A critical analysis of Game of Thrones Season 5 by showrunners David Benioff & Dan Weiss (D&D). Part 8 covers Trope#13: “Toxic Masculinity.”

To read about the ambivalent sexism framework employed, please see Part 1.



We’ve seen the way D&D’s sexist assumptions color their scripting of women in the past 7 sections. But sexism is a sword without a hilt, no safer for men to grasp. The following section explores the ways in which D&D’s sexist lens shaped how they wrote the men of GoT, and how this has negative consequences for men.

Trope #13: Toxic Masculinity (Hostile sexism; complementary & competitive gender differentiation)

“Toxic masculinity” refers to the socially constructed assumption that masculinity, viewed as the compulsory gender presentation for men, is unemotional, sexually aggressive, and violent. Men who eschew these gender norms are emasculated, and thus not “real men.” To simplify, toxic masculinity is the school of thought from which bullshit concepts like “Men Don’t Cry” are born.

Look, I’m not saying that men shouldn’t be masculine, that anything is inherently wrong with masculinity, or that there aren’t men who happen to be aggressive and stoic. What I am saying is that presenting this constructed gender expression as the only viable option for men in society has incredibly damaging consequences. For instance, in the United States, men are anywhere from three to ten times more likely to kill themselves than women, and are also far less likely to seek mental healthcare. A very large part of the reason for this is that we teach men not to express their emotions, because men are tough. Talking about feelings is “girly” and therefore discouraged.

Even worse, men who are victims of abuse are less likely to talk about/report it or seek mental healthcare for their trauma, because being a victim is shameful for men. After all, Men Act, Women Are, so any situation where a man is stripped of his agency is inherently emasculating. And if he’s a victim at the hands of a woman…it’s even worse, which is why All Abusers Are Male. This is also why younger boys who are raped by their teachers have been called “lucky” by the public. Because they can’t be victimized; after all, A Man is Not A Virgin and must always be interested in/getting enjoyment from sex with women.

The damage of this trope comes from the fact that it boxes men into the position where if they don’t “act” as heroes, then blame is placed on them in situations where they are victimized.

Martin is quite good at subverting the trope of “toxic masculinity.” For example, he goes to great lengths to show how Sam is strong in the real way, how Jaime overcomes his lack of fighting prowess through diplomacy (and in turn finds self-worth not derived from his sword), and how Jon grows into his leadership position through intelligent political machinations. D&D…do no such thing. In fact, they pointedly “correct” men who don’t meet the standard of toxic masculinity, thereby perpetuating these damaging stereotypes as well as casually chucking out a major theme of the books: finding strength outside of the context of the oppressive Westerosi patriarchy, which glorifies violence, fighting prowess, and domination.

One character with whom Martin closely explored this theme was Sam, who in the books does kill a white walker, and does have sex with Gilly, yet is unable to break out of the mindset that he is not a “real man.” In fact, he repeatedly asserts that he is “Sam the scared,” and in the instances where he “sucks it up,” he is full of self-doubt. But what’s beautiful is that Martin makes it clear just how brave Sam really is, even though he can’t see it or feel any self-worth given the fact that he was abused as a boy for lacking these traditionally masculine traits. But Sam in the show is…something else.

I guess D&D didn’t think Samwell Tarly lived up to what a man “should be” with his PTSD and continual assertions about his own weaknesses. So they corrected this by turning him into Showboating Sam, who spent all of Season 5 boasting about both his battle and sexual prowess. He’s positively proud of the fact that he killed both a white walker and a Thenn, as he’s quick to tell Gilly, and loves bro-ing out with Jon about the gentle, oath-breaking sex he had (well…he found that sex loophole, amirite? Up top!).

Fuck, he couldn’t even have PTSD associated with a maester’s chain, and instead had to be the one who proactively decided to go to the Citadel (which given the Hardhome massacre already happening and Jon bearing first-hand witness to it makes far less sense…they know they don’t have years now), because I guess Sam refusing and still being traumatized from his abuse isn’t manly enough. Men don’t have panic attacks or triggering events, right? So instead Show[boating]!Sam is doing it for love, and because he’s oh so brave and not afraid to show it.

Now that I think about it, aside from physical appearance, Sam is a stereotypical bro. D&D made sure he “manned up.”

