid they talk about their emotions. Do we not push men to bear the brunt of their pain in silence?

Now I don't believe that it is our job as women to fix men. They are adults just like us and need to hold themselves accountable for themselves and each other; we already take on enough societal burden and constantly protect ourselves from external threat, that we should have to also serve as counselors to men. But I do also believe that we need to check ourselves and not contribute to that behavior either. And so, I acknowledge the part I've had to play in toxic masculinity. And I hope that I can learn and grow, and remember that sometimes people are sick and not weak and that we are all emotional beings.