Part of MAGA lore and ideology is to dismiss all talk of “toxic masculinity” as “woke” thinking. In my first edition of my book, Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ, which appeared before the 2024 election,I concluded with an Appendix titled “MAGA’s Precarious Manhood vs. Authentic Masculinity.”
In my new version of the book, due to appear before the upcoming election of 2026, I move the Appendix up, giving it the prominence of a chapter in its own right.
More and more it is becoming clear that gender and gender distortion—including a reptilian brain out of control (“Let’s go to war in Iran and eliminate the entire country”) are not ancillary to the MAGA theology, but lies at its very core. The current director of the Defense Department has single-handedly changed the name to “War Department.” Maybe he finds that title more testosterone intensive.
Speaking of testosterone, Hegseth now wants to test every soldier over 30 years of age for their testosterone levels. If they don’t reach his ideal, he will demand prescriptions for them. He has worked overtime to fire and exclude women in the military from leadership positions (as well as persons of color), using anti-DEI rhetoric as his reason.
He, the president and the MAGA movement set up trans people as objects of scorn, derision and scapegoating, whipping up frenzy against this vulnerable minority within a minority.
In my book on healthy masculinity, I offer ten archetypes that help name that reality for us. And I end the book with an emphasis on how healthy masculinity is eager to link up with the healthy and strong feminine. I propose that rituals that marry the Green Man with the Black Madonna, for example would be healthy medicine for our times, when an ever sicker and toxic masculinity is rising — one that among other things seeks to control women’s bodies while hiding behind a façade of being pro-life and anti-abortion.
Maybe it’s time for a new language for toxic masculinity. Perhaps we ought to start talking about “hysterical masculinity.” After all, the MAGA crowd and its leaders are becoming ever more hysterical about their fear of the feminine and their commitment to controlling women, demoting women, and lording over them.
The word “hysteria” has a very interesting history after all. It is a Greek word meaning womb. In Hebrew and Arabic, womb is the basis of the word compassion and we know how MAGA loves to make war with both empathy and compassion. Compassion is a sissy concept for MAGA stars like Elon Musk and Peter Thiel for example.
Not for Jesus and the prophets and those working out their prophetic vocations as spiritual warriors however. Webster’s defines hysteria as “unmanageable fear or emotional excess.”
The accusation of “hysteria” has often been invoked against women to deny them an equal place in society, including the right to vote. (A current Hegseth religious guru is a supposed Christian minister who thinks women should not be allowed to vote.)
Maybe it is time to bring back the word “hysteria” and apply it to men who are hell bent on proving their masculinity to the public at all costs. This includes waging stupid wars, beating up on vulnerable minorities, denying diversity in gender preferences, making laws that kill women who need abortions in order to live, and making war on Mother Earth.
Maybe it’s time to call “hysterical masculinity” what it is. A refuge for men who are afraid of the feminine side to their own souls including their own powers for empathy and compassion. Hysterical masculinity is busy projecting its fears on the rest of us.
To read the transcript of Matthew Fox’s video meditation, click HERE.
Banner Image: The Phantom Horseman by Sir John Gilbert (1817-97). Photo by Birmingham Museums Trust on Unsplash.
Queries for Contemplation
Do you sense an hysteria in the precarious and therefore exaggerated masculinity of Hegseth, Trump and MAGA in general? And in wars they are waging against Iran, American cities, immigrants, Mother Earth, trans people and elsewhere?
Related Readings by Matthew Fox
The Hidden Spirituality of Men: Ten Metaphors to Awaken the Sacred Masculine.
A Spirituality Named Compassion: Uniting Mystical Awareness with Social Justice.
Original Blessing: A Primer in Creation Spirituality.
Trump & The MAGA Movement as Anti-Christ.
Adam Bucko and Matthew Fox, Occupy Spirituality: A Radical Vision For a New Generation.
Creation Spirituality: Liberating Gifts for the Peoples of the Earth.
Matthew Fox, Skylar Wilson and Jen Listug: Order of the Sacred Earth: An Intergenerational Vision of Love and Action.
Sins of the Spirit, Blessings of the Flesh: Transforming Evil in Soul and Society.
The Coming of the Cosmic Christ: The Healing of Mother Earth and the Birth of a Global Renaissance.
Charles Burack, ed., Matthew Fox: Essential Writings in Creation Spirituality.
9 thoughts on “The Hysterical Masculinity of Hegseth, Trump & MAGA”
Thank you, Rev Dr Matthew, for this excellent meditation on hysterical masculinity, for calling out the Hegseth/Trump disrespect toward women, and their false portrayal of masculinity. Your reflections give hope to those minorities who are struggling to survive in this anti-woke maga culture. Thank you for your many publications addressing vital issues of important, some of which I have purchased and continue to enjoy reading. Many thanks, Timothy O’Donoghue, Ballyshannon, Co Donegal, Ireland.
The male MAGA testosterone freaks may be Freudian hysterics in the modern Webster sense, but if we stick to the Greek roots [ὑστέρα (hystera) means “uterus,” γυνή (gyne) means “woman,” φόβος (phobos) means “fear,” μισεῖν (misein) means “to hate”] they are truly hysterophobic and gynophobic misogynists, more afraid of castration than of ridicule.
Hysterical masculinity is a perfect description, thank-you! It would be hilarious except for the real suffering and destruction being done. The potential comedy skits write themselves. Ironically, Hegseth’s purge of the military of decorated black officers, women, anyone well educated, thoughtful, anyone with expertise, in preference for white “Christian” zealots and yes men, is turning what was the world’s greatest military into an ineffective, farcical bunch of punks and war criminals.
Well said, Vivian, and well framed Matthew. I am considering having fun laughing at these weak false males, pointing out that maybe they need some little two-inch green soldier toys to help them feel better, but I’m afraid that would only make them act out more, as they would need to puff themselves up more at the mockery and that would not be good for the rest of us. (By the way, “act out” is the term I used to use when children were behaving badly.) My God, these men are such children.
I have just one question. WHERE are their wives? They must have the same mentality.
God help us!
Matt – Great analysis that feels spot on! Looking forward to reading your 2nd edition after enjoying what the Duomo in Orvieto inspired in the first!
YES! YES! Thank you Matthew for accurately analyzing the toxic masculinity of Trump and his MAGA supporters such as Hegeseth and the Republican congress enablers as “hysterical masculinity” contributing to their dangerously inhumane, racist, unjust, capitalistic greed, and militaristic destructive behavior at home and in the world. Historically, especially the last five hundred years, the deeper increasing shadow of unbalanced patriarchy/spirituality in the US and Western societies have been the root of much of the social economic injustices, racism, and destructive wars against humanity, especially the feminine and indigenous peoples, and Our Sacred Mother Earth/Her living creatures/and Her essential graces that we’re All a living part of, dangerously risking our survival as a human species…
With all his posturing, Hegseth sounds like a Putin wanna-be. That’s not working out for the Russian leader either right now…
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