While we’re up at The Wall, let’s discuss Jon. He, too, is totally happy to joke around about sex and ignore the vows of the Night’s Watch. Though I guess it was nice of D&D to show some restraint and have Jon reject Meli-sans-bra and her non-canoncial strip tease? Still, the main issue with Jon’s arc this season is that D&D looked at his A Dance with Dragons plotline in which Jon tries to make himself into the perfect leader by drawing on past mentors (his father, Old Bear) as he navigates a politically complex situation that he handles to the best of his ability with the guiding motivation of reducing the suffering for the most number of people (Westerosi or Wildling) while also struggling to separate his personal desires from his duties, and decided, “nah, Jon swinging a sword in a random battle is far better character development.”

And look, I know that Hardhome was really well-received and a cool-looking episode of TV. Maybe for a visual medium we do need to have the outside threat of the Others be a bit less on the periphery than Martin made them. I still strongly maintain that there was very little context established for Jon to actually be there. However, what I want to point out is that it’s incredibly telling how D&D chose to have Jon display his growing leadership by having him be the Action Hero™ in a battle, while Dany, whose ADWD arc ran in almost perfect parallel to Jon’s was mostly infantilized and turned into a damsel in distress for her development. It seems that D&D were quite keen to have Martin’s [arguably] two main protagonists fit their conception of proper gender roles. After all, men fight; they don’t talk. So of course Jon couldn’t progress in the GoT narrative any other way.

Even men who are newly “crippled” have to be perfect fighters on this show. Rather than exploring the way in which Jaime’s loss of his hand forced him to reconstruct his identity and understanding of what honor is and what it means to be a knight, D&D simply threw him into meaningless fights and had him be the victor. Oh and wasn’t it a hoot that his golden hand (something he quasi-resented in the books) was able to stop a sword?! No, D&D are not afraid to casually dismiss both mental and physical differences so that their men can live up to the toxic masculine ideal.

In the case of Jaime, there was also the fact that Cersei didn’t reject him in any way. Jaime volunteered to go to Dorne and “not ask” Doran for Myrcella back, because, well, Men Act. And it all had to be on his terms and without being spurned by Cersei, else it would have been emasculating. So instead of a Jaime at the closest to rock-bottom he’s ever been, ordered away from King’s Landing and struggling to overcome his new difference in a war-torn countryside as he figures out his identity, we got an ableist revision where he’s sent on a random bro-trip for yucks.

In fact “an ableist revision” might be a very good way to look at D&D’s scripting of many characters for whom Martin goes to great lengths to show their full struggle with both physical and mental differences. Tyrion in ADWD has hit rock bottom and is dealing with major PTSD, in addition to the usual barriers he faces as a dwarf in the world of Westeros. However, D&D chose not to show this, instead opting to have Tyrion be vaguely bummed out and buzzed for a couple of episodes before perking right back up and making dick jokes. Maybe we were supposed to think that spotting Drogon gave him a newfound lease on life. But if that’s the case it’s a rather hilariously superficial “healing arc” (if you can even call it that), and one that in my opinion, is an awfully generous interpretation. What does seem to be clear is that D&D have a pattern of avoiding showing men as “weak” or suffering in plotlines in a way that require intimate exploration. Tyrion’s lack of PTSD is just one case of this.

There’s also the fact that D&D had Tyrion save Missandei in the pits by killing a Harpy. And yeah, Tyrion has killed when he’s needed to in Martin’s world. But the fact is, of the “good guys” in the pit, the only people who killed harpies were the men (specifically all of them), and the only people who didn’t were Missandei and Dany. Because of course Tyrion has to slay in case anyone thinks that he isn’t enough of a man. Though don’t worry–D&D also made sure to remind us what a big penis he has this season, following in the footsteps of how they scripted Tyrion’s very first scene. It’s just so, so thinly veiled.

Now, Theon is an interesting case, because he is one of the very few men on this show that D&D have allowed to be stripped of their agency and dignity in past seasons. We’ve seen Theon at not only his personal lowest, but arguably the lowest of anybody in this series. And though I’ve found the scripting of his mental state to be slightly erratic, for the most part D&D have tried to show us the full extent of this trauma…even prioritizing his “recovery arc” (or “redemption,” as Mr. Benioff said) over Sansa’s very active and ongoing trauma: a notable choice.

