Overcompensation Nation: It’s time to admit that toxic masculinity drives gun violence

[billh58]

Every time feminists talk about toxic masculinity, there is a chorus of whiny dudes who will immediately assume — or pretend to assume — that feminists are condemning all masculinity, even though the modifier “toxic” inherently suggests that there are forms of masculinity that are not toxic.

So, to be excruciatingly clear, toxic masculinity is a specific model of manhood, geared towards dominance and control. It’s a manhood that views women and LGBT people as inferior, sees sex as an act not of affection but domination, and which valorizes violence as the way to prove one’s self to the world.

-Snip-

If toxic masculinity was just about men posturing around each other in a comical fashion, that would be one thing, but this persistent pressure to constantly be proving manhood and warding off anything considered feminine or emasculating is the main reason why we have so many damn shootings in the United States. Whether it’s Islamic terrorism or Columbine-style shootings or, as is the case with some of the most common but least covered mass shootings, an act of domestic violence by a man who would rather kill his family than lose control, the common theme is this toxic masculinity, a desire on the part of the shooter to show off how much power and control he has, to take male dominance to the level of exerting control over life and death itself.

Toxic masculinity is also the reason it’s so easy for men with major issues to get a hold of the high-powered weaponry necessary to commit these crimes. Sure, the pro-gun movement in this country likes to roll out a bunch of half-baked pseudo-arguments pretending at rationality to justify the lack of gun control in this country, but really, the emotional selling point of guns is that they feed the cult of toxic masculinity. Being able to stockpile weapons and have ever bigger and scarier-looking guns is straightforward and undeniable overcompensation by insecure men, trying to prove what manly men they are.

http://www.salon.com/2016/06/13/overcompensation_nation_its_time_to_admit_that_toxic_masculinity_drives_gun_violence/

The article goes on to point out that with the right-wing gun lobby you have a bunch of conservatives running around and pushing toxic masculinity as the solution, as if all we need to end violence and terrorism is a bunch of silly posturing about who is the biggest man of all the menfolk out there (the "mine is bigger" syndrome).

So gun owners who have passed a background check, but get drunk every night, beat their wives, are racists and bigots, and are bullies in the truest sense of the word are perfectly okay to walk around with a concealed weapon? Right...

Elect Democrats who will tighten up background checks (to include character and stability), and pass legislation making gun owners responsible for their lethal weapons.

[tonyt53]

1. Nothing masculine about it. They are scared of their own shadows. Fear isn't very masculine.

I know plenty of those guys too.

[billh58]

4. Exactly, and here's more evidence

of the quest for manhood and bravery through guns:

Consider the ads that gun manufacturers run to lure their buyers.

Glock guns give men “confidence to live your life.” The Walther PPX handgun is “Tough. Very Tough.” The Tavor Semi-Automatic Rifle, gripped menacingly by a faceless man wearing a sniper’s jacket and shooting gloves, will restore the “balance of power” to anyone holding the gun.

Ads often invite men to imagine themselves as warriors in camouflage taking on a hostile world. Buying a Bushmaster semi-automatic “confirms that you are a Man’s Man, the last of a dying breed, with all the rights and privileges duly afforded.”

In other words, guns give these men strength, status, power, and respect — exactly what many white men feel they have been hemorrhaging ever since the 1960s.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/leonard-steinhorn/white-men-and-their-guns_b_4419903.html

Wannabe soldiers and "militiamen" playing war games and bragging about their knowledge of all things guns.

[Hoyt]

2. Yep, the marketeers have identified their targets.

[billh58]

3. More examples of this marketing

theme for guns:

http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2013/06/10/2118071/sexist-gun-ads/