How Chivalry Came to Be Seen as Toxic Masculinity

It was not very long ago that courtesy towards women on the part of men—little things such as opening doors and offering seats—was regarded as natural and pleasant. Times changed, though, and such deference came to be seen as patronising and oppressive; an integral part of a patriarchal society. This was mildly annoying, but much worse was to come. In the 1980s, the expression ‘toxic masculinity’ was coined; surprisingly by men themselves. It emerged from the mythopoetic men's movement in the United States, with the suggestion that typical male traits such as seeking dominance, and success, combined with a drive for self-reliance and the suppression of emotions, could be damaging for both men and society as a whole. It was said that women were especially likely to be the victims of this supposed syndrome. This defective version of masculinity would inexorably lead, or so it was claimed, to domestic violence and rape. In a classic case of what one might not inaptly describe as ‘mission creep’, the problem then began to be identified as not merely ‘toxic’ masculinity, but masculinity itself. So it was that the rooting out of masculinity in male children came to be seen as a praiseworthy and desirable enterprise.

The phrase ‘Boys will be boys’ was seen as the essence of the problem. Boys who settled their differences with their fists in childhood and rejected the idea of crying as being unmanly were likely to grow up to be wife-beaters and rapists. A campaign began with the aim of banning this pernicious expression of juvenile masculinity entirely. There were of course those who asked that if boys were no longer to be boys, then what would they be? The answer, as we are now seeing from the veritable epidemic of transsexualism, is that boys will be girls; a healthier state of affairs all around, at least according to some.

The great irony is that by attempting to prevent boys from behaving like boys in the playground and the home, masculinity is not destroyed and replaced by gender neutrality. It will instead emerge in different ways; many of which are much worse than the old-fashioned and traditional ideas on the subject. Take, for instance, domestic violence; the use of physical force against women in the home. This was seen as something of a touchstone for identifying toxic masculinity: together with rape, it is the end destination for men afflicted with this awful psychological condition. What nobody seemed to consider was that there was in the past a fixed and very strong prohibition on boys hitting girls, one drummed into boys from the earliest age. Such behaviour was viewed as cowardly and unmanly. This point of view of course was dismissed with scorn by feminists, who thought that boys and girls should be equal and that there was no reason at all for such misplaced delicacy. 

Coincidentally this outdated notion was scrapped at the same time that it began to be thought of as insulting to offer a woman a seat on a crowded train or bus. Women could now stick up for themselves! They were just as capable of standing as men and every bit as able to use their fists in the playground as boys were. In short, what was once, to use an archaic word, considered to be chivalrous, was now held to be bad and sexist behaviour on the part of boys and men.

These changing attitudes gained strength at a time when an increasing number of boys were growing up in fatherless homes. The nurseries and primary schools they attended were staffed almost entirely by women and so they were not given the appropriate male guidance in what it meant to be a man. Even those boys living in conventional homes, with both parents, often found their fathers reluctant to appear too ‘old-fashioned’ in their views by teaching their sons about a man’s duty to protect women and treat them with respect. For centuries, it was a traditional task of men to imbue their sons with a sense of chivalry, to explain to them about such things as coming to the defence of a helpless woman if need be, that they must never under any circumstance lay rough hands upon a woman or girl, and that they should always be ready to offer their places to women, whether in queues or on public transport. Most boys thus learned a code of conduct which stood them in good stead. The idea of forcing one’s attention on a woman, let alone using physical strength to compel her to have sex with them, was repugnant to all but a vanishingly tiny minority of men. 

This is the code of chivalry to which many, perhaps most, men adhered until a few decades ago, and it served both men and women well. A man who hit a woman or pressed his attentions on her too forcefully was thought to be ‘unmanly’: a label few men desired. Without taking the time to consider what might replace it, feminism and the men’s movement of the 1980s worked in synergy to destroy this code. 

The result, of course, is that boys’ and young men’s conduct with girls has been increasingly learned not from their fathers, but from other young men or, even worse, pornography on the internet. Having been inculcated with the notion that their natural instincts are beastly and not fit to be seen, they devise their own rules and customs. Most people would probably think that teenage boys are the worst possible human group to decide how they wish to behave in society—memories of Lord of the Flies spring unbidden to one’s mind. That their ideas about women and sex should be drawn from the images and films they are all able to access freely on their smartphones is an appalling thought.

There could hardly be a better example of the law of unintended consequences. Those who came up with the tenets of feminism and the notion of toxic masculinity obviously meant well, but the mischief which they have wrought is incalculable. By dismantling the idea of chivalry as something which worked to the advantage of the weak and helpless, especially when they happened to be women, it was hoped that women would attain true equality with men. Similarly, by warning of the dangers of an exaggerated and dysfunctional version of masculinity, it was thought that men would be able to be masculine in a different and more wholesome fashion. What has actually happened is that the rising generation of boys has been left rudderless and with no idea of how to properly conduct themselves. They have picked up the notion with great clarity in their early years that there is something distinctly undesirable about males behaving like males, and this inevitably serves to imbue the thing with all the attraction of a forbidden fruit. Once out of primary school, they are determined that they will indeed be boys and young men. The only thing is that nobody has taught them how to do this in socially acceptable ways.

Not a few of the less attractive features of our modern society may be traced back to the subject at which we have been looking; from gang culture, where young men teach each other a savage code based upon violence and misogyny, to the mad enthusiasm for men adopting the outwards appearance of women, which we see in the trans movement. These things stem from an uncertainty about what it actually means to be a man and how men are expected to behave. Few people looking objectively at the way young men and women behave and interact with each other in modern Britain will be minded to claim that what is now seen is demonstrably better than the situation fifty years ago. It looks very much to be a case of the baby being thrown out with the bathwater. Perhaps there was sexism and misogyny in the world back then, but women were treated with a good deal more respect than they are now. It would have been inconceivable in the 1970s or 1980s for a man in women’s clothes to demand access to women’s spaces and grow angry and aggressive if this was denied him. Looked at objectively, this is hardly an improvement over women being treated with chivalry!

The decline of male courtesy and chivalry towards women, coupled with the rise of the notion that masculinity in itself is dangerous and undesirable, has had a devastating effect on British society. The ill effects that we are currently seeing—including the fad for the voluntary castrations known as gender reassignment surgery—are only the beginning. There is much, much worse to come.