Against "toxic masculinity"
In today's post: Big diction energy.
Let me tell you about having a brand that’s strong: last week, I did four separate appearances — for not only NPR, but also WNYC, Illinois Public Radio, and the podcast It’s Been a Minute — about the politics of manhood.
I wrote my first big piece about the politics of masculinity back in 2016, and since then, it has been both my personal fixation and, eventually, my reporting niche — the particular subject cover more and more in-depth than probably anyone else (not to toot my own horn, but you can’t kill a woman for being right).
All that while, I’ve shied away from using the phrase “toxic masculinity.” I never thought about it much…just quietly deleted it when it popped out of me in a draft or when an editor suggested it. When colleagues have called my beat the “toxic masculinity” beat, I haven’t exactly corrected them…but rather, have done something more like making a deflated, noncommittal “ehhhh” noise while vaguely shaking-slash-cocking my head.
And so I was surprised when, after my last newsletter — in which I laid out all the trash newsletter ideas I’ve had and chosen not to inflict upon the good subscribers of my newsletter — I got a healthy email response about one of those trash ideas.
The people, it seems, want to know why I don’t like that phrase.
Briefly, I wondered: Could I pull a muscle from staring into my navel too hard?
But I’m not above giving the people what they want. So. Here we go: the primary reasons I don’t use the phrase “toxic masculinity.”1
1) It’s not descriptive.
I think about this the way I think about writing anything: if I can describe what’s happening, I try to do that rather than resorting to a label.
For example: I’m not going to call the economy “bad” or “troubled” if I can instead pinpoint the problem more precisely: “inflation is higher than we’d like it.”2
“Bad” isn’t meaningless; it’s just too broad.
Similarly, the phrase “toxic masculinity” isn’t meaningless – when you say it, I have a general idea of what you mean. In fact, definitions abound.3
But then, a “general idea” of what it means isn’t good enough. The phrase “toxic masculinity” can refer to so many types of behavior: physical aggression, sexual domination, refusing to help with domestic labor, emotional repression, and on and on and on.
In addition, there’s an inescapable sense of bias that comes from labeling someone “toxic,” even if the phrase “toxic masculinity” itself is an attempt at an objective diagnosis of a problem in society.
I’ve covered gender in politics — and men in particular — for nearly a decade now. And over that time, sources, listeners, readers, and even fellow journalists have characterized many politicians (and Trump in particular) to me as “toxic.”
That’s all fine, but for me, it’s simply better writing to say what someone is doing – that they have a pattern of, say, slamming women of color. That they have acted in a particular way when confronted with powerful women.
“Toxic” tells me none of that.
—
2) In fact, it’s becoming less useful every day.
A fun linguistics term I learned while reporting a story on cancel culture: semantic bleaching.
This is when a phrase has been used so much that it dulls and fades. “Political correctness” and “woke” are examples of this, as I wrote back in 2021.
Interestingly, “politically correct” and “woke” and “toxic masculinity” all have these very specific, fascinating origin stories. These are all phrases that came about because of how particular subcultures reacted to a changing society.
“Politically correct” was regularly used, for example, by the left back in the 1960s as an in-joke. It was a way to acknowledge that, yes, one can’t always act perfectly in line with one’s morals, but whatllyado.
The word “woke” has roots in American Black civil rights struggles — it was used as a way for Blacks to talk about keeping an eye out for systemic oppression.
Toxic masculinity, meanwhile, arose out of men’s movements in the late 20th century, as they grappled with the meaning of masculinity in a world where men’s roles had changed rapidly.
All of these phrases’ meanings and uses have changed…and in and of itself, that’s not bad. Language changes all the time.
But these phrases in particular (along with many others, like “cancel”) have been laden with baggage — they’ve been weaponized, loaded up with partisan meaning, and then shellacked in layers of anger and irony and half-jokes and bad faith.
All of which means that to use a phrase like toxic masculinity is to say both more (because of the baggage) and less (because of the vagueness) than you intend to.
—DIGRESSION: let’s talk about the word “toxic”—
The increasing prevalence of therapyspeak has also, to me, made “toxic” doubly nonmeaningful. Think of how your brain glazes over when you hear the phrase “boundaries” or “self-care” for the millionth time. Calling someone a “toxic person” is at this point a touchy-feely way of saying, “they’re an asshole.” Which only adds to the blurry aura of the phrase “toxic masculinity.”
—END DIGRESSION—
One thing I will give the phrase: to me, the most useful aspect of “toxic masculinity” is that it attributes shitty behaviors to broadly accepted gender norms.
