Toxic Masculinity

Going to the doctor when you might receive bad news requires courage. And doing so is nessary not only for ones own sake but the sake of the family. Masculinity requires that one provides, protects, and sacrifice and caring for oneself is necessary to achieve that.

However in a peaceful society men are mainly valued or at least feel more valued for the financial aspect of supporting the household. This is also shown in the high levels of life insurance in regards to men vs women as men. With that said, it's easy to see your value later in life, as less necessary and the life insurance as an easy way to excuse self isolation and essential writing oneself off. Ie our worth doesn't change whether we are alive or not.

I think it's not toxic masculinity that's the issue. I think men are not wired to see the importance of emotional support and connections as readily as women. What is natural for women requires more conscious effort to see for men. And so men fail to see the importance and their value in the emotional support they provide including providing the family a sense of stability, safety, and support outside of the financial and physical.

I think they need more reminders so that they don't so easily write themselves off.

 

nope. IF this happens at all it must be medically necessary.

and i don't believe dr tiller wasted fetus parts by making the little suckers swim in the toilet either.

"thou shalt not bear false witness against thy neighbor."

 

Also blaming stoicism isn't a fair assessment either. When it comes to the medical especially long term, "just toughing it out" requires a certain level of irrational thinking. And that thinking can only be excused by other factors.

The world could use a little more stoicism honestly. But hopefully the rational kind.

 

You are right. I don't slap her around as much as she likes.

 

While men not regularly seeing doctors as consistently as women may be tied to masculinity, that is far from a settled concept. That is but one of many theories. A quick internet search did not substantiate your matter-of-fact analysis. At a quick glance, it looks to me as if the most oft-mentioned reason is fear of receiving bad news.

Here is an article specifically related to this subject from what I would think would be a reasonably reliable source. Nowhere in their analysis is your theory even mentioned.

Survey Reveals Why Men Avoid Going to the Doctor (aarp.org)

 

It isn't tied to masculinity. It is tied to a flawed, toxic version of masculinity, and this is far from the only example. Why do you think men are more fearful of going to the doctor than women are? Also, why does your article not mention fear at all?

 

Why do "I" think that men are more fearful? We could also throw in the more general why do I think men go to the doctor less, because Im not sure that I have really espoused an opinion on what I think.

I dont pretend to know. There are an awful lot of differences between men and women that I do not pretend to understand. If I had to venture a guess on my own, I would say that when it comes to sickness or pain, I think that women are stronger. I think when a man has a fever they are a complete baby about it and do not leave their bed while they moan endlessly, while women ironically "man up" by ignoring the fever, and take care of the kids or whatever other thing they have to get done. I know with myself, I can get a little tiny burn that creates a 1 cm blister, and I will wince in pain and bitch about the pain for the next week, while my wife can burn a 2 inch blister that she says ouch and then never mentions it again.

 

That is what "strong and confident" means to you? To force your wife into blind submission and follow "her duty"? That is actually very insecure.

No confident would want that.

Yes, the way you put it makes it wrong -- you want her to do those things even if she does not want it herself.

Unless she is a single mom, right?

Your definition of "strong male" is very primitive.

Why are Right-Wingers so obsessed with transgenders? My Gawd.

Hahahahahahaha. "Genetically designed".

Duuuuuuude, stop it.

The poster did not really "attack" men though, they made a post about "toxic masculinity" and instead of strawmanning the argument, you should try to criticise the actual concept and point out why you disagree with it.

I do not necessarily agree with the concept, but what you are doing is just a tiny bit dishonest.

There are many awful two-parent homes as well.

 

Speaking of "strawmanning the argument"... when he said " absent fathers and broken families have crushed culture in inner cities", was he claiming or even implying that in this nation of 330 million people that there are not many awful two-parent homes?

 

Yes, that was the obvious implication of his whole post -- marriage solves all problems.

I think the concepts of "masculinity" and "femininity" are very, very, very complicated and I will admit that I myself do not fully understand what they are supposed to mean.

Are there certain aspects of how our culture views "masculinity" that are "toxic"? Certainly and Andrew Tate is perhaps the perfect embodiment of this.

In general, I am not too big of a fan of labels unless they have a very clear definition and are easy to understand and for me personally "masculine" and "feminine" are two such labels. I am not entirely sure what these words are supposed to mean.

As for "toxic masculinity" as a concept, I find it to mostly be one that is far too generalised and often far too simplistic. For example, I do not think that little boys playing "rough and tumble" is "toxic".

 

Was it really "masculinity" or was it perhaps good ideas (a philosophy that put individual rights first and an important and beautiful reason to fight for)?


Hmmmmmmm.....

 

Interesting. Please quote him where you think that is what he conveyed. Lets take a look. I somehow missed that part. The only thing I saw was the part that you originally quoted and I responded with the following reply...

Speaking of "strawmanning the argument"... when he said " absent fathers and broken families have crushed culture in inner cities", was he claiming or even implying that in this nation of 330 million people that there are not many awful two-parent homes?

I look forward to seeing what you think he said that substantiates the claim that his entire post is saying that marriage solves all problems.

 

Literally in every paragraph.

