The Male Gender Role Bomb

Growing up as a boy, I was… well… different. As far back as I can remember, my interests and hobbies never really correlated with the other boys around me. For example, I LOVED Hannah Montana. I would belt out her music, religiously watch her TV show, and I was the first in line to see her movie – I loved of all of it. And I still do; I mean, I listened to all four of her albums this morning alone. The older I became, the more I realized that my love for Hannah Montana was… abnormal. I was the only boy I knew who even liked her. This significant difference made me feel alienated, isolated even, from my male peers. I was always taught that “boy things” were dirty, physical, and rough, but this wasn’t like that – it wasn’t related to cars or trucks or sports, so I was supposed to feel ashamed of it, right? Hannah Montana didn’t fit into the masculine norm, better known as the male gender role. In her 2003 sociology essay titled “Gender Roles and Society,” Amy Blackstone defines the gender role as “the different expectations that society has of individuals based on their sex.”

In other words, it’s how society expects you to act as a man or a woman. In America, all men are expected to be aggressive, dominant, emotionless, and impulsive. What we don’t realize is that these concrete standards can have negative long-term effects on boys. When one doesn’t necessarily meet the mark, it can make him feel as if his hobbies, interests, and he himself are not “manly” enough for society’s liking. See the gender role isn’t allowing boys to be themselves. This is why I see the gender role as a bomb – although, it is NOT the bomb.com. At a young age, boys are taught exactly how they are expected to act as men, therefore sparking the fuse of this bomb. The spark continues along the fuse when boys are consistently held to absurd emotional and psychological standards as they grow into manhood. And finally, the inevitable result of an explosion; undeniably horrendous results all because masculinity has grown fragile from the constant implementation of the male gender role. We are literally setting boys up for failure. So first, we’re going to dig up this gender role bomb and discuss how it’s affecting boys and men in our community. Then, we’ll check out the spark, so we can come to understand what is causing these issues. And finally, we’ll discuss how we can detonate the gender role bomb, but change the type of explosion from this horrible bomb of hate into a beautiful and exquisite firework, giving us, as Hannah Montana would say, “the best of both worlds.”

The other day I was scrolling through my Twitter feed when I stumbled across a tweet that read, and I quote, “Guys are only allowed to cry when Denzel Washington unites a segregated town with football.” Now, don’t get me wrong, I love Remember the Titans just as much as the next guy, but this is ridiculous – shaming men for their emotions is ridiculous. Social researcher Levant summarized American masculinity into seven main principles, the first being to restrict emotions, but as one could infer, this “emotional constipation” can lead to negative effects. According to a 2013 article by Pat Hagan on the Daily Mail, bottling up emotions can knock years off your life and raise cancer risk by 70 percent. Although the personal effects of the male gender role are noteworthy, the interpersonal results are far more devastating. Research conducted by the American Psychological Association discovered that masculine gender role stress accounts for a significant portion of aggression and violence amongst males. And by simply turning on the news these days, you can observe the devastating results. A 2014 article by TIME magazine reported that a whopping 98% of mass shootings are committed by males, explaining that when men’s masculinity is challenged, we tend to act out, feeling the need to display our manliness publically. With upwards of 300 mass shootings occurring in 2015 alone, it’s undeniable that the male gender role is becoming exponentially problematic. Another facet of the gender role bomb is domestic and sexual abuse. AARDVARC, an organization dedicated to domestic violence education, explains that sex offenders are most frequently men who are emotionally unstable. Due to masculinity’s refusal of emotions, we grow up unable to recognize the detriment of actions, resulting in mortifying results for our female counterparts. From mass shootings to domestic violence, this gender role bomb is exploding into so many people’s lives – and it’s only a matter of time before it explodes into you life or my life – so it has to be stopped. But before we go to defuse the gender role, we need to understand what’s causing it to explode in the first place.

