Rolling Maleness and Masculinity Discussion Thread

smash it forward

Starting to feel like the term "toxic masculinity" is not helpful. If you have to explain over and over again that it doesn't mean masculinity is toxic, maybe it's because the phrase carries the underlying message that masculinity is toxic? Feel free to talk me out of this position.

If you hear the term "spoiled milk" do you think it carries the underlying message that all milk is spoiled?

If you hear the term "venomous snake" do you think it carries the underlying message that all snakes are venomous?

If you hear the term "sinking ship" do you think it carries the underlying message that all ships are sinking?

Everybody knows what a "poisonous mushroom" is and people still eat mushrooms. It's not that complicated.

one bad implication of all that style of phrase is that once it's spoiled, it's spoiled; the venomous snake is always venomous; the sunk ship's sunk. so even if you perceive the other meaning re OTHER men, the specimen before you is being written off for good, which is usually n.a.g.l. for human beings.

once a man's ruined by toxic masculinity it's like you're saying you gotta erect a sign

THIS IS NOT A PLACE OF HONOR

do not enter for 10,000 years etc

idk I always read "toxic masculinity" as referring to the toxic pursuit of that toxic thing, masculinity

No, j., it's not the person who's being regarded as toxic, but rather the particular manifestation of masculinity in question. The person could rethink and/or abandon the specific attitude under discussion, and be back in the camp of the angels.

"Toxic male" would fit your description, not "toxic masculinity" or "toxic machismo."

I'm pretty sure I've exhibited attitudes that are toxic. Recognizing that, and moving forward while trying to be better, is still within reach for me. So it is for anyone.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YcfIGok1mMI

If you hear the term "spoiled milk" do you think it carries the underlying message that all milk is spoiled?

If you hear the term "venomous snake" do you think it carries the underlying message that all snakes are venomous?

If you hear the term "sinking ship" do you think it carries the underlying message that all ships are sinking?

― markle's potion (Ye Mad Puffin), Tuesday, May 22, 2018 12:12 PM (sixteen minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

milk, ship and snake are things, not qualities

If I said "delicate femininity" it would carry the implication that femininity is delicate.

The phrase allows for a nontoxic type of masculinity though (iirc it includes grilling, and getting stuff from high shelves)

if we want to turn this into a semantic argument i'm not opposed. what phrase better conveys the intent iyo?

'Delicate feminity' implies all feminity is delicate because that's the stereotype it confirms, not because the words fit together. 'Indelicate femininity' does not implicate all femininity, nor would 'toxic' femininity implicate all femininity.

There are no better phrases to convey the intent, the reason the phrase is so contended has to do with the intent rather than the wording, imo.

The things that are bad about “toxic masculinity” are just the things that are bad about masculinity, the extra adjective essentially signifies “#notallmen”

― valorous wokelord (silby), Saturday, March 24, 2018 12:00 PM (one month ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Anyway y’all can and should continue to be men without participating in “masculinity” other than in the trivial, grammatical sense. A reconstructed masculinity serves no purpose. It doesn’t serve any purpose to violent misogynists either; they need to stop being violent misogynists, not find a new way to be a “real man”.

― valorous wokelord (silby), Tuesday, May 1, 2018 7:38 AM (three weeks ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

Quoting myself from here and some other thread b/c this is all I have to say on the matter.

(Yeah I thought the grilling/shelves bit was from this thread, but on further investigation it's from The Jordan Peterson Thread )

delicate feminity' implies all feminity is delicate because that's the stereotype it confirms, not because the words fit together. 'Indelicate femininity' does not implicate all femininity, nor would 'toxic' femininity implicate all femininity.

― Frederik B, Tuesday, May 22, 2018 12:44 PM (ten minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

toxic masculinity operates the same way. masculinity already carries an association with toxicity. "toxic masculinity" strengthens the association.

Anyway y’all can and should continue to be men without participating in “masculinity” other than in the trivial, grammatical sense.

how do you opt out of participating in 'masculinity'? given that your sense of self will have been shaped by ideas of 'masculinity', your interactions with other people are shaped by (their and society's) ideas of 'masculinity', the standards you are judged by will inevitably be the standards of 'maculinity'? surely it's not just something you can discard?

you can't just say "i'm not playing this game anymore" when the game is woven into the fabric of literally the everything real and imagined

otm, and also I think that's part of the reason the phrase doesn't work in the way YMP suggests, which is that you can't simultaneously have "toxic masculinity" = "not all masculinity" and "masculinity should be discarded as an idea." But we have those messages coexisting in the same spheres of discussion right now.

You are both describing the 'trivial, grammatical sense'.

