Influencers such as Andrew Tate have become bylines for “toxic masculinity”, attracting huge audiences of young men and boys with a mixture of quasi-motivational pep talks, fast cars and demonstrations of sexual prowess.
But what about the other side of the coin? Are there any people making content for the same audience with healthier messages – or do men and boys just not want to hear it?
Jago Sherman, the head of strategy at Goat Agency, the influencer subsidiary of marketing titan WPP, says: “There are plenty of male influencers and creators advocating for and creating content around topics as varied as mental health, fitness and wellness, parenting, self-love, self-expression, anti-knife crime, education, but they don’t necessarily make the headlines.
“The likes of Andrew Tate are able to use social media to make broad, sweeping and unsubstantiated claims that appear to offer ‘quick-fix’ answers to very complex issues. The issue, of course, is that these statements are almost always untrue, or an opinion dressed up as fact.
“In a social landscape where creators battle for attention, sometimes this ‘shock factor’ content, which can be consumed and understood very quickly, can outperform lengthier, thought-provoking, neutral content.”
Against that background, last week Labour announced a plan to help boost the more positive visions of what masculinity could be. Under the proposals, schools would be helped to develop mentors from their own students to help counter the misogynist vision promoted by Tate and his ilk, as well as explain in class the skills to more critically analyse what they are seeing on screen.
Some men giving more positive visions of masculinity have already broken through, even becoming household names in their own right. Fitness influencers such as Joe Wicks, whose career was kickstarted by his Instagram posts as The Body Coach, may not enthral teen boys with salacious content, but simple advice delivered with a friendly – almost relentlessly cheerful – demeanour can still garner millions of followers.
Perhaps the biggest signifier of a more positive approach to masculinity is the charity stunt, exemplified by Russ Cook, known to many as Instagram’s hardest geezer, whose year-long attempt to run the length of Africa toe to tip should, if everything goes to plan, finish in April. Cook has raised almost £200,000 for the Running Charity and Sandblast, and almost a million followers across his various social platforms, with the stunt and definitively demonstrated the aptness of his username in the process.
But there is an asymmetry in some discussion around toxic influencers, notes Saul Parker, the founder of The Good Side, which works with charities and brands to help them achieve positive goals. Where young women are encouraged to seek out positive role models for their own good, young men are frequently encouraged to seek out positive role models so that they treat women better. That risks ignoring the harms that toxic influencers can inflict on boys and young men themselves, and stymies efforts to encourage them to find better people to learn from.
“You’ve got a generation of guys who have been born into quite a difficult conversation about patriarchy and its impact on women’s lives,” Parker says. “And as a result, they see themselves in a place where they feel like they are third-class citizens. And it’s very hard, especially on the left, to accept that young men are struggling a bit and need help.”
That is important, because focusing on the misogyny, rather than the broader messages of traditional masculine norms that the “manosphere” thrives on, risks letting a second generation of post-Tate toxic influencers slink by under the radar. Boys have learned through repetition that the casual misogyny of the likes of Tate is not cool to repeat in public, and when asked will often insist that they do not like the way he talks about women, but just listen to him for the “other stuff”.
Parker says: “David Goggins is the kind of guy we’re facing right now: he’s an ex-Navy Seal, massive on all the social platforms, but he and all his content are about ‘self-discipline’, ‘self-motivation’, ‘get up in the morning’, ‘get to the gym’, ‘have a cold shower’, like, you know, ‘be a man’, but he doesn’t talk about women at all, or sex at all.
“Taking women out of the equation doesn’t make it any less problematic, it just means that it’s hard to find a sharp point, because he doesn’t say anything hateful.”
Winning boys over to a more positive vision of masculinity will not happen by default, in other words. But neither should hope be lost. There is nothing innate in the experience of boyhood that means that toxic messages are the only ones that will gel, and with a little nudge, a better role model could thrive.
