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The word “masculine” has been defined as traits characteristic of males. Not only does this vague definition leave way too much room for the “woke” movement to start weaponising the word (e.g. making being male look toxic), but it’s impractical and senseless. Men can be both masculine and feminine in their traits and behaviour, as can women, so the word should not be associated with gender. In this video, I redefine the word masculinity (and femininity) to make it more helpful, healthy and supportive of the genders uniting peacefully.

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Full transcript (unedited)

Hey, what’s up everyone? Today I’m going to do a off the top of my head video, no script or planning just in response to something that came up in some social media comments, some bullshit I posted recently. And that is the definition of masculinity, the problem with it and the definition I use instead. So for some reason, it didn’t occur to me until like recently, to go online and look up the definition of masculinity. So let’s have a look at what we’ve got here. The Google promoting themselves definition as qualities or attributes regarded as characteristic of men, so regarded as characteristic regarded by whom it doesn’t seem to say, handsome, muscled and driven. He’s a prime example of masculinity. There’s an example there social expectations of being a man. Like there’s one massive global society and there isn’t 1000s or perhaps even millions of different cultures, mean cultures can change village to village, so I don’t know who what social expectations they’re referring to roles, behaviors and attitudes that are considered appropriate for boys and men in a given society. Now, what’s really interesting is I searched for this I’m searching for this right now. But I searched for this a few months ago, and it was completely different answer. So somebody’s gone in a fucking changed it. Let’s have a look at Merriam Webster, somebody other than Google, what their thoughts are the quality or nature of the male six, the quality state of being masculine and manly. Just one last one, we’ll have a look at Cambridge, they say the characteristics that are traditionally thought to be typical or suitable for men, again, thought by whom? Who are they referring to? There’s a thing coming through as masculinity equals men. And of course, I won’t bother googling it, but I can assume femininity means woman. Now, actually, when I Googled this a few months ago, I think the woke movements had a bit of an effect on the search, but it was characteristics and traits exclusive to me. Okay. I want you to think about this, try and identify a single characteristic or trait that only men have. Okay, take your time. Think about it. Something that only men do. Only men have a woman don’t do or have as a trait or characteristic. Well, I’ve already had this argument with people. And so far, there’s only been one see my reasonable answer, and that is rape. Trigger warning. The thing is, women can rape actually, and rapes a behavior, not a trait, the trait would be say aggressiveness, which I’m pretty sure we can admit women can do as well. So the idea that masculinity is something that’s really characteristic of mean, femininity, is really characteristic of woman is just unhelpful. It’s just an unhelpful definition of those words, you might as well delete the words because of how little sense they make. If you’ve ever met a very feminine man, for example, you can identify him as being a feminine man, but that doesn’t actually make any sense according to the definition of the word feminine, nor the definition of the word masculine. So if you mean a masculine woman, she apparently doesn’t exist. She’s apparently some weird anomaly. And what about the person who can be masculine and feminine within their own lifetime, a single individual, I, for example, can be very assertive with people that stand my ground that you can see me with my daughter. I’m like a teddy bear, you know, follow her around like a faithful puppy. So which 1am I masculine or feminine? And if I’m both in what the hell do those words mean? If I’m a male who’s characteristically masculine and feminine, depending on what time you look at me, the hell do those words mean? Those words have become weaponized by the woke movement. And they’ve always been weaponized words really especially masculine. They’ve always been words that have used to harm people. And I quite liked the word so I’d like to kind of take them back. So this little rant is really just to give you my working definition of those words, so that you can use it for yourself if you like. And to help you destigmatize anything that’s attached to these words, and reframe them something that’s helpful for you. When we look at it is that masculine and feminine is like that Japanese ying and yang symbol, you’re hard and soft. And you know, somebody’s got their black and white circle thing with the circles in between, kind of indicates that one is inside the other as well, and they’re next to each other and they work together and together, they make a whole. I think that’s a healthy view of masculinity and femininity from the individual through the community, the community, the relationship, the individual, right, so the community needs to have a mixture of masculine and feminine, that polarization to function in a healthy way and we’re seeing a great decline in It especially in the Western world, we’re seeing masculinity being shamed, or being kind of usurped and turned into aggression by traditionally feminine people. It’s all way out of whack. masculines, you know, masculine men have become passive, feminine woman have become ashamed, it’s just a mess, right? Then we’ve got like in the, in the relationship, it doesn’t matter whether the man or the woman is masculine or feminine, it doesn’t matter, who’s taking on that role at any given time, as long as there’s one of each. Alright, if you’ve got two masculines in a relationship, they just got bumped heads, and it’s just not gonna, it’s just gonna be conflict all the time. If you have too feminine, there’s going to be no leadership, no moving forwards, no progress, no development, no challenge. And of course, we got to passive the things that’s going to sit still in the water. So you need one of each a leader and a follower. And these people can they can switch roles. My wife and I do it all the time. You know, sometimes I’m the boss. Occasionally, I’m the boss. And then sometimes she is sometimes I make decisions sometimes ask you what we should do we go back and forth. It depends, you know, really getting it right is nailing the context. What who should be the masculine person in this context? Is a question we’re offering answering. And, you know, I’ll defer to her if it’s her turn, and so on. But I’m sort of more masculine, she’s sort of more feminine in general. So we also play a general role here, I’ll be person and kind of makes a final decision on stuff and she’ll be the person who organizes and prepares for that decision. You know, in general, but not always. But when neither of us take on a role, or both of us take on the same role, we just have conflict, it just doesn’t work or we don’t move forward. So that doesn’t help. I think a masculinity has been the hard femininity is being the soft, masculine is giving driving forward progress. Feminine is receiving