Toxic Masculinity and Men’s Mental Health

Terry Kupers defines toxic masculinity as “the amalgamation of male traits that involve domination, devaluation of women, homophobia and aggressive competitiveness.”

The idea of toxic masculinity is associated with traditional male roles comprising of deep-rooted beliefs, tendencies and unfavourable behaviours. This glorification of irrelevant ideas can have a detrimental impact on society and interpersonal relationships. Thus, the toxic masculinity traits prevent men from seeking professional help even if they are emotionally or physically suffering.

Toxic Masculinity Effects on Mental Health

Toxic masculinity pressurizes men to conform to the traditional idea of masculinity discouraging emotional awareness, emotional regulation and vulnerability. Toxic masculinity has negative effects on mental health because it promotes negative and unhealthy behaviours. Inappropriate ideas and behaviour patterns can have significant effects on mental health in the following ways:

• Stigma around seeking help– Seeking help is often viewed as a sign of weakness due to which men may avoid seeking mental health support resulting in severe outcomes.

• Lack of emotional awareness– Men find it difficult to express their emotional vulnerability leading to unprocessed emotions increasing the risk of anxiety, depression, anger outbursts and conflict in relationships.

• Conforming to the societal norms– There is always a constant pressure to conform to the societal standards of success, strength and independence. This unrealistic pressure may lead to chronic stress, low self-esteem and increased risk of aggression.

• Substance abuse– Men may use substances to avoid the root cause of emotional struggles. They use alcohol or drugs to cope with the stress or emotional pain leading to dependency which affects mental health to a great extent.

Toxic Masculinity in Relationships

The toxic masculine traits lead to conflict in interpersonal relationships. Lack of empathy, dominance, control and emotional insensitivity creates unhealthy dynamics and affects emotional intimacy. Below are a few ways how toxic masculinity manifests in relationships: 

• Dismissal of partner’s feelings– A toxic masculine man may dismiss their partner’s emotions by devaluing and disregarding them. They might invalidate their partner’s experiences as “too sensitive” “dramatic” and “overreacting”.
  
  
• Lack of communication– Due to lack of communication, emotional distance makes it hard for partners to connect on a deeper level. Not being able to communicate true emotions, situational pain and feelings creates unhealthy patterns in the relationship.
  
  
• Dynamics of power and control– The key features of toxic masculinity are power and control which leads to imbalances in relationships. A man influenced by these characteristics may display dominance and control over their partner, resulting in aggressiveness and abuse in most cases.
  
  
• Fear of intimacy– Emotional intimacy is an important aspect of relationships, but many men are conditioned to avoid communication or situations involving vulnerability. Thus, resulting in difficulty in forming meaningful bonds and emotional detachment.

Effects on Young Men Seeking Mental Health Aid

Toxic masculinity restricts men from being emotionally vulnerable, an inability to be empathetic and considerate, being sensitive towards their partner’s emotions and an inability to communicate properly in a relationship. Despite of these concerns, they are reluctant to seek professional help because of believing and maintaining the traditional idea of masculinity. Some examples of typical behaviours and their impact on mental health for both partners are given below:

• When a man is afraid to be emotionally vulnerable with his partner for fear of being perceived as “weak”
• When a man tries to control his partner’s life by deciding on her clothes, her social life (who they are allowed to spend time with) and her professional life (what type of job she can choose and to work or not to work)
• When a man comments with words like- dramatic, reactive, overthinker, immature to his partner if she wants to talk about a situation.
• When a man who is struggling with his mental health doesn’t want to see a therapist because he should deal with this on his own and not seek any help from others.

Recognizing and Addressing Toxic Masculinity

In research done in America, it was found that one disturbing implication of traditional masculine norms is less help-seeking behaviour among men for health-related issues.

Due to this behaviour, positive mental well-being has become an important concern for men. In order to develop and work for better mental health, they first need to identify the toxic masculine traits. It often manifests through the following behaviours – Disdain towards help-seeking, rigid gender roles, homophobia and misogyny, competition and frequent anger outbursts, dominance and emotional suppression.

Therefore, recognizing the toxic masculine traits and adopting ways to develop a healthy mindset can save a man from emotional struggles, pain, relationship conflict, social conflict and even job crisis.

To conclude, developing a positive mindset may be possible by cultivating empathy, and respectful behaviour towards their partner, altering the core traditional belief about a specific gender, seeking help whenever needed and considering different perspectives towards life and people.  This practise will lead to the elimination of toxic behaviours and help men to work for better mental health.