[flagged]
Thanks again for the insightful article!
Curious, did you downvote because it seemed to violate the norms, or did it have a negative experience for you? Or was the negative experience seeing it violate the norms, or something else.
Thanks for the upvotes (and down votes!) and comments.
I can tell you that, after clicking and reading through, having the same text repeated felt like it didn't use my attention well. That was the basis of my downvote.
Thank you for your curiosity and for sating mine.
The "start" of this (or at least, the earliest documented occurrences of it I know of) were body builders selling workout tips to men in the 1930's who lacked the physiques we decided were how men should look. And since then it's gone on to sell all manner of things: the SUV/Truck obsession we wrangle with was sold heavily on this, since men felt emasculated by minivans (because Detroit told them they were) and later, SUVs became too associated with moms so men get trucks instead now that are functionally identical to SUVs but I digress; the endless parade of supplements, testosterone boosters, hair growth formulas, pills that make you have more and longer erections, basically every workout product ever sold to men has some masculinity angle attached to it, all the way to the more ridiculous shit like dude wipes, which are baby wipes except MANLY, and Axe bodyspray which purports in ads to cause every attractive sub-25-year-old woman in a 2 mile radius crave your dick, on, and on, and on, probably IMHO at least, culminating in the new phenomenon of manliness camps where bros pay tens of thousands of dollars to be hauled into the wilderness (or an industrial park) and be made to perform all manner of bizarre rituals that will fix the hollowness society has engineered inside them, no but for real, this time we pinky promise.
Masculinity has always been in crisis and that crisis has been used reliably to sell men all kinds of stupid shit for a century and if we're honest, probably a LOT longer than that.
Understanding what types of men are impacted by the masculinity parade and what types are not may prove quite insightful, and may also offer some clues about how to push back against it (for those who need or want to).
[0] although I am unquestionably subject to social trends, often without realizing it until years later, none of the list above has ever held any sway over me. I loved our minivan (I even thought it was sexy). I worked out to keep up with some of the women I raced against, not ficticious male standards, I've never used a deodorant, nor paid anyone to take me into the wilderness (I do go there alone, though) etc. etc.
I think some or all of these following things would push one in the right direction of the cause:
- Men are not urged in any way to develop social skills while growing up; such things are solely the domain of women and girls. Speaking your feelings is girly. Resolving conflicts in non-violent ways is girly. This results in a lifetime of sub-optimal social operation and thus a lifetime of lesser-or-un-met social needs. Men often post online about craving affection, sexual or otherwise, but lack the vocabulary to ask for it, if they even have relationships in their lives that would connect them with the people they need to ask.
- In fact, quite the opposite, boys are socialized to scrabble and fight over everything: feminine attention, social status, access to scarce resources, all can prompt fights in schools, on busses, etc. When bullies would steal my lunch as a kiddo, my dad encouraged me to fight them, because you can't simply ask a young boy to not harm another young boy; you have to prove yourself threatening to that boy, so he will pick on someone else who is less so. And like, credit where due, his advice worked, even if it costed me a tiny piece of my humanity.
- Many man-centered hobbies also require money, which pushes men and boys into employment earlier than their female counterparts. The act of earning money itself is highly masculine; the "breadwinner" is the husband, it's a trope for a reason. Even decades after women have entered the workforce in a big way, and a single-income household is all but a fantasy for the upper middle class and above, this still holds. And this one isn't even just enforced by men: women, rightfully so due to economic pressures, demand a man earn his keep too in order to be even considered relationship material. And like... again, she's right to, because single income households are practically unheard of these days.
Can't tell you why though. Maybe I had enough friends and real life experience to keep me grounded and that's missing for some that get caught up in this communities.
> Masculinity has always been in crisis and that crisis has been used reliably to sell men all kinds of stupid shit for a century and if we're honest, probably a LOT longer than that.
...I feel like I could change it like this and it would be equally "true":
> Femininity has always been in crisis and that crisis has been used reliably to sell women all kinds of stupid shit for a century and if we're honest, probably a LOT longer than that.
I'm not sure what it is other than some general insecurity common to humanity.
Until quite recently (~100 years?), child-rearing was the socially approved center of female life in most cultures (obviously many women avoided it, just like many men avoid the tropes of masculinity, but it was where social pressure would move you) and babies and children are an enormous amount of work (1). So as the economic, cultural and material world changes what it means to be a "man" can change, but what it means to be a woman didn't start to change until much more recently. So Masculinity has been in crisis for millennia- always worried about lack of manly virtues (2)- because it has to be constantly changed to fit with the times.
1: Personal experience, 2016-present.
2: See, e.g. https://acoup.blog/2020/02/07/collections-the-fremen-mirage-... for a discussion of how people of Caesar's day viewed their decadence
And you're absolutely correct that the lions share of it can be directed at women too, though they tend to use different words. Women take down other women for being too sexually available, or not sexually liberated enough; they take them down for dressing to impress men, or trying to seduce other women; for wearing the same dress to multiple occasions, etc. etc. etc. It's an equally irrational set of made up rules to justify people being shitty to one another.
I would argue the masculinity crisis is unique only in that it occurs in a largely privileged and advantaged group, which prevents a lot of the "rallying" that one sees in actually oppressed groups of people and causes a lot more infighting.
And I mean, all of this could be led into quite easily a discussion about capitalism's ongoing alienation of everyone from everyone and everything, because when you feel that yawning chasm in your soul, you're much more primed to consume products to try and fix it. But that's a whole other topic and HN usually doesn't like those kinds of discussions.