Toxic Masculinity

"By far the worst thing we do to males— by making them feel they have to be hard— is that we leave them with very fragile egos."

Wikipedia page for toxic masculinity

Definition
Toxic masculinity is a narrow and repressive description of manhood, designating manhood as defined by violence, sex, status and aggression. It’s the cultural ideal of manliness, where strength is everything while emotions are a weakness; where sex and brutality are yardsticks by which men are measured, while supposedly “feminine” traits— which can range from emotional vulnerability to simply not being hypersexual— are the means by which your status as “man” can be taken away.

Researchers have defined it, in part, as a set of behaviors and beliefs that include the following:


 * Suppressing emotions or masking distress
 * Maintaining an appearance of hardness
 * Violence as an indicator of power (think: “tough-guy” behavior)

In other words: Toxic masculinity is what can come of teaching boys that they can’t express emotion openly; that they have to be “tough all the time”; that anything other than that makes them “feminine” or weak.