Men are aggressive because we let them be aggressive.
And how we can be less so.
We are all aware of such maxims as ‘boys don’t cry’, ‘man-up’ and ‘face it like a man.’ Traditional masculinity frequently enforces men to deny such emotions as gentleness, grief and vulnerability on the basis of these being ‘unmanly.’ The only emotive response it would seem traditional masculinity allows for is anger. To quote the brilliant feminist scholar bell hooks, “boys learn that it is better to be feared than to be loved.”[i] But what is the impact of such emotional suppression on society? And how can we change?
What Men do to the World
The numbers, while staggering, are hardly surprising.
Here are the statistics from the United States; Of the 116 mass shootings reported in the United States since 1982, 113 have been by men. In the CDC’s 2010 sexual violence report, 90% of sexual violence against women was from men, and 93% of sexual violence against men was from other men. 85% of women experience intimate partner domestic abuse compared to 15% of men. In 2018, 87.7% of convicted murder offenders were male.
And it’s not a singularly American problem. Dr. Valerie Hudson, the principal investigator of the WomanStats project, used 350 variables in 175 countries to directly link patriarchy and male aggression to just about every global issue under the sun; macro-economic instability, poverty, warfare, political corruption and unrest, climate change, and the list goes on. And those are just the exterior damages. What demographic has the highest suicide rate? Men. More specifically; white men over the age of fifty.
The numbers are conclusive; the greatest threat to humankind is traditional masculinity. We are a planet suffering at the hands of angry men… and the angry men are suffering too.
The Biology
Some would have you believe this is simply the product of nature. Men commit more acts of violence because they are intrinsically more violent. But does the science measure up?
According to one study, “male toddlers emote more than girls, but scientists notice an inexplicable drop in boys’ emotional expressions starting at the ages of 4 and 6 years, while it remains steady for young girls.”[ii] Men are not only capable but naturally inclined to process emotions, yet lose such privilege when socialised masculinity enforces otherwise.
The most common defense of men’s biological essentialism for violence is the testosterone argument. We’ve all heard it; because boys have more testosterone than girls, they are naturally more inclined to use violent force and emote anger. While this has been widely regarded as the indisputable explanation for male aggression, it rests on a foundation of unfounded assumption. According to a University of Pennsylvania study, convicted rapists do not have higher levels of testosterone than the average man, and despite Alabama’s recent mandatory sterilization of child sex offenders, castrated men do not produce lower rates of sexual assault. The link between chemical levels and violent men are casual at best, as we have largely misunderstood the function of testosterone to brain activity. Professor of psychology at Knox College, Frank McAndrew, headed a study to understand the correlation between testosterone and violence. In his findings, McAndrew revealed, “[Historically,] researchers expected an increase in testosterone levels to inevitably lead to more aggression, and this didn’t reliably occur.” The study found that testosterone levels do not influence violence, but rather come as a result of enacting violence, much like how adrenaline does not bring a physical threat but comes as a result of experiencing a physical threat. As author and journalist Liz Plank put it, “Testosterone is not the cause of violence, but it can be the result of it.”[iii]
If testosterone does not have our back on excusing men for violence, than what does? Really, nothing; there’s no excuse.
But if we were to indicate a cause, it would be how we are raised. According to the American Psychological Association, harmful practices of traditional masculinity are trained upon boys consciously and unconsciously, beginning as early as infancy. Male and female infants display aggression and sensitivity, but while girls are socially discouraged to express aggression and thus permitted to be sensitive, boys are discouraged to express sensitivity and thus permitted to be aggressive. Aggression, in itself, is an innate trait of being human. The only reason cis men commonly express more aggression than cis women is because men are allowed to be more aggressive. While a plethora of counters to this statement persist, from the likes of Professor Jordan Peterson, and the following of young men he amasses, the majority of the evolutionary science community, including the APA, agree: men’s violence persists because it is allowed to. Biology does not excuse poor behaviour.
