Masculinity in Crisis

According to Hanna Rosin (2010), “Man has been the dominant sex since, well, the dawn of mankind” (online). She goes on to explain, however, that this is no longer the case, and that the very notion of patriarchy has been challenged in the wake of the economic recessions of the 1990s and early 2000s. Such challenges have led to a widespread perception that contemporary masculinity is in crisis, and this perception is circulated in popular and public discourse (Fig. 1). Indeed, as Sally Robinson (2000) writes, “The idea that dominant masculinity is ‘in crisis’ is evidenced in widely divergent discursive registers,” and she indicates that this narrative has repeatedly popped up in everything “from scholarly histories of American masculinity to popular newsmagazine coverage of the Lorena and John Bobbitt incident” (p. 5). E. Anna Claydon (2010), however, contends that the very idea that masculinity is in crisis “has become distorted by pop-psychology because what was a concept specific to an individual identity has been generalized into an experience shared by a generation” (p. 133). Nevertheless, even a cursory glance at the way masculinity is depicted and discussed within popular media reveals that “something is happening with men in America” and abroad (Kanwal, 2011, online).

Fig. 1: Masculinity is perceived as being in crisis, particularly in the early half of the 21st century. Image credit: http://saltysojourn.tumblr.com/post/59106980627/how-can-i-have-privilege-if-sometimes-im-sad

In discussing this phenomenon, Anoop Nayak and Mary Jane Kehily (2008) write that “contemporary masculinities can appear as displaced subjectivities, alienated and ridden with insecurity about their purpose and role,” and that this, in turn, has led to the idea that “modern masculinity has somehow lost itself, forgotten what it once was or at least struggled to be” (p. 38). Granted, this idea runs counter to the notion that gender is not a fixed concept but rather a sociocultural construction, yet there is nevertheless a perception that the very concept of masculinity has “become endowed with an enormous amount of cultural meaning” (Nayak & Kehily, 2008, p. 49). Robinson (2000) explains this idea of masculinity in crisis further, writing that the advancements of feminism, the civil rights movement, and gay rights activism have resulted in the perception that heterosexual white men have become “decentered” from their traditional dominant positions within society (p. 2).

This perception is also tied to economic shifts that have impacted men’s role as the primary breadwinners within a societal context over the past several decades (see Horrrocks, 1994; Cohan, 1997; Kahn, 2009; Rehling, 2009; Rosin, 2010). Indeed, in the United States, “Men dominate just two of the 15 job categories projected to grow the most over the next decade,” and it has become clear that the nation is moving toward an “economy that, for the working class, has become more amenable to women than to men” (Rosin, 2010, online). While it is true that these types of economic shifts often have a more profound effect on women and people of color, there is nevertheless “an enduring image of the disenfranchised white man” that has “become a symbol for the decline of the American way” (Robinson, 2000, p. 2).In the United States, “three-quarters of the 8 million jobs lost” during the Great Recession were those considered to be “overwhelmingly male and deeply identified with macho recession” (Rosin, 2010, online). Furthermore, Rosin argues that the recession “merely revealed – and accelerated – a profound economic shift that has been going on for at least 30 years, and in some respects even longer” (2010, online). This trend continues today, nearly seven years after the beginning of the Great Recession. As of January 13, 2014, employment among young men “is still about 5 percent under its 2007 peak, while female employment is about 2 percent higher” (Drum, 2014, online). This appears to indicate that “The working class, which has long defined our notions of masculinity, is slowly turning into a matriarchy,” even though “the upper reaches of society are still dominated by men” (Rosin, 2010, online). As Rosin points out, however, this paradigm of male dominance “feels like the last gasp of a dying age rather than the permanent establishment” (2010, online). Thus, as old notions of dominant masculinity become increasingly irrelevant, it would appear as though there are still a number of individuals, such as the Men’s Rights Activism movement, invested in restoring the old patriarchal order (Friedman, 2013). Within this tension, then, the cultural narrative that positions masculinity as being in crisis continues to be perpetuated throughout public and popular discourse.

Hanna Rosin, the author of the book The End of Men (2012) argues that the global economic crisis has had a profound impact on our understanding of masculinity.