Up until this season, I would have assumed Theon was a great counterexample to the toxic masculinity presented on this show. FFS, they had him castrated on-screen, the ultimate symbol of “unmanliness” (toxic masculinity is disgustingly just as cissexist as it is sexist). Yet this year, D&D seemed to throw out the playbook with Theon’s arc. He was undoubtedly a broken man at the hands of Ramsay, but his about-face after Sansa yelled at him a bit felt completely random, casually blowing up the rather sensitive scripting of Theon’s mental state that we saw in the past seasons. Additionally, they made the very notable change to have Theon be the sole, independent actor in “saving” the wife of Ramsay.

In the books, Theon is heavily strong-armed by six spearwives into rescuing Jeyne. And yes, he goes along with them at great risk to his own person, but it is the women, not Theon who devise the rescue strategy. And when Theon jumps out the window with Jeyne, it’s not some big heroic rescue and finding the strength to “keep on keepin’ on” (the words of Mr. Weiss from the video linked below), but rather the realization that a quick death would be more merciful than being caught by Ramsay. And of course, in the books, Theon is not given a Stark to rescue…a “proper” prize. He is not given a chance at “redemption” for betraying Robb. He helps Jeyne Poole. And he wants to help Jeyne because he realizes it is the right thing to do and he wants to be a better man than he was prior to his capture, even if Jeyne is just a “steward’s whelp.” That matters.

Yet in the show, it was just Theon who chose to save Sansa Stark, and he did not need to be threatened at knife point to do so. Because Men Act. According to D&D, the fact that he saved a Stark was an incredibly important part of his arc:

“I think the great original sin in Theon’s life was turning on the Starks and betraying them and he has regretted it ever since. And now finally, after all this time comes a little bit of a chance for redemption.” (x)

Because men need to be heroes. And save the proper damsels in distress…the ones worthy of saving. Because in a world where toxic masculinity is compulsory, there’s no room for women like Jeyne to get rescued, when women like Sansa can offer more for the man’s image.

You know what else there’s no room for men to do? Cry. Show their emotions. That girly shit. I mean who cares that Stannis was painted as caring so much for his daughter that he didn’t send her to an incredibly inconvenient (and illogical) leper colony? He did not even shed Man Tears at Shireen going up in flames, while his wife (who “finally became a mother again” in that moment) crumpled to the ground in despair, and ultimately took her own life. And then Stannis didn’t show any emotion at that either. What a Tough Guy™. I guess it could be argued that Stannis in general is just a rather stoic individual, so perhaps this is in keeping with his character. Not to mention this was hardly painted as a positive reaction (or course of action) by the narrative. But given the overarching pattern of the season, especially given the way that Stannis’s reaction was quite clearly juxtaposed to a woman’s, makes ignoring the gendered implications almost irresponsible on our parts.

I should probably also point out the other father that they didn’t allow to shed tears: Tormund. I know this seems like an odd point, because as far as I know Show!Tormund doesn’t even have kids. Show!Tormund doesn’t even seem to bear passing resemblance to Book!Tormund, unless you count “they both have beards.” However, the reason I mention it is because the newly introduced (and then quickly offed) character Karsi is the Wildling D&D chose to have face children wights. And she got weepy and then didn’t bother to defend herself. In the books, Tormund certainly didn’t meet a similar fate, but he tells a story to Jon of his own son becoming a wight and how he had to kill the boy himself, and he tells it with tears in his eyes. I’m not saying I wanted Show!Tormund to get killed like Karsi did. But I do think it’s worth noting that Karsi, who was changed from a man to a woman specifically because of the manner of her death, was the only character allowed to interact with and be affected by zombie children. Can you imagine a man in D&D’s world having such weakness?

In fact, D&D are rather keen to script men without any weaknesses. This year, Ramsay Bolton was in many ways foregrounded to be the undeniable “bad guy” of the season, a role arguably filled by Joffrey before. Perhaps to make him more intimidating, D&D bestowed him with some magical plot armor (though notably lacking in real armor), superior intellect, and incredible fighting prowess. He was able to out-think Sansa at every turn, putting her back in her place each time she somewhat tried to assert herself. He took down an entire army’s supplies, siege weapons, and set free their horses with twenty Good Men. In the season finale, we see Ramsay wearing no armor, surrounded by corpses. Because in a world where women are Damned by Comparison, only Real Men can be suitable foes.

