My dad, in many ways, was my hero and as a licensed psychotherapist, I think it's
important that one of my biases is I hold every man to that standard. He was a loving husband to
my mom. He was a loving dad to my siblings and there were eight of us in the family and every
day he modeled strength and I love that about him and about masculinity, physical strength,
ability to be gentle, ability to be respectful, ability to verbalize what you're feeling.
Yes, those things are all parts of masculinity, but we run into problems when we take other
concepts of masculinity and make it normal for men or we normalize it or we expect it of men
and those are issues such as aggression, such as physical power used in a way to hurt another,
disrespect. We make men man up and we don't allow them a space to be real. We don't allow them to
feel. The only feelings they can have are anger and aggression. When we start normalizing men
that way, we come into toxic masculinity and that's a big problem. You may have been hearing
more and more about it especially since the #MeToo movement and everything else. However, it's been
around for a long time and in the 1980s and 90s, it was all part of the second wave of feminism
which may surprise me and may surprise you. It was a reactionary thing and many times, things
that come that are a movement of such aggression, such power and often demise are due to a movement
or a reaction to something else. I want to talk a little bit about how men grow up with this concept
and why this is so important to men. It's not only important to men. It's important to women too
because both genders are affected when men are expected to act a certain way that says, “Okay,
now you're a real man.” That is a very harmful concept. Men are men. They don't have to do
these divisive, disrespectful behaviors to be real men in my mind or anybody's mind and if you're a
woman listening to this, it's very important that you do some self-reflection as well so they may
grow up in a home. First of all, that has a lot of toxic masculinity. If you grew up in a home where
there was a batterer and they were a father and they hit people and disrespected them
and that was your only role model or worse they left and then you had no role model so you joined
gangs and part of being a gang was being a tough guy, a killer, a disrespectful person, a hater.
This could happen and this is what happens to many of our boys who laid or grow into men. Secondly,
you may have been in a community where machoism was something prideful. To be aggressive,
to be the man, to be stoic, to treat a woman like she was less than you. That's another alternative
and basically, these types of things that we instill in men are not only unrealistic, but
they're harmful and they're not only harmful to men, they're harmful to the anybody that man tries
to love because he's not going to have success and it's going to be difficult for him. However, it is
if you feel like you have a lot of toxic masculinity. You're angry. You're prideful. You
don't like women. You're disrespectful of them. They put you in bad ways time after time again
and you realize you don't want to live this way. First of all, I want to go through some signs
because I think being aware and being able to identify signs that you are this way are extremely
important, so a higher occurrence of mental health issues like depression, substance abuse,
or other deviant behaviors. Aggressive behavior such as chauvinism,
physical aggression, sexual violence, homophobia, bullying behavior, emotional abuse,
a coercive behavior that means you need control and degrading toward women sexually coerced
feeling that it's their right to treat women with disrespect and acts superior. No man
that I’ve been around or loved has felt these things, so I know it is a sect of men,
so when women tell me all men are that way I really I find that offensive and I don't like it
because I know it is not true and when you spread those myths, because those are the kind of men
you've been around maybe because some of your own upbringing had these types of men in them
and you think of these type of men as loving in nature when that's not the concept of love at all.
So, here's some red flags men who have a toxic masculinity struggle to express their emotions.
Part of the reason they get angry and they get hostile and aggressive is because they've never
been allowed to feel when they felt they were called pussy or they were belittled in someone
being a wuss, being a girl and so, they grew up never allowing themselves to feel anything
other than anger or aggression. They can't tolerate a no. If you tell them a no they go ape
and the reason they go ape is because part of the masculine toxicity is winning. I’ve got to
win. I’ve got to overpower. I’ve got to overtake and not only that, but within toxic masculinity,
there's a narcissism and that narcissism is very clear. Whenever, you do a personality test on all
of them - and let's not forget - narcissists don't like to be told no because they're never wrong and
they can't feel and they're not empathetic, so if you're saying something that makes them mad,
they disregard you totally because they are superior. In their own minds, they show little
respect or interest in your thoughts or ideas. Again, you can see the narcissism coming through
in that or they demean you and many times, people who have a toxic masculinity are emotionally and
physically abusive. Now, how to deal with this if you're in a relationship with one.
If you're in a relationship with one, the most important thing is that partner wants to change.
If they're willing to change, then a therapist can work with them and really help them because
many of them understand I was raised with a messed up family and yes, my choices are my own now, but
getting past this is really tough, so if they're willing to change and go to a therapist,
then I see great hope. There is a light at the end of the tunnel for these guys.
A few things that they can do when they're willing to change and if you note these,
I would for sure get a therapy appointment. They take accountability for their behavior. Okay, then
they don't have the narcissistic edge that many of them have. They’re patient and understanding of
your views and feelings. Demonstrating empathy and support, that's another really good healthy sign.
They take the first step in recognizing the problem and committing to a path of healing
for themselves and their partner when you identify three of these three or even two of these three.
Then, as their partner, I would say we need help. Let's go to therapy because I think
together, we can work on this. If you don't identify these and your partner continues to
demean and blame you, then I would say your best option is to leave this relationship.