It is important to note that the idea that masculinity is in crisis is not a new one, and it has resurfaced again and again throughout history and across cultures. According to Nayak and Kehily, “there is a lack of precision regarding when the alleged crisis of masculinity began,” but they argue that since the postwar years, men have been “perpetually portrayed as in ‘in crisis’; indeed it is practically a feature of the lives of young working-class men” (2008, pp. 49-50). More importantly, despite the fact that it is primarily white, middle-class, heterosexual masculinity that is in decline, it is clear that the so-called crisis of masculinity has had a profound effect on men around the world and across cultures, regardless of ethnicity or socioeconomic status. Rosin contends that a variety of cultural and economic forces have had the effect of upsetting or challenging notions of gender order around the world, particularly following the global financial crisis of 2007. She writes that the global economy “is evolving in a way that is eroding the historical preference for male children, worldwide,” and that beginning in 2010 “the balance of the workforce tipped toward women,” who suddenly found themselves the “primary breadwinners in their families” (Rosin, 2010, online). This development has left many men feeling unsure of their place within society. This insecurity is reflected in how popular the topic has become in both the popular consciousness and mainstream media, particularly during the last few years, around the world.

There is evidence that the idea of masculinity being in crisis is a global phenomenon. In the context of “a globalized media world,” it is vital to “think through the differences within white masculinity played out along the axes of other identity categories, such as nation and ethnicity, as well as class and sexuality” (Rehling, 2009, p. 168). Furthermore, as the dominant masculine ideal that is represented by global hegemonic masculinity is often inaccessible to the vast majority of men, “the promotion of this inaccessible image of virility leads to a painful realization: that one is an incomplete man” (Badinter, 1992, p. 133). This is a realization that is experienced by men around the world, and within various cultural contexts. For example, according to one study, men in Russia have been undergoing their own crisis of masculinity for years, and it is often tied to a sort of victimization theory that often accompanies discourse surrounding the idea of white masculinity in crisis. In this case, popular discourse centers primarily on “indicators of low life expectancy compared with women, self-destructive practices…and high rates of morbidity and mortality that make it a ‘sad privilege’ to be a man” (Novikova et. al, 2005, p. 155). Furthermore, it is believed that in this context, “men are passive victims of their biological nature and structural (cultural) circumstances” (Novikova et. al, 2005, p. 155). In this cultural context, so-called normative masculinity is positioned as being under threat from a number of outside sources (including women and other types of masculinities), particularly when traditional notions of masculinity are challenged by social and economic forces that serve to disrupt patriarchal institutions. This challenge then results in a perception that traditional dominant masculinity is in crisis, and the response can range “from rejection of change to transformation of identity” (Connell, 2005, p. 78).

Dr. Elizabeth Wood discusses Russian masculinity and hypermasculinity in the context of Vladimir Putin, who goes out of his way to project an image of extreme masculinity.

An example of a transformation of masculine identity occurred in Japan when that nation experienced its own crisis of masculinity. During this period, Japanese women put pressure on young Japanese middle men to move away from traditional patriarchal constructions of masculinity (Connell, 2005). This pressure led to a shift in the traditional Japanese gender order. Indeed, as Rosin explains, this shift in the gender order has led to the rise of young men who reject “the hard-drinking salaryman life of their fathers and are instead gardening, organizing dessert parties, acting cartoonishly feminine, and declining to have sex” (2010, online). By embracing a more non-traditional form of masculinity that borders on the feminine, these young men, known colloquially as “herbivores,” are subverting the traditional Japanese notions of patriarchal masculinity. Conversely, Japanese women of this generation have begun to display more male traits and stepped into the more traditional male gender roles, and have come to be known as “carnivores” or “hunters.” This has led to a “national panic over the rise of the ‘herbivores,” and serves to illustrate how the tension between traditional and non-traditional masculinities can lead to the idea that masculinity is somehow in crisis (Rosin, 2010, online).

Author Maki Fukasawa coined the term “herbivore” to describe Japanese men who reject traditional notions of dominant hegemonic masculinity.

