TOXIC WASTE

For good reasons, charities have stopped using the phrase ‘toxic masculinity’. Ben Bryant looks at why experts are encouraging the media and government to avoid the term

- Ben Bryant

When Andy Hill started to engage schoolboys in masculinity workshops six years ago, he noticed that children didn’t seem to warm to one phrase in particular.

“We were trying to address the concept of toxic masculinity,” he says. “It was very common language at that time. But the more work we did with young people, the more we found that when we use this kind of terminology, it just led to this immediate sense of defensiveness.”

Hill is the Creative Director of Voicebox, a charity that aims to help boys aged nine to 16 thrive against a backdrop of declining school performance, increased scrutiny of misogyny and violence against women and girls, and a broader sense that boys are being left behind. Voicebox is one of several charities that have positioned themselves in recent years as mentors for young men, in part to act as a counterbalance to “harmful ideas of masculinity”.

Out of nine charities working predominantly with children that The Independent has contacted, eight of them say that they now avoid the term. The charity sector’s reevaluation of “toxic masculinity” may be a sign that something is shifting in attitudes towards boys.

“The aim of Voicebox was to engage boys in conversations to reflect on these harmful ideas,” says Hill. “But when they heard the phrase ‘toxic masculinity’, what they heard was, “You are toxic; you are the problem.” Six years on, Voicebox has adapted its approach to “empower participants to promote and embody healthy masculinity”. “Boys are not inherently toxic, and they’re not inherently problematic,” he says. “They’re struggling, and we need to reframe the way we’re talking about them.”