healing, accepting, you know, if you wanted to work on yourself, for example, self development, you need to have the masculine to drive yourself forward but at the same time, so that you don’t feel not good enough and competitive all the time. You need the feminine to balance out and say well, you’re you’re good enough as you are, you’re trying your best. So to constantly work on yourself, but also accept yourself as you are you need both of those. If you just accept yourself as who you are, you’re just going to turn to a piece of shit because you’re just going to let all your problems run rampant you know your your flaws and sort of harmful traits do you do nothing about them? Take somebody who’s like morbidly obese, for example, that’s too feminine about their health. They need to be kicking your own ass a little bit there. But of course, too masculine is a problem. If you always compete ambition drive, go forward. Never stop always when whatever that kind of driving force that ends and misery for yourself and others. You’re never satisfied. You crush other people along the way. You lose connection with your partner. There’s all sorts of problems with being like that all the time. This is the classic dad who neglects his kid. Right? He’s out there like crushing it in his Korean little kids growing up way daddy to even know me, right? That’s a problem. If he can, crushes Korean and come home be like, right, let’s play with dolls, then he’s gonna have a nice balance, isn’t it? I don’t think there’s any such thing as toxic masculinity. I’ve talked about that before. And I believe in toxic femininity. That’s like saying toxic health. That doesn’t make any sense so oxymoronic. There’s masculinity and femininity, and then there’s unhealthy stuff. Right. And one way to kind of further break down the definition is masculinity as a set of traits, values, and femininity is a set of traits and values. And if you’re living by one or the other, you’re being healthy. And if you’re balancing them, right, you’re being really healthy. Okay, so to give you some examples that you can work from some of the masculine traits, we’ve got honesty, we’ve got courage, we’ve got responsibility, assertiveness, respect, while the self respect, these are really masculine driving forward type values, there’s many more we can add. But if you stuck with those, you’re being quite masculine, feminine, you know, we’ve got curiosity, we’ve got acceptance, we’ve got giving respect, so respecting others, we’ve got nurturing. Again, all of those are healthy, aren’t they? And if you combine them with the first list, and it doesn’t have to be a 5050 combination, you know, within the person, like I’m quite masculine, but it’s like icing on the cake. I bring in the feminine as much as I can to kind of counterbalance that my masculinity can be excessive, I’m prone to burnout and stress. I’m trying to do too much and control too much. Letting Go chilling out letting someone else make the decisions. These are things I have to practice I have to like force femininity into my life. And it can go the other way as well. You can be quite a feminine, caring, nurturing person, but sometimes you’re going to have to step up and say stop them other fuckers Not good enough, sometimes you’re gonna have to assert yourself, sometimes you’re gonna have set boundaries. You have to be more honest sometimes, right? Sometimes being more caring and nurturing isn’t going to get you what you want. And you should get what you want if it’s healthy. So sometimes you have to step up and ask for it and be brave. The counterbalance, it doesn’t have to be exact percentage, just the right amount to suit who you are and your life and your goals and your values. And when you create a partnership with someone, be it romantic or business, they should be accountable balance, right, they should be strong in your weakness, they should be strong in their weakness, and then you’re great together, you’re better than you know the sum of your pots. Of course, the community probably should be a bit more 5050. I actually quite believe in feminine leadership. I quite like the idea of a matriarch, I think the person at the top should be caring and nurturing. And then the next level down should be assertive. Alright, you put a certain person at the top, you too often get tyranny, right male or female, if you’ve got one person at the top, who’s masculine, they generally just run rampant, because they don’t have like a counterbalance counterbalance as a level down and you know, the top of the mountain generally you don’t listen to anyone. But when you’ve got feminine at the top of the mountain, the next level down, you’ve got masculine generally tends to be healthier in my experience, and in my sort of theory or hypothesis. So I believe in feminine leaders, but feminine leaders need to be feminine, okay, they need to be caring, and nurturing and listening and curious and accepting and respectful. And then the next level down male or female for all of these roles, these ones are going to get shut down. And there’s protective and ggressive when it needs to happen, translates the feminine message into something direct and honest, that kind of thing. These are all just ideas off top my head. But the key is, especially to the men I’m speaking to, you know, the ones that I work with, it’s okay to be both. And you might be more feminine than masculine. Maybe that’s your kind of setup. That’s fine. Zero problem with that, as long as you play to your strengths, and you accommodate for your weaknesses. And when you connect with others, you look for counterbalances, right. So if you’re a feminine guide, don’t just have feminine friends, right? Have some masculine friends, if you can, right, get out there and banter a burden rough play and bring a better down into your life to counterbalance. And you’ll be bringing something into the life. Like if you’ve got a group of sort of hard tradie guys, and they’re all masculinity all the time. And some of it’s kind of an act and you bring in a feminine guy and makes it okay to sort of talk about feelings or makes it okay to, you know, accept things the way they are and just calmed everyone down a bit, that group is far less likely for conflict far less likely lead to violence, far more likely to become shameless about sort of the more feminine sides that they have, if so on. And maybe the feminine guy will be toughened up a little bit as well. Maybe they’ll have such a thin skin and take things so personally when they’re around people who can show them that that’s okay, you can just play and so on. Right? So anyway, I just want to throw this out there because I think the current working definitions of those words don’t work there’s cause lots of conflict and pain, especially in the kind of work world that we seem to be immersed in this 1984 Bullshit. So you go out there you decide for yourself what these words mean. But trying to make it a healthy definition try to make it okay to be either trying to make it nuanced so that you can apply it correctly in any situation rather than being loyal to one side of the fence and being stuck with it when it doesn’t work. And I think it’ll work out welfare works out for me most of the time, and when I’m in pain is because I didn’t apply it. So that’s why I’m so into it. Get in touch with me if you want help with your masculinity or femininity dan@brojo.org and I’ll catch you all next time.