Similarly, Scandinavian welfare policies, which are “often celebrated for their woman-friendly potential,” have led to a crisis of masculinity in nations such as Denmark (Borchorst, 2008, p. 2). Indeed, one of the goals of Scandinavian welfare policies is to promote “sameness between the genders, and it aims at the integration of women in society” (Borchorst, 2008, p. 12). In spite of, or perhaps because of, this attempt to promote equality between genders, there is a perception that masculinity itself is being threatened, and many young men feel as though they have lost an important part of their identities. This sense of threat has resulted in the creation of a gangster subculture among Scandinavian youth that does not necessarily coincide with “being a gang member” but rather has been appropriated simply “because it sounded ‘cool’ and created associations to the tough hyper-masculinity of black American rappers” (Bengtsson, 2012, p. 678). While this subculture originated with young men belonging to the immigrant and refugee families that make up a significant portion of Denmark’s “urban outcasts,” it nevertheless has become a way for young Danish men to “form individual identities constructed primarily by choice, not by structural or social constraints” (Bengtsson, 2012, p. 679). Therefore, it could be argued that by appropriating this gangster identity, these young men are attempting to reclaim or reestablish a masculinity that they consider to be threatened or put in crisis by larger societal forces.

Indeed, this appropriation of hip-hop culture seems to indicate that these young men are dissatisfied “with the perceived inauthenticity of whiteness” and are attempting to reclaim their masculinity through the adoption of “stereotypical images of black masculinity formed in the white imagination” (Rehling, 2009, p. 168). Furthermore, as these “images of the cool pose, the tough guise” continue to be perpetuated through cinematic masculine archetypes such as The Gangster, boys and young men are taught to believe that ideal masculinity most closely conforms to this “glamorized image of the hyper-violent black male body and this urban street style” (Jhally, Earp & Katz, 1999). Thus, this is yet another indication of how notions of global hegemonic masculinity continue to be perpetuated and reinforced by the recurrence of cinematic masculine archetypes.

Young men will occasionally appropriate signifiers from gangsta and hip hop culture in order to compensate for a perceived lack of masculinity.

Jackson Katz (1999) points out that these sorts of “changes in images of masculinity are in part a response to a perceived threat to the traditional or dominant idea of masculinity.” Perhaps this explains why there persists across cultures an overarching narrative that states that “masculinity is a tangible essence that once unbuttoned from white-collar lifestyle will spring forth, hell-bent on exerting violent fury” (Nayak & Kehily, 2008. P. 38). According to this narrative, men must engage in an act of “‘regeneration through masochistic endurance’,” a recurring idea that “structures representations of masculinity in the Hollywood tradition” (Rehling, 2009, p. 74). Yet, as Robinson indicates, the idea that “crisis leads to a resurgence of old models of masculinity” does not necessarily imply that the crisis “requires a singular outcome or, indeed, any outcome at all” (2000, p. 10). She goes on to explain that:

…some historians have complained that the crisis model constructs masculinity as a necessarily defensive, reactive identity formation, always looking to recoup its power, and men to remasculinize themselves in traditional ways. (Robinson, 2000, p. 10)

Still, the idea that men must engage in a form of “remasculinization through violence” is a narrative that continues to have a hold on popular culture to this day (Rehling, 2009, p. 68). Indeed, Katz (1999) argues that it is due in large part to the fact that “the culture in general…tells boys that you become real men through power and control,” and that the only way for men to gain respect is through “physical strength and the threat of violence and the ability to scare people” (Jhally, Earp & Katz). Similarly, Roger Horrocks (1994) writes that “Men are socialized to be aggressive and violent” by the culture as a whole, particularly in violent and warlike human societies that celebrate these traits (p. 131). Thus, one of the primary ways that men reject the idea that their masculinity is somehow in crisis is to embrace traditional forms of masculinity, which are often closely identified with traits such as violence, aggression, and competitiveness, the hallmarks of global hegemonic masculinity.

Jackson Katz discusses the crisis of masculinity in the documentary “Tough Guise: Violence, Media & the Crisis in Masculinity” (1999, dir. Sut Jhally)

This cultural perception of masculinity as being violent and aggressive is reinforced by cinematic masculine archetypes. These depictions are positioned as the normal or default setting for masculinity, and thus “Violent masculinity is constructed as a cultural norm” (Jhally, Earp, & Katz, 1999). Yet, there is a resistance to these types of masculinities across societies, and as a result, “the perception and image of heterosexual men…has never been as negative, de-idealized, and potentially harmful as it is now” (Kanwal, 2011, online). Indeed, there is a prevailing narrative within mass media that “The old hegemonic fictions of masculinity become increasingly untenable in the postmodern climate, prompting ever greater insecurities and emptying out the sureties of hegemonic masculinity” (Bainbridge & Yates, 2005, p. 302). This disruption of patriarchal power has led to insecurities among some men, particularly white, middle-class heterosexual men, who have seen their dominant position within society erode since roughly the 1960s.

These insecurities are often fueled by popular cinema, which “continues to play an important role in the articulation of psychic and cultural anxieties around masculinity and its perceived crisis” (Bainbridge & Yates, 2005, p. 302). Part of the reason for this is due to the fact that, more often than not, “The male archetypes populating contemporary movies don’t line up with reality” (Scott & Dargis, 2011, online). This discrepancy between real life and reel life can lead to insecurities surrounding masculinity across cultures, and is increasingly being addressed within contemporary American pop culture. Indeed, “Subordinate and marginalized masculinities that challenge more traditional forms” are increasingly “finding representation in popular culture” (Bainbridge & Yates, 2005, p. 305). This idea is epitomized by the rise of the “omega male, who ranks even below the beta in the wolf pack” (Rosin, 2010, online). The omega male most often manifests as an unemployed, perpetually adolescent, misanthropic loser who “can be sweet, bitter, nostalgic, or cynical, but he cannot figure out how to be a man” (Rosin, 2010, online). According to Jessica Grose (2010), men – particularly young American men – have been taught by the mass media “at the very least, that they would master a lifelong stable job and a healthy family” (online). Following the Great Recession, however, this prevailing cultural narrative proved to be nothing more than a fiction, particularly “as job security becomes a fantasy for many, and marriage rates plummet” (Grose, 2010, Online). Thus, the omega male is the “confused, paralyzed” counterpart to the heroically masculine heroes of a past era (Grose, 2010, online). More importantly, he serves as the stand in for men who have learned the harsh lesson that, since the 1960s, dominant masculinity has gone “from a guarantee of inalienable rights to something of a dirty little secret” (Robinson, 2000, p. 4). In other words, sociocultural notions of masculinity have changed, but not all men or patriarchal institutions have accepted or adopted these changes (Fig. 2).

Fig. 2: Actor Zach Galiafianakis as Alan in The Hangover (2009) embodies the concept of the Omega Male. Image credit: http://dealbreaker.com/2013/03/new-hostess-owners-infallible-business-plan-zach-galifianakis-and-healthy-twinkies/

However, depictions of the omega male notwithstanding, masculine cultural roles have remained static for some time, and are often at odds with current understandings surrounding gender order. As Grose points out: “The image of the American woman has gone through several upheavals since the 1950s, but the masculine ideal seems fixed in cultural aspic” (2010, online). Indeed, despite the fact that gender is now understood to be a hypothetical construct determined by societal and historical factors, dominant masculinity nevertheless continues to be defined by “‘stereotypical male’ traits, such as aggressiveness, competitiveness, distance, lack of emotion, and non-communicativeness” (Kahn, 2009, p. 69). Furthermore, as Caroline Bainbridge and Candida Yates (2005) point out:

In the postmodern context, the extensive parody of hegemonic masculinity and the lack of obvious routes out of the paradoxical spaces it opens up, force a kind of retrospective nostalgia for a fiction of masculinity that becomes overvalued as a result, and it is this that traumatizes the postmodern masculine subject. (p. 303)

Therefore, tension often results when men come to believe that they do not conform to dominant societal and cultural norms about how men should act, and this serves to “reinforce the actualized ideal of masculinity and marginalize those who presumably do not fit this ideal” (Kahn, 2009, p. 63). This tension, then, serves as the basis for the idea that masculinity is in crisis, particularly when men feel that they do not conform to the stereotypical cinematic masculine archetypes that are used to convey hegemonic notions of masculinity.

Featured image retrieved from: http://www.leftfootforward.org/2013/09/opinion-man-up-the-need-for-feminists-to-tackle-the-crisis-in-masculinity/