And masculinity is not considered toxic the way femininity has been considered delicate. Come on!

so much delicate masculinity itt

i mean i see man alive's point, but each word/phrase has its own history, and so their connotations change and differ depending on what period in history we're talking about

the word masculinity poses a problem in that it may refer to maleness, and in a post-gender world, there are different views on what is being talked about when you say "male" (biological/sexuality/etc), from what i can tell

so some guys think there is no way of escaping being a male if you were born with male genitalia, and masculinity encompasses this definition to some

language is a tricky thing -- feel like we're discussing semantics at this point

@man alive: You are comparing gender norms that have been societally imposed for thousands of years with, like, something some people have said on twitter recently.

so what's your semantic argument here, fred? words don't matter?

multi-xps

One difficulty with 'toxic masculinity' is that it adds an element of highly subjective hyperbole that is not present in the term 'spoiled milk'. Whether or not milk is spoiled is easily verifiable, but you can't determine when masculinity has become toxic by testing it for toxic substances. The same for 'testosterone poisoning'. Those are not statements of fact, but rhetorical constructions reflecting subjective judgments in hyperbolic language.

So, without the speaker expatiating on their intended meaning, it is quite possible to hear the phrase 'toxic masculinity' and infer that the speaker judges all masculinity to be toxic.

The benefit of transfeminist discourse to cis dudes should be that you should feel entitled to being a man without having to endorse, actively participate in, or seek to reconstruct any received cultural ideas about what "masculinity" is. If you are a man, great! Please be a good person. You don't need to seek to gender the process of being a good person, since you are no less of a man no matter how "unmasculine" you are.

so much delicate masculinity itt

― lbi's life of limitless european glamour (Le Bateau Ivre), Tuesday, 22 May 2018 18:08 (ten minutes ago) Permalink

cool

Like what is the purpose of a reconstructed and ostensibly nontoxic masculinity to you, man alive? What personal growth do you need it for?

xxp the process of 'being a good person' is gendered though, the things you say and do can mean different thing depending on whether you are a man or a woman, because society will treat you differently based on whether you are a man or a woman - you can't separate 'being a good person' from the system of gender relations/inequality and where you personally are situated in that system?

Like what is the purpose of a reconstructed and ostensibly nontoxic masculinity to you, man alive? What personal growth do you need it for?

― valorous wokelord (silby), Tuesday, May 22, 2018 1:24 PM (fifty-six seconds ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

What is the purpose of a transman identifying as a man then? What is the meaning of identifying as a gender other than your sex if gender is a mere vestige of a less enlightened era?

Yeah I mean I’m not saying you can dismantle patriarchy by thinking hard enough I just mean you don’t need to find a way to dismantle patriarchy while still getting to endorse or adhere to “manly virtues” or whatever else you think need out of masculinity as a concept.

Why do we need to go out of our way to attach positive and non-traditionally feminine traits to women, girls, femininity etc. if the goal is actually that gender should have nothing associated with it whatsoever, a pure blank slate?

To mitigate the harm of gender-based oppression, I guess?

Anyway the one step process to being a man is:

1. Be a man

The accoutrements have no obvious metaphysical function. If you are a man, you are already a man, and the state of being-a-man cannot be taken from you even if masculinity is itself a nullity.

If you are a man, you are already a man, and the state of being-a-man cannot be taken from you

see, i don't think this is right if we go by new gender ideas

No, silby is right.

Again, what is the meaning of an entirely blank slate gender divorced from biological sex? What does that actually mean? What is the difference between saying "I am a man" and "I am a blorf"?

whoa never seen blorf used before but that's definitely what i am

xxp

but if you are a man your gender can also be woman

so being a man is not enough to define the other parts of your self

Well sure like gender is performative and coercive and constructed and all those things but it is also metaphysical and so if there’s nothing that it means to be a man, then you succeed at being a man simply by being a man. Like a trans man isn’t a man because he medically transitions, or self-identifies as a man, he’s a man because he is. Which is the same reason a cis man is a man and a nonbinary person is nonbinary. Which is not to say any of these people could not be something else later, for some reason.

This is mostly my own half-baked concept of how this shit works, I have no authority to cite here.

man alive, there is no meaning you are free from meaning.

yeah, if you want to be a 'blorf', man alive, you should go for it.

xxp

okay seriously not trolling, but to play devil's advocate, what if i don't believe in metaphysics?

i feel like it just further confuses things because it creates an intangible concept

so my solution, call the person whatever the person wants to be called!

Idk; if you don’t believe in metaphysics my argument doesn’t apply. You’ll have to look elsewhere for a different argument.

fair

to blorfinity… and beyond!

i have a lot of ideas about this that i can't untangle into sentences but i've really enjoyed silby's posts itt

more multi-xps

What is the meaning of identifying as a gender other than your sex if gender is a mere vestige of a less enlightened era?

People create meaning both within and among themselves. What it 'means' for a transman to identify as a gender other than their sexual equipment at birth is a meaning the transman has created for themselves, in dialogue with other meanings generated by others. Such meanings tend to cluster together in a similar neighborhood, which is fortunate in terms of being able to live together in society, but ultimately that meaning is the transman's personal possession. So, ask them what it means to them.