how did it get so bad lol

the top post rn complains about people saying the male suicide rate is so high because of toxic masculinity, and then describes... toxic maculinity

wild

  • davidr4 [he/him]
    ·
    4 years ago

    I saw that. The post was literally "Men aren't killing themselves because of toxic masculinity! It's because people punish them for opening up!" I feel like most people that criticize the idea of toxic masculinity don't even know what it means

    • SerLava [he/him]
      ·
      4 years ago

      Yeah that's very true, and I don't know if I like the term "toxic masculinity" as it's used outside of contexts where people actually know what the hell it means. It really does sound like it's victim-blaming in certain circumstances even though it isn't, and in other contexts it just sounds kind of essentializing, like maleness itself is toxic, even though you and I both know that's not what it means.

      On one hand it's very useful but on the other hand it instantly turns a lot of people off.

        • AlexandairBabeuf [they/them]
          ·
          4 years ago

          people just need basic education, the term is perfectly fine. feminist theory just doesn't get taught in secondary school even though thats exactly when its most important imo

          • alcoholicorn [comrade/them, doe/deer]
            ·
            4 years ago

            I mean education is nice and all, but it's better to use intuitive terms that anyone whose never heard the term can immediately understand than terms that mislead anyone who hasn't heard the definition.

            • AlexandairBabeuf [they/them]
              ·
              4 years ago

              please indicate another adjective we could use in conjunction with masculinity to dilinieate negative attitudes associated with masculinity that is immune from misunderstanding

              i guarantee you whatever we change the name to the reactionaries will still rail against it and that'll be some people's only exposure to the term.

              • Jeff_Benzos [he/him]
                ·
                4 years ago

                i guarantee you whatever we change the name to the reactionaries will still rail against it

                This is exactly it. We could all agree tomorrow to call it "self-destructive masculinity" tomorrow and The Discourse wouldn't get any better. Anti-feminist knee jerk reactions are to feminist concepts, not the specific choice of words

                • SerLava [he/him]
                  ·
                  4 years ago

                  "self-destructive male expectations" could be used when not talking about outwardly-directed toxicity, and it would have either not confused the specific poster in that thread, or not given them the ammunition to intentionally confuse the readers of that thread.

                  I mean, I would much rather just widely teach feminist theory to kids but that's a lot less likely to happen soon

                  And like, I have heard the clarification of what toxic masculinity really means like, two times out of the thousands of times I have heard it used.

      • davidr4 [he/him]
        ·
        4 years ago

        Yeah I agree 100%. I think maybe we should call it toxic misandry or something, but tbh its such a well-established phrase I don't see it being replaced anytime soon :/