 

I see where he extols the virtue of marriage, but where does he say or imply that marriage solves "ALL" problems?

Why I accuse you of employing a strawman argument is because you are arguing as if he had said all problems are solved by marriage, when in reality he merely argued in favor of the benefits of marriage. That is a FAR cry from saying it solves ALL problems.

The "all problems" claim is the strawman, and well, you knocked down that strawman, which was set up by you precisely because it is extremely easy to knock down. Of course it does not solve ALL problems, and nowhere did he say or imply that it does. The only person in that exchange that has said "all problems" is you. It most certainly was not him.

This is why I am 100% correct in accusing you of using a strawman argument. In fact, this is a textbook example of such.

 

No actually it doesn't. And your first response contradicts your second.

 

Terms like "toxic masculinity" are stupid. These are over simplified ideas designed to engineer society. Lefties have been using this nonsense to push society in the direction they think it should be heading.

Why not say men are victims of society? Men have been used to make the world a more civilized place. Now that things are more civilized it seems lefties think men are no longer needed.

The idea of women and minorities being "oppressed" is stupid as well. When the world was a less civilized place men had the responsibility of taking care of business. No one really bellyached about gender roles.

 

I'm sorry to hear about your dad and hope he's OK.
I've got a friend who is also over 70 and takes pride in the fact that he hasn't seen a doctor for 20 years.
I think that his reasons have more to do with being tight fisted with a dollar than toxic masculinity but I'm aware of the syndrome you're describing.

Anyway, I am in no position to point fingers since it was only by a fluke that I found out that I have leukemia (CLL).
and had to have half of my Right kidney removed too.

Re:

I was a Psychiatric Case Worker in the Juvenile Justice system and worked with kids from broken homes and / or who had been involved in criminal behavior.
Our facility was a residential group home for boys and girls from 13 to 17 years old and even though there were occasional episodes of teen age romance that would erupt, most of the time the boys and girls were together they were busy fighting.

I had a good rapport with the kids but became the most frustrated dealing with entirely unsuitable parents.
There was one girl that was on my case load who was so excited about spending Christmas with her family that she had gotten a job, saved her money, bought and wrapped Christmas presents for her parents all as early as August.

Finally, on Christmas Eve morning, her worthless parents called to tell her that they had changed their minds and were going to Disneyland but didn't have room to take her with them so she would have to stay behind.

Since she had used the phone in the office, I heard parts of the conversation and watched as she started crying, ran upstairs to her room and slammed the door.

Because I had been working with this child for about a year, helped her make it to work, do well in school and shed numerous self destructive habits and negative thoughts, I was furious with the parents when I made the mistake of calling them back before taking 10 deep breaths.

I didn't lose my job but I do suppose that my reaction was an example of counterproductive toxic masculinity.

Would anyone reading this have handled things any differently?

Thanks,

 

What you're talking about here I don't see why it's related to masculinity. That's stubbornness and in many cases it's a good quality.

My grandmother was extraordinarily resistant to going to the hospital my sister's the same way. I'm not stoic about it I just am really not comfortable with it.

Once you see enough people in your life go to the hospital and die you start to associate that place with death. And I'm willing to bet your father's probably seen that a little more than you have in your life maybe not though.

So it may not be stoicism it's happening here or maybe some other thing happening.

I wouldn't really even consider the stoicism. Stoicism isn't about hiding yourself or being stubborn it's about not wearing your heart on your sleeve. I know enough people in my life that do that and I wish that I could.

So toxic masculinity seems to be more about what negative traits and behaviors you associate with masculinity it doesn't seem to be about whatever masculinity is as a whole.

I'm glad your dad's okay and hope he recovers well.

 

My wife would have called them and given them her mind! Anyways don't engage or entertain this sexist trope. Toxic Masculinity, toxic Feminism. It isn't constructive in identifying the actual specific personality flaw or mindset a person faces in life or given situation. It just demeens men/women with no real opportunity for redemption.

 

Whenever you hear about oppressed minorities, you must realize that is the powerful attempting to loot the productive segment of society. Books have been written about this topic. The elite using the minority to take power and money from the middle has been happening for longer than we have been alive.


This is going on in South Africa where whites are less than 10% and are still portrayed as the oppressors instead of the oppressed minority that they are. The elites will always plunder the productive if given the chance. They are not interested in giving that power and money to the people they purport to care about, they are interested in giving it to themselves.

Given the instant availability of information today, it is amazing that people buy their bullshit anymore.

 

Please give your wife a kiss for me.

All this nonsense about genders, pronouns and shaming labels is a clear indication that some people don't have anything interesting to do.

Thanks,

 

When responding yesterday, I missed this question.

It does mention fear of a bad diagnosis. It was stoicism and/or toxic masculinity that was not mentioned.

"Some said they didn't mention a health concern because they weren't ready to face a troubling diagnosis"

 

Sounds about right.

 

The topic has nothing to do with "oppressed minorities." You guys act like reading hurts or something.

 

Please read the OP. Men are the primary victims of toxic masculinity. And this thread has nothing to do with minorities being oppressed. You think the term is "stupid" because, as you've clearly shown, you don't even understand it.