The expression “Toxic Masculinity” might have gone under your radar, it might be an expression you have heard but you don’t really know what is meant by it, it might be something you are aware of and are very concerned about or it might be that you are a woman or a man and have suffered as a result of it. Whichever of those categories you fall into, this subject is an important one and needs to be taken very seriously by all of us.
At the recent St Mary’s men’s barbecue I spoke on this subject and sought to address what Toxic Masculinity is, why it is gaining such traction and what the solution is. Many people (both men and women) weren’t able to hear the talk and asked whether it would be available. As a result Adam Curtis and I have recorded a podcast on the subject which you can access here from the St Mary’s website, or you can download it from the usual St Mary’s podcast feed via Apple Podcasts.
Our hope is not just that this podcast will be informative but that it will lead people to act.
It would be wonderful if parents encouraged their teenagers to listen and then discussed it with them, it would be great if people picked up the two challenges at the end of the podcast and it would be fantastic if as many of us as possible were praying about it.
A generation of young men are being sold something which is shoddy, ultimately unsatisfying and potentially very damaging to both men and women. We have something much better to offer.