The worst thing to tell boys? Be more like girls!
How do you solve a problem like masculinity? All that anger! All that violence! All that inherent misogyny every young boy has bubbling inside of him! well, according to Labour, you install male ‘influencers’ inside classrooms in the hope they can teach other boys how to behave towards women. Bridget Phillipson, the Shadow Education Secretary, has pledged to introduce the scheme as an answer to the post-pandemic rise in sexual harassment in British classrooms; a response, as it were, to the Andrew Tate-ification of modern man.
In case you aren’t aware, Andrew Tate is a 6ft 3in former kickboxing champion and social media personality, who ironically enough has been kicked off almost every social media platform there is for his abhorrent views.
He has been hailed as the ‘king of toxic masculinity’ and recognised as one of the loudest voices in the ‘manosphere’ — the collective term given to blogs, forums and websites that promote masculinity and, in some cases, encourage violence against women.
Make no mistake, Andrew Tate is not a good guy; he is, after all, currently languishing in Romania awaiting trial for rape and human trafficking, allegations he denies.
The 37-year-old, who grew up in Luton is, by all accounts, a selfproclaimed misogynist, and routinely shocks and goads with such ridiculous remarks as suggesting women should ‘bear responsibility’ for being sexually assaulted.
SoHow is it then that he has become a figurehead for thousands of men across the world? The answer, I believe, is because men — and particularly school boys — are sick of being told to be more like women. And Andrew Tate, with his six-pack and flash cars and ability to do a nearperfect tornado kick, is one of the few male voices out there unafraid to defend masculinity.
As far as I can see, masculinity has been under siege for the past decade; seen by many as a problem to be solved. The #MeToo movement has spawned a fourth wave of feminists with zero tolerance for ‘boys will be boys’ behaviour, which has led to an entire generation of young men questioning their every interaction with the opposite sex.
Just before Christmas, I found myself talking to a young male friend at a party. He is a decent sort — smart, kind, and deeply respectful of women. He was explaining to me how confused he feels when out dating.
Like an increasing number of twentysomething men, there is something consciously unmanly about him. There’s a softness to their voices, a delicateness that was never there when I was growing up around boys.
when I broached the topic, he told me: ‘This is how we think women want us to be. More like them . . .’ He then went on to explain how so many men he knows feel unable to be themselves any more; masculinity having such a bad reputation in 2024. They are trying anything and everything to present less like a ‘classic man’.
I lay in bed that evening feeling desperately conflicted. on the one hand shouldn’t we celebrate men being more in touch with their feelings. on the other, I thought about all the times I’d heard the phrase ‘toxic masculinity’ being bandied about by young women in front of men.
I thought about what sort of characteristics society currently attributes to ‘good men’ — vulnerable men, men who are in touch with their emotions, men who prefer the book club over martial arts. Men who are basically a bit more like women.
And this, I suppose, is what truly worries me. Because the more we point the finger at male identity as the problem as opposed to specific examples of criminal behaviour, the more some men will push back and turn to characters like Andrew Tate.
So what is the answer? well, I’d start by suggesting compassion, not anger is what is needed. And celebrating what is good about men — ambition, drive, strength (yes, I know, women have these traits, too) rather than admonishing them for what is bad.
But most of all, I think understanding that men are either feeling lost and rejected or angry as hell should be the beginning of the solution. Imposing a governmenttrained ‘influencer’ on them to explain why everything they’re doing is wrong is probably not.