January 6, with its flood of lies and violence flashed for us on live TV, what the opposite of masculinity is.  

See no evil, speak no evil. Photo by Taras Chernus on Unsplash.

It highlighted cowardly, not manly, behavior because:

Lying is not masculine.

Bullying is not masculine.

Leading with the reptilian brain is not masculine.

Having no interior life is not masculine

Narcissism and egoism are not masculine.

Raw expressions of anger are not masculine.

Making tons of money and hoarding power does not make you masculine.

Refusing to lose gracefully and admit defeat is not masculine.

Addictions to guns, booze, sex, power is not masculine.

Controlling women and telling them what to do with their bodies is not masculine.

The pain of homophobia. Photo by Adrian Swancar on Unsplash.

Lying is not masculine.

Homophobia is not masculine.

Letting fear run one’s life is not masculine.

Fatalistic self-hatred is not masculine.

Projecting your self-hatred onto others is not masculine.

Being out of touch with your heart is not masculine.

Authoritarianism and fascism are not masculine.

Waging war as a solution to differences is not masculine.

Toxic masculinity deprives young boys/men from their divine right to self-expression. Photo by Jackson Simmer on Unsplash.

Dynamics of power-over is not masculine.

Sexism is not masculine.

The compulsion to control women is not masculine. 

Living in denial (i.e. lies) is not masculine.

Preaching denial is not masculine.

Denial is to refuse truth, to choose forgetfulness of truth.  It is a cowardly thing to do.  It is less than manly, there is nothing virile about it.  Denial about climate change, denial of the facts of January 6, hiding from the truth of January 6, is unmanly.


See Matthew Fox, The Hidden Spirituality of Men: Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine.

To read a transcript of Matthew Fox’s video teaching, click HERE.

Banner Image: Tune in for your daily dose of lies! Originally posted to Flickr by Ged Carroll.

Queries for Contemplation

Does this list of toxic and bogus masculinity strike you as real?  What more examples would you offer?

Recommended Reading

The Hidden Spirituality of Men: Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine

To awaken what Fox calls “the sacred masculine,” he unearths ten metaphors, or archetypes, ranging from the Green Man, an ancient pagan symbol of our fundamental relationship with nature,  to the Spiritual Warrior….These timeless archetypes can inspire men to pursue their higher calling to connect to their deepest selves and to reinvent the world.
“Every man on this planet should read this book — not to mention every woman who wants to understand the struggles, often unconscious, that shape the men they know.” — Rabbi Michael Lerner, author of The Left Hand of God

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8 thoughts on “A Litany of Toxic Masculinity”

  1. I read something by David Richo, which I sense speaks to the toxic within humanity often expressed through patriarchy, hierarchy, and the imbalances both within masculinity and feminity that we’ve been discussing. He says the following, which I’ve paraphrased.

    “Spiritual evolution is painful. This is because the dark shadow of our humanity is the nemesis of the arrogant inflated ego. The purpose of this dark shadow side is to grant hegemony to the Higher Self, to depose the fearful ego in favor of uninhibited love; to free the ignorant ego, so it can find wisdom, to break the clench of pride, so a healthy humility can appear.

    This dismantling of the ego will feel like annihilation, much like the continious irritating rubbing of the sackcloth upon one’s skin, that Hildegard speaks of. However, this is actually a path to liberation, in which one repents, turning away from the narrow ego, in order to turn towards the Divine presence and essence within… whose aim is to impress the ego into the service of the Divine, so that it can find its true status of service to people and the planet.”

    1. Richard Reich-Kuykendall
      Richard Reich-Kuykendall

      Jeanette, Thank you for your comment concerning spiritual evolution, and how painful it is going through it, and dealing with the shadow side of ourselves and the danger of ego inflation… These are all ways to get to the toxic masculine in all of us! Good paraphrase of Richo…

  2. Fear engenders anger and self defense, the biggest of which is a series of lies. One cannot bear to look within and deal with the darkness we all carry, so it is projected outward to the nearest “safe” scapegoat. I don’t think lies are confined to men, though. Lies allow the false self to continue on in its self delusion and rationalizations. Lying in inhuman, as you say. Notice that there were women proudly accompanying and/or supporting the Jan. 6 attempted coup. We must take responsibility for rejecting in our selves and in our children this tendency.

    1. Richard Reich-Kuykendall
      Richard Reich-Kuykendall

      Sue, Yes, we use scapegoats to “deal with the darkness we carry”–and we all lie, and there were women who supported what went down on January 6–and even fought there, so as you end up saying, “We must take responsibility for rejecting in our selves and in our children this tendency.” AMEN!

  3. The main source of the toxic masculinity throughout our history of destructive patriarchal cultures up to the present time has been egocentricity or lack of enough development in most humanity of our human spiritual evolution/consciousness in God’s Spirit of Love(Compassion…)~Light(Wisdom/Truth/Justice…)Life(Peace/Beauty/Joy/Creativity…) eternally Present with-in us and transforming us on our Sacred Spiritual Journeys…. may God continue to bless us with Love, Wisdom, and Strength on our long spiritual journeys with one another because so many of us, God’s creatures, nature, and Mother Earth continue to suffer….

  4. Since we are aware of the downside of being under the yoke of patriarchy and the toxic masculine for these two thousand plus years, is there hope for the future of peoplekind on this earth? Are we making any progress? Jon Meachum claims the pendulum is always swinging from one extreme to the opposite but there is a slight gain each time to overcome the evil in our world. But will the next 10-20 years be enough time for that to happen, that is the question.

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