Shifting from toxic to positive masculinity

When Will Smith walked onto the stage at this year’s Oscar ceremony and slapped Chris Rock in the face, he did so in a show of masculine aggression in retaliation for a joke Rock had made about his wife, Jada Pinkett Smith. Tapping into the uglier side of masculinity, Smith seemed compelled to assert and showcase his manhood by meeting the occasion with violence.

While many felt Rock’s joke was in bad taste —it poked fun at Pinkett Smith’s alopecia — there was a range of alternative responses that didn’t involve physical violence. But Smith chose it regardless, as we men tend to do.

In a teary speech after winning his first Oscar for Best Leading Actor for his role in King Richard about a half hour after the incident, Smith spoke of feeling “called” in that moment to protect his family.

“Richard Williams was a fierce defender of his family,” he said. “In this time in my life, in this moment, I am overwhelmed by what God is calling on me to do and be in this world… Art imitates life. I look like the crazy father, just like they said about Richard Williams! But love will make you do crazy things.”

The notion that Smith was “protecting” his wife was viewed by many as a noble act, as evidenced by the standing ovation he received during and after his speech. This was toxic masculinity on display in full view of the entire world, and for the most part it seemed to be viewed as heroic.

So, what is toxic masculinity, you ask?

Healthline, a platform that covers all facets of physical and mental health, describes toxic masculinity as “an adherence to the limiting and potentially dangerous societal standards set for men and masculine-identifying people”.

To unpack this further, I speak to Amanda Gifford, a therapist registered with the Health Professions Council of South Africa who previously worked in a restorative justice prison programme in San Francisco, where she counselled violent offenders.

In our chat, Gifford gives me a sense of the causes of toxic masculinity and how we as a society can go about correcting it.

She starts off by sharing how the restorative programme she worked on emphasised that toxic masculinity comes from the cultural indoctrination of the male-role belief system.

“That is a deeply held belief system and needs a lot of deconstruction, including the way that we have been held in a kind of a prison-programme mentality, even through things such as religion.”

She explains that there’s a lot of indoctrination around men’s perceived superiority — a perception that is strengthened by biblical references, for example.

To be clear, masculinity is not inherently toxic. Couples therapist, counsellor, and existential coach Sadé Dubois says she is not a fan of the term toxic masculinity. “It can be unhelpful to weaponise labels like this,” she says.

“We could easily refer to ‘toxic masculinity’ as ‘traditional masculinity’. It would imply the same without the shame, which is at the root of the issue with toxic masculinity.

“Toxic masculinity is born out of reinforced social conditioning of attitudes in young men and, unfortunately, it still persists today.

It continues to contribute to greater societal issues such as gender-based violence, other violent tendencies, and even sexual assault. Sadly, statistically, suicide and violent crimes disproportionately affect men.”

Dubois says young men who are conditioned to believe that toxic masculinity is essential in order to get ahead usually do get ahead at some point in their early adult lives, but later in life there is a backlash effect that leads to depression and isolation.

“Toxic masculine traits can lead men to have a low level of emotional intelligence, become avoidant in conflict situations, experience anxiety or apathy towards the emotional needs of others, experience a lack of emotional intimacy in their relationships, and essentially sabotage the possibility of a healthy relationship with their significant others.

“When these ideas are reinforced by men’s achieving the greater social status or the economic reward, it means we as a society are still complicit by regarding these traits as more capable or more powerful — we still reward toxic masculine attitudes.”

I’ve seen some of this is at play in my own life and in the lives of friends. Recently, a close friend who started dating a younger woman who’s doing slightly better than him financially, confided that the fact that his girlfriend has a car and he doesn’t has been the cause of a lot of insecurity for him.

He told me he couldn’t see himself in the passenger seat for no other reason than that he viewed it as emasculating.

Toxic masculinity is not always obvious. Sometimes it’s subtle.

For instance, I’ve been guilty of using the phrase “no homo” after making a comment that I felt was overly sentimental or “soft” to one of my male friends. I’ve always been hyper masculine and competitive, and that phrase is commonly used in hip hop to shore up a perception of masculinity.

This, at times, has had the negative effect of me bottling up my emotions and avoiding expressing feelings of “weakness”.

A few months ago, when I was struggling financially owing to the pandemic, I hid my anxiety from my partner because I felt weak, despite her reassurances and pleas for me to open up.  This is not unusual in our society. “Indoda must” is a common refrain on social media, and is a suggestion that men must find a way to make things happen no matter what.

This — and the social construct of misogyny that we exist in — feeds the fire of toxic masculinity. There are expectations that we place on ourselves as men that are mentally, physically, and emotionally damaging.

The goal should be to strive for conditions in which masculinity is healthier and doesn’t contribute to violence, sexual abuse, and other unhealthy traits.

Fortunately, Gifford says, we are in a time where there is a dismantling and reorganisation of these belief systems. “We are going through this kind of great awakening… where people are letting go of a lot of the old belief systems and detoxifying aspects of dominance that keep us in this prison mentality.”

In the restorative programme Gifford was part of, violent offenders had to recognise that their violent behaviour was coming from a “superior or inferior” attitude. So, if you’re not being superior, you’re automatically feeling inferior.

These are the sort of behaviours that often prompt men to use escalating levels of violence to assert some level of superiority, particularly if they feel inferior. “People are taught to identify where they are and move into what they call in the prison programme ‘authentic communication’, where they identify how they’re feeling and what’s going on.

They speak from their own opinion and they don’t try to minimise the other person’s point of view.”

Masculinity can feel so uncompromising that it almost feels forced on young men, pressuring us to alter who we are and instead exhibit stoicism, hyper aggression, and overall dominance.

However, Gen Z and millennials are gradually championing exploration and self-discovery, which is helping to improve toxicity.

To this point, Dubois adds that a good start in helping men and boys to achieve healthy and progressive masculinity is for them to begin challenging themselves to define the traits of a high-value or progressive male, and work on those of their beliefs that contradict these traits and try to replace them.

“I believe the solution lies in starting early, by raising our boy children with healthy validation, validating their emotions, and rewarding healthy expressions with positive affirmation.

We need to help boys regard vulnerability as empowering, not disempowering, and teach them not to suppress personal traumas.”