Toxic Masculinity: Are We In Or Out?

Are we not men?

   Gay Liberation hasn't lived up to the early-70s promises demonstrated by significant actions like forcing the American Psychiatric Association to de-pathologize homosexuality. For decades gay men have accepted limited rights within the rise and rise of Neo-liberalism and its attendant pitfalls. Homosexuality as practiced took a sharp turn from freewheeling counter-cultural liberation towards fetishizing hyper-masculinity & practically everything else. A slightly cleaner psychiatric bill of health doesn't necessarily mean that gay men automatically question the psychology of masculinity. Calling oneself a liberationist necessarily involves knowing what one needs to be liberated from.

For the homosexual to pursue and desire masculinity for the sake of masculinity means alighting upon a psychological minefield, best explored and navigated only with good psychology. As projection, we often indulge in desire for men we neither like nor respect - to much the same degree that our non-gay brothers cause exemplary shipwrecks in their pursuit of women. And since we're talking about male psychology, it's immaterial whether or not women do it, or the degree to which they might. While good psychology (and the life-skills acquired from it) are of prime importance to all, functioning as a man who wishes to experience positive outcomes from sex and intimacy with other men as well as negotiating life in general requires supportive psychology. That is, one which supports a unique, integrated self in being the best man he can be. Nothing "special" per se - just something which doesn't bulldoze the specifics.

I've complained for years that the field of studies we call Masculinities is a neglected and scattered pursuit which tends to retread time-worn tropes - especially notable when offset with related and component studies around feminism and gender. Ergo male homosexuality presents as a psychological dead-end street without some solid framing within masculinity as understood, and understood well. The likelihood of death for a man who desires other men at the hands of toxic masculinity is reflected in suicide and murder statistics, which aren't adequately or entirely explained by catch-alls like "homophobia". We can look at simple cause and effect only up to a certain point.
 
When it comes to masculinity, homosexualists certainly have skin in the game. And we owe it first to ourselves to sort out what masculinity is inherently good and healthy, and what is just plain toxic. Ruminating about men and masculinity is a pointless exercise if our discrimination isn't focused on concepts like "real men versus toxic masculinity" as opposed to silly platitudes like "There's no right or wrong way to be a man." We're probably on a winning trajectory if our daydreams about real men turn to equating sexy masculinity with characteristics like the easy-going kindness which only comes from real masculine security. Toxic masculinity is very much at home in a gendered regressive narrative about 'tops' and 'bottoms': homosexuals however don't spring out of the womb imitating narrow modern heterosexual paradigms.

The paradoxes of toxic masculinity are many, but the central paradox, i.e. that toxic masculinity seeks to both reward and punish its adherents goes a long way towards meaningful definition/s. And it's only recently been fingered as a belief system more akin to religion than good psychology. The appeal of toxic masculinity is both obvious and covert, with the dual promises of superiority and domination ahead of simple survival. Not unlike bad religion and bad psychiatry, its dark obverse is rooted in "curing" perceived threats to its ideological self by whatever means it takes.

Toxic Masculinity isn't an interchangeable term for "the patriarchy", and while the latter nurtures the former, toxic masculinity opposes any real tolerance which may emanate from within patriarchy. Its toxicity lies within its archly reactionary but changeable characteristics, as well as its punitive practices. Toxic masculinity's reach isn't restricted to heterosexist derision ("He throws like a girl!"), hurt feelings ("Just man up!") and exclusion ("Not man enough") but could present as latter-day attacks by a man in a dress...a man who has serious issues with maleness himself. 

 

So...are we in or out?

   That would seem to be entirely dependent on whether we rally around the LGBTIQ+ flag. And whether our thoughts about ourselves are shaped by Queer thinking. Both are quite opposed to the homo male who lives his maleness as a self-realized male. Both are vehemently opposed to the very idea of innate homosexuality, and invariably and often deviously suggest we're all 'a bit bi'. And both foment a climate of anti-male homophobia.

It's becoming clear that transvestites have the most to gain with the diminishment of male homosexuality. The drag queens who traditionally prowled gay bars may have been men in dresses who desired other men but they were never connecting with their own maleness or liberated male homosexuality. Only the names have changed - they now call themselves 'transwomen' and many undertake extreme surgical mutilations to deny what they loathe about themselves, while failing to be what they're not. Is that not toxic masculinity...done by 'our own kind'?

 If we struggle with the question, we can always ask women...those people who were the only people who stood by us and nurtured our asses while AIDS devastated us. The growing consensus seems to be that some or many gay men indeed are running a protection racket for 'trans' toxic masculinity which demands the erasure of women.    

  

 What's Next? Homos Acting All Entitled?

     The homosexualist may (or may not) well understand the impact of psychological warfare against him - including often hateful and violent exclusion from the boys-and-men club, as we knew it: homophobia wielded by the axe of toxic masculinity from extraneous sources. The contemporary homosexualist however is faced with lethal psyops coming from within our own "communities" and organizations. Young homo men especially are being targeted with psyops which exploit self-doubts traceable back to childhood. To psychologically gaslight a fundamental birthright to maleness as the foundation of healthy male homosexuality is to do intentional damage. It's a sure way to guarantee that damaged men will just go on to damage other men and not much more. Of late, we've become sloppy at seizing entitlements, with good mental health being a prime example which is costing us dearly. Bad psychology will always rush into a vacuum where no good psychology is permitted. 

Going forward, the homo man will earn entitlements - rather than special rights - by his contributions to society as a self-realized man who leads rather than follows. He's grounded, he gives, he dignifies manhood by being the antithesis of toxic masculinity. 

He'll look back at his history, take what is his and attract the love his loving self deserves. 

    (Expanded and revised November 2024)

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