The Possibility of Change
Just as masculine ideologies of suppressing emotions and displaying aggression are socialised traits trained into boys, they can be trained out. Equal and equitable parenting, education systems and social structures can aid the next generation of cis men into being less aggressive and more emotionally capable. Some may call this ‘the war on men.’ I like to think of it more as the revolution to end rape, sexual harassment, domestic violence, homicide, war, the subsequent refugee crisis, poverty, sex trafficking, gang violence, gender inequality, economic turmoil, totalitarian regimes and the ongoing destruction of the environment… But I suppose we all have different priorities.
Change is not just possible for the next generation. We can choose to change at any age. As an adult cis male I can consciously alter the socialised behaviours of my subconscious. I am certainly a work in progress, making many mistakes on the way, but here are a few acts of conscious change I have tried myself that I recommend:
1. Recognise your emotional suppression
Coming from a small town whose main revenues are logging and farming, the conceptualisation of manhood was rural hypermasculinity, complete with copious amounts of camo and grizzly chewing tobacco. The over-the-top performances of manliness polarised traditional masculinity as some extravagantly obscene concept for me. As long as I was not waving a confederate flag and barraging deer crossing signs with a shotgun, I was not at risk of the harms of traditional masculinity, right? Wrong.
Traditional masculinity works on a spectrum. Whether learned from parents, schooling, the media or peers, virtually all American cis men have some residual emotional suppression. It’s imperative for the sake of our mental health and the relationships we have with others to recognise this.
Reflect on how you respond to discussions regarding loss, heartbreak, and vulnerable feelings. When conflicts arise is your primary response aggression? Would you rather slam a door than hold a difficult conversation? Do you allow yourself to lose your temper with more ease than you would allow yourself to publicly cry? If it’s a yes to any of these, you’re still encased in the emotional suppression enforcement of traditional masculinity.
2. Hold conversations about your emotional suppression with someone you trust
This may seem counter-intuitive; to overcome the difficulty of talking about your feelings, just talk about your feelings? Is that not a massive oversimplification? Yes it is, but that is not what I mean.
Talking to a trusted relation, whether it be a partner, family member or friend, about the difficulty you may have at expressing your emotions is an excellent foundation for change. You may not be instantaneously able to hold a flawless heart-to-heart, but the act of saying ‘I find it difficult to talk about my emotions’ is a start. It also gives a support to hold you accountable and find solace in, so you can simultaneously dash aside the ‘I am a rock, I am an island’ traditional masculinity obsession with solitary independence that is also inflicting men.
While doing this, it is crucial to remember that confiding in someone does not make them responsible for your growth, neither does it make them an emotional punching bag. Because men are socialised to emote aggression while suppressing other emotions, when we begin to try to express said emotions we may feel like we are displaying sadness or pain or sensitivity but really we are just emoting slightly varied aggression. It is tempting to classify this as being ‘passionate’, but for the recipient it could very well be emotionally abusive. Cis men subconsciously retract to anger when entering a foreign emotional territory, oftentimes unaware that they are no longer displaying the emotion they aimed to express. We must refine the aggression out of other emotions by normalising these emotions into our lives.
3. Read feminist literature and books on mindful masculinity
One of the best motivators for change is recognising the harm of the status quo. The term ‘feminism’ is intensely divisive in masculine circles, because apparently “the belief that men and women should have equal rights and opportunities” is still a matter of debate. If you are a man who doesn’t find women to be inferior, I highly recommend reading feminist writings. Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie, Rebecca Solnit, and bell hooks are excellent ports of entry into the feminist literary world.
Equally, there are a plethora of books directly confronting the harms of traditional masculinity and offer social and individual solutions to evolve to a higher masculinity. My top four recommendations are;
· For the Love of Men: A New Vision for Mindful Masculinity, Liz Plank
· The Descent of Man, Grayson Perry
· Men Explain Things to Me, Rebecca Solnit
· The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity and Love, bell hooks
4. Stop giving a hoot what people might think
The bonds of traditional masculinity on society are contingent on how intensively we regard the opinion of others. We enforce each other’s performances through judgement, and we perform because of concern for being judged. Do you hide a ‘feminine’ interest or not wear a certain colour because you are biologically hardwired to, or do these acts of performance come more from a place of fear of what other might think? An observation of male fashion through the centuries contradicts the claim that men congenitally are demarcated to a specific appearance. Idealised masculinity is a historically fluid concept, ranging from the flamboyant flourishes of rococo embroidery, to the minimalist, neutral conservatism of mid-century office wear. While there is merit in recognising what sort of clothing is appropriate for certain occasions (a funeral, a business, a place of worship), the notion that gendered fashions are set in stone and abide by some natural order is arbitrary. The only constant of fashion is its consistent habit of changing. We only consider certain clothing masculine or feminine because, at this present moment of history, we collectively decided so.