But again, for me, here is another area where there are often better phrases. “Traditional masculinity” gives a sense of a timeframe — of shifting societal norms. “Patriarchal masculinity” is a way of talking about power dynamics and structural inequality. “Toxic,” meanwhile, just kind of vaguely gestures at the idea of “bad.”
IMMATERIAL TO ME SO I’M NOT GIVING IT A NUMBER IN THIS LIST, BUT I’M JUST SAYING) It’s not helping your cause.
Not that I’m in the business of having opinions or convincing people to do anything (I’m a news reporter – I don’t get to have opinions or convince anyone of anything, ha ha lolsob JUST KIDDING or am i?). But if I WERE, say, trying to tell men to stop with the domineering, violent behavior, I wouldn’t start by calling it “toxic.”
It’s like if you were to insult the way I was socialized (“Hey Danielle – your douchebag workaholism and weenie-ass perpetual self-effacement make you insufferable”) and hope I would change. Instead, what I’d do is call you a dumbface, give you a wedgie, and run away.4
4) Toxic to whom?
I put this one last because a) it matters least and b) it may fall under the category of overthinking things.
But hear me out: the word “toxic” implies a poison. It implies that you, the speaker, are vulnerable to the other person’s toxin.
Given that the types of people who use the phrase “toxic masculinity” are already stereotyped as snowflakes, I wonder if saying “I find this person toxic” doesn’t reinforce that idea.
In which case: Does the phrase “toxic masculinity” imply that the supposedly toxic person is the aggressor, or at the very least, the stronger party? And if so…don’t supposedly toxic people often like being the aggressors?
(I have related reservations about the term “microaggression” … not because I don’t think microaggressions exist (they do) but because by attaching the prefix “micro-”, I wonder if the word sets the speaker up to fail. If I accuse you of a microaggression, am I letting you know that you should micro-care about my micro-complaint about your microaggression?)
Sometimes, just saying, “hey, you’re being a jerk” is all you need.
UPDATES AND LINKS AND RECOMMENDATIONS
What on earth do I call this newsletter? As I’ve done more appearances, and as hosts have attempted to say the title of this newsletter to family audiences, I’ve realized I need to change the title. I am open to suggestions. Leave them in the comments, if you’re a paid subscriber, because hey that’s your privilege. You earned that, you beautiful animal.
The fusion of Trumpism and Christianity. I went to Butler for Trump’s return after being there during the shooting. I was struck this time by the heavily religious rhetoric his followers use to talk about him.
Trump and Vance do the dudebro podcast circuit. Lots of people have written about the Trump-Vance dude strategy, but to my knowledge, I’m the first to put numbers to it. For example: did you know the Full Send podcast has a listenership that’s around 90% men? 90%! That’s a lot of dudes!
Trump’s rhetoric is getting…darker. Which is saying something. Calling Kamala Harris “mentally impaired” and suggesting that if America’s police had “one rough hour, and I mean real rough,” it would curb crime? These things happened.
RECOMMENDATION: Go see The Substance. Oh my God, the joy. Is it perfect? No. Does it get at all the nuances of beauty culture and womanhood in a society where we have to be permanently hot? No. But it’s an all-caps cathartic scream. I had a blast.
RECOMMENDATION 2: Ambition Monster, by Jenn Romolini. What’s that you say? A memoir about a successful media lady who works too hard and starts to wonder what it’s all for? I’m halfway through. It’s wildly relatable. I feel attacked.
TODAY’S OLD-INTERNET JOY: “Shia LaBeouf Live.” A disclaimer here: this is not a statement of support for Shia LaBeouf the person. Women have accused him of reprehensible things, including abuse. HOWEVER: this song is a prime example of internet joy. I think of it at least weekly. It starts out kind of funny and dark and weird, and it just keeps going bigger and bigger. A string quartet? Modern dancers? A children’s chorus? A gay men’s chorus? Those aerial scarf dancing ladies? Incredible. More stuff like this, internet, preferably about non-problematic people.
To be clear here, you do you. I don’t like to use the phrase, but you still can. Please don’t write to me telling me I’m wrong for judging your choices. I’m not judging your choices! In fact, the truth is uglier: I don’t care about your choices. Hahahahaha I’m the worst, aren’t I.
Which, by the way, doesn’t mean the economy as a whole IS bad.
Fun fact I learned while writing this: WebMD has an article on toxic masculinity. And I don’t know why, but it tickles me that the place I go to get repeatedly misdiagnosed with MS is also diagnosing people with being products of the patriarchy. Shine on you, crazy website.
This is not true: I would work my ass off to change, thereby failing immediately, and then insult myself for doing so. Either way, you will have failed.