So D&D wrote the “perfect” Villain Sue in Ramsay, gave him a woman who was earnestly fighting for his affections despite the fact that he’s clearly abusive and sadistic, and had him easily win all his battles with his overpowered fighting skills. In fact, he bears such little resemblance to Book!Ramsay, that he’s pretty much an original character. So…is this what D&D think men should be like? Just like their scripting of Talisa appeared to be wish-fulfillment for a Strong Woman™?

So much toxic masculinity up north! Let’s move down south to Dorne, the land where patriarchal norms are bucked in the books. How did the show fare? Well, the main character, whose entire plotline revolves around her refusal to be set aside and infantilized was completely cut, and instead her NEVER “SEEN” ON-PAGE brother was aged up, given chest hair and a cutlass, and foregrounded as Doran’s heir.

That’s right, Trystane Nymeros Martell not only supplanted Arianne, but represented just about every single toxic gender norm that her character actively pushes against (and frankly, his too). Trys let us know he was a Real Man. Given his coy smile when that petty and jealous Myrcella asked about past girlfriends, he is most definitely not a virgin. But don’t worry, his entire characterization isn’t just him snogging Myrcella; he also is quick to draw his sword that he randomly has strapped on rather than like…get his father’s guards or something. Because men are of action, not of words!

^Keep your hand on that sword, Trys. Why not.

Like. There’s just nothing to Trys. He was a walking, talking ball of tropes that all served to remind us of his manliness. And perhaps some of this could have been mitigated by Doran’s presence, who was hardly presented as the picture of masculinity, and he was very much shown to be the voice of reason (though as I explained in my section on “infantilization,” “men are the reasonable ones” is a sexist trope as well, and plays into the toxic masculinity stereotype that “men are logical and not driven by emotions”). But even there it’s worth pointing out that Book!Doran is so enfeebled by gout that he’s his barely able to cough without grimacing in pain. Show!Doran was not shown to be physically weak in any way. I guess we can assume he’s in a wheelchair because of a debilitating condition, but this was literally not shown at all this year. The very astute watchers will remember Oberyn mentioning last season how Doran has gout. Yet given how D&D felt they needed to remind us of greyscale every. single. episode. leading up to Jorah contracting it, the complete omission of Doran’s disease this year is notable.

Perhaps most telling of all though, was that Show!Doran’s culminating moment of this season was certainly not a conversation where he ended up humbled by a woman (in the books, his daughter) and begging forgiveness. In fact, I don’t have a dusty fuck’s idea of what Show!Doran’s culminating moment was. Schooling Ellaria Sand because “father knows best”? Charming. Because why even create a space where men can learn something from women when you can instead perpetuate toxic masculinity that actively discourages men to reach out and ask for help, lest they appear emasculated. Much better for society.

What kills me is that I believe D&D actually think they’re writing a progressive narrative. I mean this was a season that was clearly anti-religious extremism/homophobia, right?! I’ve given my thoughts before on the cartoonish adaptation of the Faith Militant. But amping up the violence of this movement actually came at a great cost to the character of Lancel, who in the books was a man that was weakened and changed from the injuries he sustained during the Battle of the Blackwater. Where he may have been slightly prideful in the earlier books, by AFFC, Lancel is has turned towards the Faith for comfort, and as a result emphasizes the power of forgiveness and a tendency towards peaceful actions. Jaime even thinks to himself of his cousin, “he has milk in his veins.”

But…I guess peaceful, forgiving Lancel wasn’t manly enough. Season 5 gave us buff!Lancel who fucking carved the seven-pointed star into his forehead and takes pleasure talking about sending the “godless on the run.” And I mean, this is a completely minor character.

I suppose this is the logical result of creating a more militant Sparrow movement and wanting to give us a character that could provide “buy-in” as well as an easy way to convict Cersei. However, it should also be noted that there were absolutely no women shown as being involved in this populist movement (other than the three septas, who from what I can tell were likely already associated with the Sept prior to the Sparrow Revolution), unlike in the books where there are women who actively speak for the movement to Jaime, to Brienne in her travels, and even to Cersei in King’s Landing. But how can that be? Women aren’t the violent actors.