Likewise, fear of judgement restricts men from displaying ‘unmanly’ emotions. What would other men think of you being vulnerable with your partner? What would women think of a man who cries about his parents’ divorce? These thought processes restrict our ability to change. When we stop giving a hoot about what others may think of us, we allow ourselves to process emotions we would otherwise suppress, and in turn, decrease our tendency to act with aggression.
5. Seek Therapy
The stigma towards therapy that persists in traditional masculinity can be dangerously debilitating. According to Newsweek; “Six million American men will be diagnosed with depression [every] year. But millions more suffer silently, unaware that their problem has a name or unwilling to seek treatment.” Men, on average, are significantly less likely to seek therapy than women, despite their aforementioned higher suicide rate which would suggest a desperate need for it. Traditional masculinity, much like the horcrux which worked to pull Harry away from the Sword of Gryffindor in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, convinces its victims that therapy, the very thing that could help most, must be avoided at all costs.
Perhaps one of traditional masculinity’s greatest attacks on the practice of therapy is the belief that it is solely for the visibly certifiable. In truth, therapy is for everyone. Every human has undergone trauma, mental strain, and the negative impacts of socialised expectations. We all can benefit from a structured setting wherein we can make sense of and work through our mental aches and anxieties with the curation of a medical professional educated in psychology. You do not need to wait for a breakdown before you can seek help.
The key with therapy is understanding that therapists are like music artists; you cannot just pick one at random and expect them to work for you. We all have our likes and dislikes when it comes to music, and it sometimes takes meandering around the realm of Spotify before we find the sound tailored to our mood. Therapy works the same way. There is a panoply of therapeutic practices; cognitive behavioural therapy, client-centered therapy, psychoanalytic therapy, gestalt therapy, and so on. There is also an array of therapist personalities influenced by their religious beliefs, political leanings, and moral philosophies. It is imperative to research both the practice and the therapist before entering a session to know whether they are the right fit for you. Therapy, when done correctly, can aid in the unchaining of emotions suppressed by traditional masculinity, and help tame the destructive aggression so freely unfettered.
The Revolution starts with you
To quote renowned therapist Terry Real, “The force of patriarchy is the water that we all swim in.” All of us can aid by not tolerating the aggression of traditional masculine cis men. That being said, it is not the responsibility of women in heterosexual relationships to be their partner’s emotional caretaker or therapist. Cis men are the source for traditional masculinity’s harms to society, and therefore must be the primary force of championing the systemic change in masculinity’s emotional suppression. Men must, as individuals, take responsibility for their aggression and proactively expand in emotional maturity.
This shift is not demanding an end to masculinity or villainising men for holding masculine characteristics. You do not need to compromise the positive traits of masculinity you possess when evolving out of the negative traits of masculinity that inflict you and others. Some excellent examples of cis men who are actively defying traditional masculine ideals of emotional suppression and aggression are Terry Crews, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Taika Waititi, Karamo Brown, and Robert Webb. We may maintain or reject the elements of manhood as we so choose, but one emblem of traditional masculinity we cannot afford to keep a hold of is our emotional suppression and uncontrolled aggression. The masculinity revolution starts with you.`
[i] bell hooks, The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity and Love. Simon and Schuster. 2004.
[ii] Plank, L. For the Love of Men: A New Vision for Mindful Masculinity. St. Martin’s Press. 2019. p.4
[iii] Plank, L. For the Love of Men: A New Vision for Mindful Masculinity. St. Martin’s Press. 2019. p.59
