Lately, there has been a lot of discussion about masculinity, its characteristics, and its harmful effects on a man and the people around him. This discussion, though, is almost entirely limited to White masculinity or ‘traditional’ masculinity. Black masculinity is therefore lumped together with White masculinity despite them being majorly different. Black masculinity's main aspects are family and community, external and internal vulnerability, and image and presentation. Black masculinity’s core is family which shapes who Black men will grow up to be and how they will be able to deal with the vulnerabilities that are commonplace in Black lives. Black masculinity is tied to vulnerability and struggle and to remedy this Black men focus on their image and presentation so they can appear strong despite it all. Black masculinity’s core teaching is that despite everything that is thrown at them, Black men have to bypass all obstacles and stay strong. Black masculinity is not widely recognized, though, so it is grouped together with traditional masculinity. Black masculinity can not be equivalent to White masculinity because they do not share many of the same values and shared ideas are not expressed similarly. Also, by not distinguishing between both masculinities, it disregards the problems Black men face and could lead to the continuation of these problems. By discerning between Black and White masculinity, that not only acknowledges that generalizations of masculinity do not fit Black men, but also that Black men are not comparable to White men. With more attention on Black masculinity its problems, such as antihomosexuality, can be solved, and positives, like emphasis on love and community, can be highlighted.

The fundamentals of traditional masculinity are usually strength, status, domination, and control to name a few. While there are some aspects of Black masculinity where these ideas are practiced, its principles are defined differently. Mincey et al. says, “. . . Black men defined manhood through self, family, human community, and spirituality and humanism” (168). In Black masculinity there is more emphasis placed on family, community, and brotherhood. Black masculinity is more about selflessness and providing for others than selfishness. Black manhood is defined by the people and ideas Black men come into contact with. Black men absorb lessons taught by family and friends and they take these ideas and carry them to the next generation. So, the people in a Black man's life are crucial to his development and his relationship with masculinity. Mincey et al. describes three distinct groups of people that shape the mold of Black masculinity. The first group, the primary group, is related to a Black man’s family and the Black values they teach him. The second group, the peer group, helps Black men develop Black masculine traits, and the third group, the mainstream societal group, sends messages to Black men through media about White masculine traits that are different from what the primary and peer groups teach (Mincey et al. 169). The people who directly impact Black masculinity the most are parents who teach and guide a Black boy into becoming a Black man. The Black mother protects her Black son from any harm that could come to him and tries to teach him the lessons of Black life. The father teaches his Black son how to be a Black man and will pass the role of provider to him one day. Black masculinity’s greatest lessons come from the Black maternal, though. As Abdur-Rahman expresses, “For at the heart of the Black masculine is the Black maternal from which it comes, or came” (40). Black mens’ relationship with their parents is usually represented as a protective bond with the mother and a distant relationship with the father. If a Black man’s father has a limited presence the mother will have to take on the role of mother and father and teach their sons everything he needs to know. But Black mothers still have a tough time playing both parental roles and they struggle more with no help. No aid in parental duties can lead to the mothers parental stress which can cause a domino effect on her parenting quality and her sons’ behavioral development. Jackson et al. states, “. . . the availability of social and instrumental support from nonresident fathers serves a protective function with respect to single mothers’ psychological well-being, the quality of their parenting in the home environment, and the influences of these, in turn, on their preschoolers’ development” (246). Although Black men learn the ideas of masculinity from their mothers, it is their fathers that help them with Black masculine gender performance. For example, a mother could teach her son that his worsening behavior is a problem, but it is the role of the father to teach him how he can act better as a Black man. A mother can only do so much when teaching her son about the vulnerabilities. It is up to the father to show the son how Black men deal with these vulnerabilities.

A persistent issue in Black masculinity is the constant vulnerability that Black men have to live with. Black men are constantly vulnerable to harm, death, and substance use for example. Vulnerability is common in all Black lives, and Black men are told they have to accept and strive to overcome these problems from a young age. Vulnerability is such an integral part of Black masculinity because it is integral in all Black lives. Vulnerability and how Black men are expected to deal with it is one of the first lessons a Black boy will learn in his journey to become a man. External vulnerabilities are at the forefront of Black mens’ problems, and are emphasized more than internal vulnerabilities. Disadvantages such as familial responsibilities, financial instability, health problems, discrimination, and lack of mental health help are all vulnerabilities that lead to negative mental health for Black men. These vulnerabilities leave Black men in a constant state of worry and vigilance and are common struggles they are taught to live with. External forces are constantly working against Black men, and are persistently putting them in worse situations. This leads to worsening behavior, mental health issues, and more stress piled onto the already existing stress Black men are accommodated to. But they are not equipped to live with them because of their maladaptive coping practices. Despite struggles being common, and Black men being told to prepare for them from a young age, they still cause the largest amount of stress and strain and their response to these struggles and stress only adds onto this. For example, Elizabeth Johnson et al. states, “Previous research has indicated that risk for adolescent substance use varies by household composition, such that youth raised in households where neither parent was present are at greatest risk of developing a substance abuse problem, followed by their peers in step-parent and single parent families . . .” (2105). Black mens’ life circumstances breed long-term issues and terrible coping habits to deal with them. Black men are taught self-reliance and are expected to toughen up and deal with anything that is thrown at them. But what gets ignored in these teachings is that self-reliance only causes more problems and does not benefit mental health. Black men are encouraged from a young age to overcome their vulnerabilities no matter how hard they are to deal with, but what they do not understand is that their actions allow their internal vulnerabilities to grow.

Not only are external vulnerabilities risk factors for stress and deteriorating mental health for Black men, but internal vulnerabilities are too. A common practice in Black masculinity is emotion masking where Black men do not show intense emotions unless the moment is poignant or joyous. They hide their true emotions so as not to show vulnerability and to constantly appear strong. This emotion masking can be detrimental to Black mens’ mental health, though. Mark Anthony Neal is quoted in “Reflections: On Black Masculinity and Bereavement” as saying, “. . . ‘we do incredible damage to ourselves and to those around us by submitting to an idea that there is some little box that all Black men must fit into’” (qtd in J. Johnson 45). Black masculinity is stuck in the idea that restricting emotions heightens the appearance of strength. Black men feel they must perform this strong role because the world will beat them down, yet this role beats them down internally. Black men use image to hide internal vulnerabilities, like low self-confidence, and external vulnerabilities, such as financial problems, but this could lead to more external vulnerabilities, like struggling to pay bills because they spent exorbitant amounts of money to not appear poor. Black mens’ status as men is threatened because of their limited role in the economy which makes them unable to assume the provider role. Black masculinity places importance on how much Black men give back to their community, so not being able to provide is seen as unmasculine. Black men place emphasis on what Jordanna Matlon calls consumer-based identities because of their inability to provide. Matlon comments, “While his minimum wage earnings and unsteady job record frequently do not meet the requirements for, say, sustained child support, they can afford sporadic spending on something that both his peers and constant advertising promises to make him more of a man” (40). The consumer-based identity that Black men follow is an image-based identity that places value in possessions someone owns. Black men sink their money into an image to portray themselves as more masculine because of their apparent wealth. But this investment in image could lead to spending habits that could plunge them into debt and stress. Vulnerability will never not be a part of Black mens’ lives, and it is guaranteed to affect all Black mens’ lives. The constant vulnerability is a cause for concern for all Black men, so they develop strategies to deal with this. But, these strategies are ineffective and create more problems rather than solving them. This constant vulnerability is not discussed widely, as is Black masculinity, which allows it to persist and be passed onto future generations. Black men will never learn how destructive their coping strategies are if it is never talked about. These self-destructive practices can only be stopped if there was more conversation about Black masculinity and its many attributes.

As stated before, image is important in Black masculinity and the appearance of strength is upheld, but masculine gender performance is difficult for homosexual Black men. For Black men, showing any hint of weakness or femininity is unacceptable and must be corrected. This anti-femininity is grouped together with antihomosexuality which causes homosexuality to be frowned upon in Black masculininity. Fields et al. describes, “Participants described a specific disdain for homosexuality among Blacks arising from perceptions that homosexuality conflicted with Black cultural expectations of masculinity . . .” (124). Black homosexual men feel pressures to abide by Black masculine standards. They are expected to not be homosexual and feminine so the appearance of strength is not lost. Showing signs of homosexuality is equivalent to showing signs of femininity for Black masculinity, so for Black men being masculine means being antifeminine and antihomosexual. Black homosexual men face the possibility of losing their close personal relationships and social standing because of their sexuality. They experience psychological distress over gender performance, known as gender role strain (GRS), and must choose whether to abide by masculine expectations or not. Fields et al. describes gender role strain and its substrains as, “GRS encompasses psychological distress associated with failing to meet masculine ideals (discrepancy strain), difficulty enacting and maintaining normative masculine expression (dysfunction strain), and negative experience with the masculine socialization process (trauma strain . . .” (122). Black homosexual men have two choices when it comes to dealing with their gender role strain. They could either not camouflage their sexuality and possibly lose important relationships, or they could camouflage it and maintain these relationships at the cost of their mental health. Black homosexual men who camouflage would feel constantly pressured to keep up appearances and would be stressing over their gender performance. They would constantly feel fear of losing relationships and they would feel conflicted over their sexuality. Black men would have no support in dealing with their sexuality because of the pressures to hide it. Like in many other aspects of Black mens’ lives, vulnerabilities lead to more stress and risk. In fact, vulnerability is the only aspect that distinguishes Black masculinity’s attitude towards antihomosexuality from White masculinity’s attitude. Black masculinity is antihomosexual because of the idea that it is unmasculine and weak for Black homosexual men to expose their vulnerabiliy by being ‘femine’. White masculinity is antihomosexual because homosexuality is unmasculine and men being unmanly is wrong. Though Black and White masculinity do share ideals of antihomosexuality, there are many differences in their ideals and expressions of those ideals.

Some may argue that separating Black and White masculinity is unnecessary. Most research, such as Hoffman et al. and Wong et al., conducted about masculinity does not consider how race impacts relationships with masculinity. Subjects in this research are mostly White with the rest being a mix of races. Sometimes there is effort put forth to distinguish between what different races value in masculinity, but not much is said besides how one race answered differently than another. Instead of considering that race and culture can impact views of masculinity, researchers take ideas of masculinity from men of many different races and group them together to characterize masculinity. Since there is no effort to differentiate between racialized masculinity and traditional masculinity they are often looked at as the same entity. Traditional masculine values are defined as such, “Among men, the categories most frequently identified were forceful/assertive (35.0%) and biological sex (31.3%). These were followed by societal standards (22.5%) [what mainstream society expects of men] and expressive/relational (13.8%)” (Hoffman et al. 71). Out of all these values only expressive/relational is a value in both Black and White masculinity. But, this is only one definition of masculinity, and many essays differ on definitions and values of masculinity. Another definition of masculinity is, “. . . five ISME dimensions comprised at least 5 percent of participant responses. In order of frequency, these dimensions were: (a) Family, 11.7 percent, (b) Responsibility, 11.1 percent (c) Physical Body, 9.4 percent, (d) Emotional Toughness, 9.1 percent, and (e) Work 5.4 percent” (Wong et al. 241). Here we find more similarities between the two masculinities as they both share values of family, responsibility, and emotional toughness. Out of the nine gender definitions, White and Black masculinity shared four values. But just because they share a couple of values does not mean that they are the same.

Though Black and White masculinity share some of the same values, that does not mean they are expressed similarly. Expressive/relational for White masculinity could mean how many colleagues a man has and the status of those colleagues, but for a Black man, this could mean how many people he knows in the neighborhood and how much he can help out in the community. For White masculinity, the most important family members are the wife and children, but for Black masculinity the parents are of utmost importance. Responsibility for White men could be being responsible for themselves, but for Black men it could be being responsible for others. Lastly, emotional toughness for White men could mean not showing emotion because that is unbecoming of a man, but for Black men they have to hide their emotions because they do not want to be more vulnerable. Only in emotional toughness are White and Black masculinity comparable. It is an ever present value in both, and is seen as masculine in both masculinities. The only difference with Black masculinity’s use is that emotional toughness is used to overcome vulnerability. Despite their shared use of emotional toughness, though, the many differences in shared values listed above further proves that White and Black masculinity are not comparable.

There are other lesser aspects of Black and White masculinity that are shared, but they are also expressed differently between the two masculinities. Another shared aspect of both masculinties is antihomosexual beliefs. For White masculinity, homophobia is used to insult the masculinity of someone and to just be homophobic. This is also true for Black masculinity, but homophobia is also used to discourage men from acting ‘feminine’ so that they will not appear vulnerable. But though both masculinities share a disdain for homosexuality, Black and White mens’ expression of gender is markedly dissimilar from each other. Though both masculinities focus on performing the masculine gender role, Black men do not exhibit hypermasculinity but instead display androgyny or agender gender performance. Buckley expresses, “Similar percentages of Black male adolescents were classified as androgynous (31%; high masculinity and high femininity) and undifferentiated (32%; low masculinity and low femininity) . . .” (e315). Black men are not predisposed to using hypermasculinity, but it is used as a defense mechanism in response to subordination. Black men are more adept towards androgyny or agenderness because they perform many different gender roles depending on the situation. Gender for Black men is fluid and gendered actions that are seen as traditionally feminine, like cooking and cleaning, are seen as masculine in Black masculinity. Black men value mothers and female family members, and even though Black men are adverse to other Black men appearing feminine, Black masculinity is more feminine than traditional masculinity. Comparatively, White masculinity is focused only on masculine actions so there is no blending with femininity. A trait such as being caring is seen as feminine in White masculinity, but in Black masculinity it is masculine. Therefore, Black mens’ concept of manhood is more feminine than White mens’ because Black men embrace traditionally feminine concepts more than White men.

Not only do the similarities show the stark contrast between White and Black masculinity, but so do the many differences. Firstly, the origins of the two masculinities are dissimilar. White masculinity is based on societal expectations of men and male ideologies, while Black masculinity is based on environment and social surroundings. For White men, image is status-based, but for Black men, image is used to hide vulnerabilities. White men view work as a competition and strive to reach the top, but Black men struggle to find and keep a job. For White men, employment is about how much one achieves, but for Black men being employed means one can provide for their family. An aspect that is hugely present in White masculinity but is barely mentioned in Black masculinity is violence. Black men are regularly portrayed as violent in mainstream (White) media, but rarely is this attribute ever taught or endorsed in Black masculinity. White masculinity, though, has built a culture of violence around it. This is seen in adolescents use of sexual harassment for the sake of masculine beliefs. Rizzo et al. states, “Boys’ violence toward other teens accounts for a disproportionate amount of the [sexual harrassment] among adolescences . . . these acts of [sexual harrassment] are frequently linked to unhealthy beliefs about gender and masculinity . . .” (825). Ideologies of dominance, control, violence, and apathy allow for White men to feel justified in their use of violence and the perpetuation of this culture of violence. White masculinity’s skewed view of violence promotes actions such as sexual harrassment. In contrast, Black masculinity promotes ideas of love and compassion and does not teach Black men to be violent. But violence is so often linked to White masculinity through its culture of violence. The disparity between values of Black and White masculinity show that they are not comparable and that they need to be separated. Two widely different ideas should not be grouped together if they do not reflect the same ideals. Black and White masculinity do not share much in common and trying to fit them in the same box is not only foolish, but also can be harmful. 

 The research that is conducted about masculinity strives to find a universal definition of masculinity when that is simply impossible. Life is not a universal experience, so trying to put all men into the same box is ridiculous. Black masculinity is not equivalent to White masculinity, and the sooner this is realized the sooner Black men’s positives and problems can get highlighted. Putting Black masculinity in the same box as White masculinity not only generalizes Black mens’ experiences, but also casts a shadow on their issues. As recounted above, a large part of being a Black man is stressful. To group White and Black masculinity together is to hide the many struggles Black men live with because it does not fit the universal male experience. Not highlighting issues such as Black mens’ lifelong vulnerability, their maladaptive coping strategies, and the antihomosexuality allows these problems to persist and for Black masculinity to continue to have a negative light to it. Another issue is that the positive aspects of Black masculinity are not talked enough about. Black mens’ predisposition to be caring and compassionate, to give back, to honor family and community, and to work hard is not talked about enough. When we discuss Black masculinity rarely do the positives come to the forefront. Yes, Black men do struggle, but there are many positive aspects in their lives that they go through this struggle for. There needs to be more discussion on Black masculinity and its positives, and there needs to be actions put forth to solve Black masculinity’s problems. With this we can have better discourse on the topic of Black masculinity and could get a more positive version of it. The first step, though, has to be acknowledging that it is not comparable to White masculinity.

In summary, Black masculinity is defined by its community, vulnerability, and image and presentation. Black men are taught and guided by their parents and are thrown into a world that will throw everything at them. Here, Black men will have to deal with the universal Black experience of internal and external vulnerabilities such as self-image and debt. They have to struggle to survive and still appear masculine throughout it all. But a masculine gender performance can be difficult for all Black men, but especicially homosexual Black men who were taught that homosexuality equated femininity. They are forced to hide their sexuality to not appear weak and to keep their relationships which puts their mental health at risk. All of these factors compose the most important factors of Black masculinity, and are highly different from the factors of White masculinity. Though there are some aspects that both masculinities share, they are expressed differently and show how markedly dissimilar they are. Grouping the two together is irrational as the two are extremely unalike and uphold conflicting values and experiences. By separating the two, it acknowledges that Black mens’ experiences are incompatible with White mens’ experiences and that Black masculinity has its own separate ideals and problems. With Black masculinity highlighted, there can be more attention on solving its fundamental problems and spotlighting its positives. With greater attention put on Black men, Black men could be taught that their coping mechanisms are harmful and that valuing motherhood but criticizing homosexuality is hypocritical, and the view of Black men could be changed by portraying Black men’s positive attributes.

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