Now, the primary victim of this plotline, Loras, in many ways bucks the toxic masculinity trend in D&D’s scripting. However, it’s hardly for any praise-worthy reasons. Being gay, Loras is inherently subversive to the trope, because it places his desires (and sexual activity) outside of context of the gender dichotomy on which toxic masculinity hinges (being the realization of both complementary and competitive gender differentiation). Therefore, Loras can’t be a “man,” and in fact, D&D scripted him in such a way that he is entirely reduced to his sexuality. In Season 5, all he did was have sex with Olyvar and whine a lot, before getting taken away without so much as a fight (it’s not like this is one of Westeros’s finest knights, right?). Men Act, but men who inherently buck gender trends in a way that D&D can’t ignore must be stripped of any traits reserved for Real Men.

And that’s how insidious toxic masculinity can be. D&D’s outright offensive scripting of Loras is because they can’t even conceive of a world in which a man in possession of masculine-coded traits (such as being an amazing fighter, being reckless, so on) wouldn’t be sexually interested in women. Which is why Loras, therefore, can’t be the type of guy who volunteers to lift the siege at Dragonstone and rushes in head first. But D&D simply ignore these unfortunate homophobic implicates that come along with their scripting of Loras.

In fact, their total acceptance of toxic masculinity as both the norm and the ideal allows them to ignore many implications. For instance, this season there were three men (well, two men, one boy) who abused/coerced by women. But D&D ignored this very fact because in their world, it’s impossible for men to not be in a position of power.

In the case of Tommen, D&D aged his character up simply so that he could have sex with Margaery Tyrell. And we know this, because in every other respect, Tommen acted like an 8-year-old with no political power. I don’t want to get into specifics about guessing character ages. I think it’s fair to ballpark Tommen around thirteen and Marg in her mid-twenties. But that’s not really what matters. What’s important is that we were shown Marg, an adult, having sex as a means to coerce and manipulate Tommen, a child.

To quote theculturalvacuum, “this is abusive.” Yet that’s not how it was scripted. Tommen/Marg was Played For Laughs, as if there was nothing wrong that we were witnessing. It was supposed to be funny that Tommen thought having sex with Marg was so great that he wanted to do it all day, every day. As if he was lucky to be in the exploitative situation he was in. Which, by the way, is not an uncommon reaction for victims of this type of dynamic. But the real harm is that the show’s narrative never actually did anything with these implications. Marg and Tommen’s physical relationship served as a sexy backdrop for her manipulation of him, and then was later used by Marg to stick it to Cersei. After that…it was just kind of dropped. Tommen seemed desperate to keep Margaery happy, and given the sheer idiocy/straw-manned homophobia that caused Marg’s arrest (a perjury trap? Really?), I think we were supposed to be rooting for her in a way.

It’s hard to tell what was intended because of D&D’s confusing scripting of Cersei, but what is clear is that they gave the relationship between Tommen and Margaery as little thought as possible. And given our society’s predisposition not to take abuse charges seriously when the perpetrator is a woman, particularly in the case of boys and younger, attractive women, the fact that they would handle this subject matter in such a blasé fashion is outright disturbing. Especially given the fact that they knew this plotline was problematic since Season 4, as actor Natalie Dormer revealed:

“That [S4] scene [with Marg and Tommen] was altered because I phoned Dan [Weiss] and David [Benioff] and said, ‘I’m not comfortable doing this.’ It’s the nature of the beast that I’m four years into playing Margaery Tyrell and the big plot points of the book are in stone.”

…

“George R.R. Martin wrote a particular plot line, so on the specifics of Margaery and Tommen getting married, there’s nothing I can do. On the show, we had to find a way to navigate that in a sensitive way. There’s more of it next season too, and we’re trying to handle it with intelligence, and integrity.” (x)

Did they navigate it in a sensitive way? Well, D&D wrote the statutory rape of a young boy and thought it was funny. Because to them, even as a child, Tommen had more power than Margaery, being just a woman. Their women can’t be rapists–the power is in the hands of men, meaning a boy must want this kind of sexual relationship, or else this world-view falls apart.

And we can see how this lens led to the downplaying the abuse men suffered at the hands of women throughout the season. How could women be abusers when they are so Damned by Comparison?

Take Dorne. Tyene outright tortured Bronn. There is no other way to look at what transpired. I mean, yes, it was nonsense for sexposition, but the fact is, she poisoned the man, flashed him to supposedly “activate” it, and then withheld the antidote until Bronn paid her a compliment. And it was just simply never addressed. I understand that depiction isn’t endorsement, but D&D wrote Tyene as almost desperately smitten with Bronn for the rest of their interactions, painting the entire arc as…flirtation? Bronn was clearly not receptive of this, but he also wasn’t freaked out or angry or anything. Just vaguely confused and a little turned off.