From birth, we are told what is for girls and what is for boys. Pink blanket, blue blanket, Barbies, monster trucks, emotional, emotionless, weak, strong, supportive, dominant – the media, our educational system, and even our parents are constantly telling us how to become men. But what they’re failing to do is tell us how to become ourselves. The media enforces gender roles by portraying the traditional and outdated role of men – superior and dominating. Schools are responsible for the transmission of gender norms from early education. Aside from these, the primary way children learn gender roles is from their parents. Theorized by psychologist Albert Bandura, the Social-Learning Theory states that children initially learn gender roles two ways: one – from being punished or rewarded for certain behavior, and two – observing the behavior of the parent of the same gender. Even from early childhood, we are being taught to conform to the behaviors of our gender, or else we are punished and outed, never properly allowing many of us to grow into who we want to be… such as myself. I felt like I needed to hide my love for Hannah Montana because boys weren’t supposed to like her. My belting of her songs turned into singing in my head; my religious viewing of her TV show turned into watching in secret; and I would never dare be seen at a Hannah Montana movie in public. I tried to take my life and shove it into the confines of the gender role, even going as far as forcing myself to play football. I lived my life completely different than how I wanted to – until just recently. I quit playing football after months of living in fear of not being “manly enough.” It was what I wanted to do – but for so long I was afraid to leave the gender role. But now that I can be true to myself, I’m the happiest I’ve ever been. I’ve been given “the best of both worlds” as should all men. We all deserve to experience the positive sides of manhood, and to do this, we need to detonate the gender role bomb.

Although it will not be easy to diminish the presence of gender roles in our society, it will be well worth it when we reach where we need to be. First and foremost, parents and teachers must come to understand that individuality amongst boys is essential to their psychological well-being. If we embrace their differences, they will accept themselves. A 2013 article on loveplayandlearn.comexplains that one of the most effective ways to fight gender stereotypes is to sit children down and simply discuss them. If we continue to bring up the discussion about the gender role, awareness will be raised which will lead to a more accepting society and less explosions in everyone’s lives. Second, boys themselves must challenge these societal limitations. Wear that hot pink t-shirt next time you go out, go into Starbucks & order that grande caramel macchiato, and cry when you’re watching The Notebook. Wait… these are just things I do… but when boys are themselves, they assist in our mission to detonate the gender role bomb. But instead of being this bomb, boys need to become fireworks: at a young age, we should light the wick of the firework by letting boys know they are allowed to be themselves. As the spark continues along the wick, the boys will be able to enjoy their lives as they see the positive results of a non-restrictive gender role. And finally, the inevitable result of an explosion: a burst of color and excitement, a beautiful sight for all, and different with each explosion. If boys can be fireworks instead of bombs then ultimately they will become better friends, better brothers, better husbands, and better fathers, in turn creating a better society for you and me. It is essential that we let boys be themselves, be fireworks, so that they can live better lives. Trying to contain boys in this narrow definition of manhood is no longer acceptable, and it is truly doing nothing for the good of boys. No one deserves to be restricted in who they want to become.

And although Hannah Montana is right when she sings that “Nobody’s Perfect,” we cannot give up on the hope for an almost perfect gender role free society. See, the problem with the gender role is that it prescribes how we should be rather than recognizing who we are. Imagine how much happier we would be, how much freer to be our true individual selves, if we didn’t have the weight of gender expectations. Now that we have seen the detrimental effects of the gender role on our society and who and what are perpetuating gender roles, we, as a society, should have no problem detonating this bomb and turning boys into fireworks by simply letting them be themselves. It’s all about giving boys the choice to be themselves. But if we continue to ignore this issue, boys & men will continue to explode. So before you and I have an explosion take place in our lives, we need to let boys be themselves. So I will wear pink when I want to. I will proudly drink Starbucks. And I will continue to jam out to Hannah Montana- I will be a firework. because as my favorite Hannah Montana song says: “you are one in a million.”