@girlwriteswhat

1 year ago

Academics use a thing called the "conformity to masculine norms inventory" when they're studying gender. It's been around since the 1970s, and is supposed to be a list of the characteristics and behaviors society perceives are appropriate and specific to white, western masculinity. Back in the day, it was a mixed bag of virtues and vices. "Aggression" and "violent" were on the list, but so were "courage" and "hero". You also had all the traditional roles expected of men within the family context: "faithful spouse", "breadwinner", "protector". In 2003, a researcher sat down with a focus group composed almost entirely of women and minorities, to modernize the inventory. The group effectively did away with all the masculine virtues. After all, sometimes women feel pressure to be breadwinners, and women are ALSO expected to be faithful to their partners. Women can be courageous, too. And be heroes. And be self-sufficient. So they took all the masculine virtues (the good things we expect of men. The positive standards society holds them to), and made them gender neutral. Which bumped those things off the list. And all we were left with was the negatives. They sat down and talked about the expectations of men as relates to sexual relationships with women. They had four possibilities: faithful, nurturing, breadwinner, and promiscuous (they called it playboy). The first three also apply to some or all women, so they were out, and we were left with just "playboy". Even though when men were surveyed on the question, "what best describes your primary mode of relating to a female sexual partner?" 98% chose one of the first three, and just 2% said, "playboy." When you remove all the many virtues from the list of what society expects of men, all you're left with are the vices. And then you get to say masculinity is "toxic" and men need to be fixed.

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