Masculinity in the 21st century

The noun masculinity’s dictionary definition is: qualities or attributes regarded as characteristic of men. However, I think this word holds a lot more meaning in the 21st century than it did in a previous era. With synonyms such as ‘strength’, ‘ruggedness’ and ‘robustness’ it’s clear that the Masculine ideal before was for Men to be the dominant gender who wouldn’t express their emotions, whereas women would be the gender associated with being irrational when it came to their feelings, which is totally ridiculous! Right? Physical appearance also comes into the topic of masculinity in the 21st century as it is more open for males to not have to be the stereotype that is ‘talk, dark and handsome’ like dreamboats like Zayn Malik or Shawn Mendez (swoon) instead, males are able to be of all shapes and sizes and still considered loveable, everybody knows you love Smithy more than Gavin in Gavin and Stacey. Some could argue that the word ‘masculinity’ has been more diminished than ‘femininity’ as it seems more publicly for males to express their emotions, not have to be the stereotypical ‘gentleman’ in regards to hand-holding, car door holding, romantic gestures. Although us girls still love these things (or me at least!) it’s no longer a requirement that is expected of the man.

I think the concept of transgender and sexuality is a more expressed topic in the 21st century, for example in previous eras the idea of a man feeling like he should’ve been a woman or potentially having feelings towards other men instead of women like ‘normal’ would’ve been ridiculed and shunned. Unfortunately it wasn’t discussed so no progress was made in embracing people’s sexualities and preferences. However, in the 21st century people (including men) are given the opportunity to be themselves without the judgement of a bigoted society. Laverne cox is a perfect example of this: born as Roderick Laverne Cox, she was able to express that her identity as a male wasn’t who she felt matched her as much as if she was female. In her case, she has a negative response from friends and teachers but she continued to make her transformation, knowing it was best for her. She went on to become  an American actress for popular Netflix show ‘Orange Is The New Black’ where she plays transgender inmate (and hairdresser) Sophia Burset where she’s able to show clips of her transition from male to female and the reactions she got from her peers. Although it’s only a show, it does show resemblance her real life. FUN FACT: In the flashback’s of the show, it’s her twin brother who plays her! She now has a huge 680.8k thousand followers on twitter and 3.6MILLION on Instagram and is an LGBTQ+ advocate! What’s your view? Get involved in the discussion online by tweeting #seventeendiscussions online!

Reflection:

I think my piece of writing reflects on the ideologies that teenagers, typically girls, were being indoctrinated with ideologies to do with masculinity having connotations of physical strength and therefore having expectations of what a real ‘man’ should be and act like. It’s important to breakdown these issues that revolve around the stigma to ensure that we’re not raising other generations to still hold these  ideologies and don’t keep the stereotypes as an unhealthy role to think they have to be like. By me using an example such as Laverne cox it shows her identities as being young, black and male (however now she is viewed as female) which automatically creates an expectation from them in their social categories.