Will the war on masculinity only fire back?
The problem with the term toxic masculinity by Jacinta Petrohilos
Toxic masculinity has become a very over used term in modern day society, the application of the term “toxic” traits target things such as aggression and sexist behaviours but we only ever associate these terms with males. We are now in the era where masculinity is raised to praise what is wrong with men and to address how to change them. But have we ever stopped to think that these are learnt behaviours.
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The concept of toxic masculinity has not only been a modern day so called problem, but these types of behaviours have been shown not only today but in times such as The Elizabethan era and The Victorian era. For example William Shakespeare had a very good reputation for writing some of the most well-known poem and plays in history most are still studied today, but many of these plays have toxic masculinity incorporated in them and nobody has a problem with this? Yet we victimise males today with having these “toxic” behaviours.
A very popular play that Shakespeare wrote is a very good example of these toxic behaviours. The play “Macbeth” dramatizes effect of power and the destructive physical and psychological effects of civil drive on those who seek power in their favour. In the beginning of this play the main character Macbeth has a strong conscience and is not won over by evil easily. His ambition however, suppresses his good qualities and eventually become his flaw.
But power then becomes his main focus with help from his wife, he becomes violent and begins to show his ruthless side by killing the current king to gain the thrown, his wife being the main integrator pressures him into becoming more of a man she pressures him to do this by using his weak traits against him and with playing mind games with him begins to question him “are you afraid to act the way you desire” Lady Macbeth [1.7.3] She pressures him to act more like a “man” if he wants what he desires. He begins to kill more and more people and becomes the villain of the play as people begin turn against him.
But both Lady Macbeth and Macbeth and wracked with guilt and become insane and are both lead to a miserable death. This play demonstrates how with the encouragement from others new behaviours can be learnt and in this case Macbeth had built up a more of a masculine side. So how is this behaviour different from our modern day male behaviour today? Macbeth wasn’t always the bad guy he was pressured into being more “masculine” and yet we fight the fact that “toxic” masculine traits are just a normal behaviour from men in this era. We don’t take into encounter that these traits have been learnt or
Even forces upon men, because it’s just “normal” for them to act like this. But Shakespeare wasn’t the only poet to incorporate this type of toxic masculinity into his play and poems. Robert Browning also done this is a poem My Last Duchess, this poem explores the negative impacts of the power a man could have over a women in this era. The Duke is a man of important stature and therefore is as symbol of power. He speaks with a man to negotiate the marriage of his counts daughter, but shows a painting in his house. The painting of the Dukes wife who has passed.
The Duke explains to the man, that his wife had a flirtatious personality and he felt he could not control her and explains that she is to easily impress (A heart- how shall I say? –too soon made glad, too easily impressed; she liked whatever she looked on) Browning, 1842 the duke was filled with jealousy which he could not control and he gave away that he snapped and killed her, with expressing that the duke gave the commands and as a result all smiles stopped together (This grew; I gave commands; Then all smiles stopped together) Browning, 1842. This is a vague allusion to her death.
This poem shows that a man thinks he has the right to act in such a way towards a women just because he’s jealous, but there has been no negative feedback on how a man should act this was or it is to be expect from him to this play only how “creative and unique” Gradesaver, 2018 the poem is and it is still being studied in schools along with Macbeth. But we wonder why men in this time have such “toxic masculinity”, well if we ever stopped to think that plays and poems like this have negative impact on men such as they learn from these behaviours, especially if children in schools are learning about this type of toxic behaviours.
But not only this have had we expected men to act in such a way that you could classify as perfect, but when they slip up they need to learn “respect” or we classify their bad behaviour as expected, But yet they show no change, well maybe if we took into consideration that the behaviour like this is learnt through studied poems and plays or even the very own TV shows, movies and video games in particular that are being produced today, a report shows that “Some research finds that violent video game use is correlated with, and may cause, increases in aggression and decreases in prosocial behaviour and that it is a cause of social development, and a variety of stereotyping and sexual morality issues. ” Wikipedia,2019
So how do we stop this kind of Toxic behaviour we find in men? Well the answer is simple we stop teaching it to them, we stop making them study poems with toxic masculinity in it and then telling them it was normal behaviour in those times and we stop releasing Tv shows, movies and violent video games with this kind of behaviour in it because
if we want men to change we need to change the way they see and learn things first.
Bibliography
- Salter, M. (2019 , febuary 27). The Problem With a Fight Against Toxic Masculinity. Retrieved from the atlantic : https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/02/toxic-masculinity-history/583411/
- saver, G. (2019 ). Robert Browning: Poems. Retrieved from https://www.gradesaver.com/robert-browning-poems/study-guide/summary-my-last-duchess
- wikpedia. (2019 ). Retrieved from Video game controversies: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_controversies
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Video_game_controversies
- https://www.gradesaver.com/robert-browning-poems/study-guide/summary-my-last-duchess
- https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/02/toxic-masculinity-history/583411/
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