A review of For the Love of Men: A New Vision for Mindful Masculinity by Liz Plank, St. Martin's Press (September 2019) 336 pages."There is no greater threat to humankind," Liz Plank announces on the first page of her book For the Love of Men, "Than our current definitions of masculinity." A bold claim. "Toxic masculinity," Plank claims, underpins vast amounts of suffering across the globe.
Lest this introduction lead one to expect an anti-male screed, Plank is at pains to insist that many of the victims of "toxic masculinity" are men themselves. Who could claim that masculinity cannot be problematic? Men are undeniably responsible for most of the rape and murder in the world, and suicide claims a disproportionate number of male lives. The male bias towards camouflaging vulnerability — expressed, for example, in men's disproportionate unwillingness to address potential health problems, be they mental or physical — was more adaptive when familial life depended on men getting up to work and fight every day of every week, but it is less so in our more comfortable times.
Social conservatives, meanwhile, may be surprised to find some common ground with Plank's emphasis on the importance of fathers playing a role in the lives of their children. She scorns egoistic promiscuity, and she identifies loneliness as one of the great scourges of our time, even if, regrettably, she reduces it to male reticence and ignores family breakdown and the decline in social capital.
Comment: See also:
- The Trials of Masculinity, Feminism and the Modern Male
- The Feminist Seduction of Western Society
- Five Feminist Lies We Take For Granted
- How genetics is proving that race is not necessarily a social construct
And check out SOTT radio's: