Hiding behind the mask of masculinity is a toxic problem

Be a man: The three most damaging words a boy can hear. The sad truth is those words are said and repeated by fathers, coaches and other masculine authority figures who, since they themselves were boys, seem to have forgotten — or simply ignore — how much meaning they carry.

UHCL’s Office of Student Diversity Equity and Inclusion (SDEI) started a group called MASC (Men Against Social Constructs) to call attention to the attributes of toxic masculinity.

“The program focuses on providing a safe space for open discussion, so our UHCL students can share their own experiences and opinions on the matter,” said Arturo Perez, SDEI student ambassador.

The group put on an event Nov. 15, called “MASC: A Hidden Identity,” where about 18 participants were able to engage in an open, inviting and respectful atmosphere about what it’s like to be a man in a society that forces males to hide who they are and how they feel behind a mask of masculinity.

During the event, the participants viewed the 2013 documentary “The Mask You Live In” about toxic and hypermasculinity and did an activity that was featured in the film.

Other discussion topics included gender roles, real man versus good man, the role of entertainment in the development of the masculinity concept, and vulnerability.

In a boy’s shoes

Some of the information revealed in the documentary may surprise people of any gender watching because the insights gained might be uncomfortable. For many men, questioning the performative aspects of their gender roles will be an uncomfortable exercise.

Imagine you are a young boy and you skin your knee and start crying. Imagine instead of being comforted, hugged or empathized with, you are told by your father to instead “suck it up and be a man.”

Being unable to cry and forced to bottle up feelings causes adolescent boys to grow up programmed to avoid any and all instances of “feminine” behavior. This is how society creates toxic masculinity.

Masculinity defined

Toxic masculinity is defined by Perez as being a concept that gives false expectations of what it means to be masculine.

“[Toxic masculinity] serves to limit men in the way in which they can think, act, speak and, overall, the way in which they can express who they really are without being told who they have to be,” Perez said.

The idea that men and women are fundamentally different can be traced back to the beginning of Abrahamic religions.

Some believe that the origin of this idea is, in itself, fundamentally flawed and that it is time to re-examine the idea of gender identity.

“Sex is biological,” said Lise Elliot, neuroscientist, in the documentary. “Gender is a social construct.”

Masculinity is created

When children are young, boys and girls are virtually indistinguishable. They are both very emotional and fragile and look to their parents to protect and nurture them.

The difference is, the documentary suggests, by the time boys are 5 years old, they know they are not supposed to cry in public but still often do; then by age 10, if they still show signs of sadness and emotions, parents are alarmed and the boy is seen as abnormal.

“The culture in the United States doesn’t allow boys to be secure in their masculinity, so they are made to go out and prove it all the time,” said Michael Kimmel, sociologist and educator, in the documentary.

Now, imagine you are a boy who never had a father for any number of reasons. You have no father figure and get all of your sensory information in your still-developing brain from your mother.

Bullies at school are starting to pick on you for being a “sissy” and a “mama’s boy” when you show an inclination for theater or other activities. While being confronted by bullies, you are now forced to either be silent and hurt — sometimes even physically — or to fight back.

Ultimately, you turn to sports. A father figure emerges. Enter your coach.

Masculinity in athletes

The documentary demonstrates boys often turn to athletics to show their peers they are masculine.

The role a coach plays in a young boy’s life can be comforting and worthwhile or damaging and detrimental to that boy’s entire future. One of the ways in which this determination is made is by how the coach encourages or fosters hypermasculinity.

Hypermasculinity is a form of toxic masculinity that can be defined as an exaggeration of male stereotypical behavior, such as an emphasis on physical strength, aggression and sexuality.

There have been many examples of hypermasculinity in locker rooms, on the field and just generally among athletes.

There was the case at the high school in La Vernia, Texas, of hazing on the basketball team in which three high school athletes, Colton Weidner, Christian “Brock” Roberts and John Rutkowski, held down a struggling student and sodomized him with a flashlight. In this case, the coaches allegedly were aware of this “hazing ritual” and did nothing to stop it — some even going so far as to encourage it.

As is often the case, the victim in this particular case did not report the attack to his parents at the time, the arrest affidavit stated.

“Men are taught not to disclose sexual attacks in any manner,” said William Hoston, political science professor and author of “No Bullies in the Huddle.”

Hoston explained by not being taught to show or display vulnerability and hurt, the victim may have severe emotional damage.

The hypermasculine, dominant behavior doesn’t stop in high school, there are also many situations in which professional athletes are in the news, such as in the case of former Baltimore Ravens running back Ray Rice savagely assaulting his wife in an elevator in September 2014 captured by surveillance video that went viral.

Abuse by coaches

There have even been instances of coaches abusing children who directly look up to them to lead and keep them safe.

In the highly publicized Penn State sex abuse scandal, coach Gerald “Jerry” Sandusky was convicted of sexually assaulting and raping 10 child victims. Though he was a college coach, he founded a nonprofit organization called The Second Mile that “helps young people to achieve their potential as individuals and community members,” the website stated. Many of his victims were young boys in the program and looked up to Sandusky as a father figure or role model who would spend quality time with them and even take them to sporting events, the court transcripts stated.

Less often in the news, yet arguably still just as prevalent and damaging, are instances of coaches being verbally abusive to young athletes to “motivate” them.

This “motivation” comes in the form of name-calling, degrading, humiliating and shaming the children to embarrass them so they will work harder in an attempt to avoid that kind of reaction from their coach or other people they trust.

Bullying and verbal abuse by an adult “can impair social and emotional development and cause substantial harm to mental health,” wrote Indiana University’s School of Medicine Professor Nancy Swignonski in a 2014 article in Pediatrics. “When the bullying occurs in an athletic setting, those harmful effects are augmented by the stress kids often feel as a result of athletic competition.”

Healthy masculinity

Some say now is the time to challenge these ideas of gender roles and the ideas of masculinity and femininity once and for all.

UHCL students made short videos answering the simple question: What is healthy masculinity?

To Karnam Vamsi Krishna, computer science major, healthy masculinity simply means feeling safe in expressing his feelings and knowing it is OK to ask for help.

Julia Ross, psychology major, simply responded that to her, healthy masculinity means being in touch with your feminine side.

Austin Bouley, finance major, said healthy masculinity is the ability to show empathy and emotion, having a good relationship with your father and, overall, to just be nice to others without being questioned. He added to try being passive rather than violent and enraged.

Bouley also attended the MASC event.

“I learned that If men and boys cannot open up and talk about their feelings, pain or hurting, then they are more likely to become depressed or lash out in anger and violence,” Bouley said.

Solutions

To Perez, however, the answer lies with society itself.

“We aren’t dealing with a viral strand that can be thoroughly analyzed and find a vaccine for,” Perez said. “We are dealing with people’s beliefs and their perceptions toward the composition of society.”

How to solve the societal problem of toxic masculinity is something MASC hopes to continue to talk about and discuss at future gatherings.

“Instead of telling people to ‘be a man’ or ‘boys will be boys,’ why not just teach them to be decent people overall,” Perez said. “Let’s ask our men ‘what’s wrong?’ instead of forcing them to ‘suck it up and be a man.’ What one can do is simply pay more attention to the world around them. Being more considerate of how we raise our men to view women would play a big role.”

For more information

While the MASC group does not have any future events scheduled at this time, keep an eye out for updates in future editions of The Signal or on the SDEI website or their Facebook page.

The office of DSEI, located in SSCB-1.203, can be reached at 281-283-2575 from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. Monday through Friday.

Perez can be reached directly by emailing him at perezlu@uhcl.edu.