Once again, the entire thing was supposed to get laughs. Because when women threaten men with death, it’s funny. If it was serious, that would be emasculating.



Yet the reality is that men who are in abusive situations need to be taken seriously. The assumption that men are always in a position of power is particularly troubling, because then when men are victims at the hands of women, it creates this narrative that blames them for their own victimization. That they should be in control and a Real Man wouldn’t get hurt or taken advantage of by a woman.

Hizdahr is the final example of this. Dany’s marriage proposal to him was clearly coerced. She had threatened him with death earlier, and her line to him when she suggested the betrothal was literally, “thankfully a suitor is already on his knees.” Do you know why he was on his knees? Because he had been begging for his life. Yet we were supposed to think of this in a positive light, evidenced by the Missandei/Dany conversation that preceded it. And then…that was that! I mean, it was clear that Hizdahr was playing second fiddle to Dany, but the fact that he had absolutely no choice in the matter was never even alluded to. I suppose there’s the argument that “he got something out of this too,” but let’s flip the genders (or compare it to say, Joffrey/Sansa) and see how much water that holds.

Myranda is almost, almost a counterpoint to D&D’s underplaying of abusive women, as she was very clearly an abuser acting of her own volition (because the implications of her own abuse were never even considered). Also, in S3 we saw her participating in Theon’s torture, though it was apparent that it was at Ramsay’s behest. This season, however, the only person we saw Myranda attempt to hurt was Sansa, another woman. Even in the case of D&D’s “sexy psycho side-kick,” they couldn’t bring the narrative to show her having power over a man. And the other situations that clearly depicted such dynamics were played off as jokes.

But there are times that D&D can’t ignore the implications of women having power over men in Martin’s story. And when this happens, they opt to simply cut the plotlines and not adapt them at all. Take Arianne and Arys Oakheart. In the books, Arianne is in a consensual, sexual relationship with Arys, a knight of the kingsguard, though one that is also problematic and manipulative. Arianne is able to persuade Arys to help her commit light treason by appealing to his sense of honor and somewhat ironically, protective paternalism. Though she doesn’t outright twist his arm, the chapter “The Soiled Knight” makes it abundantly clear that Arys wants out of this relationship, and she uses every single tactic imaginable to talk him out of it. It’s also quite clear that Arianne holds all the power, not just because of her rank, but also her stronger personality and, well, intellect. In the end, her plan blows up. Arys can’t bear facing his dishonor, and opts to kill himself (a suicide charge into battle).

I’ve spent a gross amount of time explaining Arianne’s actions and overall arc (though not excusing her for anything), so feel free to read the linked. But there is simply no way to spin the fact that she was in an undeniable position of power and successfully manipulated a gallant knight into doing her bidding, ultimately to his doom. Arys Oakheart does not appear on our screens. Neither does Arianne Martell, Doran’s heir. In D&D’s world, there is no room for these two, or for this dynamic. Men hold the power, except when it can be made into a joke or glossed over.

by Sacha Angel Diener. © Fantasy Flight Games.

Perhaps a clearer example is the Blue Bard, a singer who Book!Margaery is rather fond of. For this reason, Cersei has him taken to Qyburn, where she has him tortured all night to force a [false] confession out of him about sleeping with Marg. His boots are filled with blood by the time she and Qyburn are finished with him. He’s driven half-mad from the ordeal. And…that’s it. There’s no way to spin it. The singer was a complete victim, at the mercy of The Queen. And he was excluded.

Theon is the notable, notable exception to this rule (though I’ve touched on the way D&D altered his plotline this year to make him into more of a Real Man). However, once again, it’s the pattern. Men tend to only be shown in situations where they have total agency, whereas women are degraded and brutalized as background flavor (Craster’s rape shack and Selyse’s suicide, the most notable examples).

And though this Men Act, Women Are bullshit that stems from toxic masculinity might seem like it is a positive for men (because it’s clearly a negative for women), the reality of the situation is that it creates this false concept of how a man “should be,” and does so in a way where men who fail to have agency in a situation are viewed as “lesser” or at fault. They get blamed for their own victimization, and that’s something we need to take seriously. No one benefits from sexism.

Next Section (final trope & conclusion)

Previous Sections:

Also related: