Last winter, following the Alabama Supreme Court ruling on IVF, I put pen to paper — or more aptly, finger to keyboard — addressing the troubling reality of how bigoted judicial opinions, theocratic influences and hegemonic masculinity possess a disturbing ability to sway the course of justice. My concern centered on the ways in which, “when entrusted to those who derive authority from control, subjectivity’s intended purpose to foster inclusivity and autonomy is instead co-opted to restrict freedom and eradicate choice.”
In the wake of the 2024 election results, this concern extends beyond a single court ruling — a dynamic I believe has played a pivotal role in shaping the political landscape that led to President-elect Donald Trump’s victory.
Amid the fraught weeks leading up to election day — characterized by Vice President Harris’s brief yet fervent 108-day campaign and a sharp ideological divide between candidates — voting patterns largely followed party lines. Republicans focused on economic stability and immigration, while Democrats, though not ignoring these issues, emphasized reproductive rights and other social policies that critics dismissed as left-wing “wokeness”. Both parties, at least publicly, maintained a nominal commitment to preserving democratic values.
Nonetheless, I’d argue that Trump’s campaign could have disregarded these policy issues altogether. His success, I suggest, hinged on a mechanism untouched by either Democrats or traditional Republicans — a seed deeply embedded in the nation’s soil that, until the rise of Trumpian politics, had not been adequately nourished, allowing the fetid appeal of toxic, hegemonic masculinity to flourish.
This phenomenon, however, is not new to the course of history. Coined by Australian sociologist R. W. Connell, hegemonic masculinity refers to how prevailing gender norms are upheld not as innate but through a collective yet implicit societal agreement and subtle conditioning, rather than through overt coercion.
An acknowledged divide among voters in this election was the gender gap, with no demographic more steadfast in their support of Trump’s rhetoric — despite the mounting irrationality and instability during the final days — than young white men. It is the ostensibly impressionable and porous nature of this group that enabled toxic masculinity to function not only as a political tool but as a mobilizing force for a misogynistic ethos that resonates deeply within the existing sociopolitical order.
The term ‘manosphere’ is relatively new to my vocabulary, yet it has unapologetically carved out a space in my daily discussions and broader discourse. My first encounter with the term — perhaps fittingly so — came with a Forbes article published on July 4, where it was defined as “a collection of websites, blogs, online forums, and communities focusing on men’s rights, men’s interests, and critiques of feminism.”
The article then sought to unpack why certain men gravitate toward the sexist rhetoric and chauvinistic ideologies that thrive within, and frequently emerge from, the manosphere. It attributed this trend to seemingly reductive ideals of needing a support base or tending to past heartbreaks and romantic rejection. Or, at least how I read it, essentially sentimentalizing male aggression and the roots of misogyny as a way of absolving those who propagate and sustain its pervasive influence; romanticizing these harmful ideologies and dismissing the broader implications of the manosphere’s expansive and indomitable spread.
From television to podcasts, and now — disturbingly — the Oval Office, those who dominate the media shape and negotiate what it means to ‘properly’ embody and express masculinity. Whether through Mr. Rogers and the rise of the ‘new man,’ or Joe Rogan and the unchecked propagation of dominant masculinity, we see how these influences have paved the way for Trump to stand upon his petulant pedestal.
As social media continues to emerge as the primary channel for disseminating information, having a significant media presence has developed into a form of social capital — the larger the space you occupy, the greater the audience you have, the more influence you wield. The commanding presence of the manosphere has created a sordid man cave where hegemonic masculinity is no longer subtly reinforced but openly orchestrated. The ‘overt coercion’ Cowell once thought had no place is now laid bare — with the socialization process no longer tacit, all guardrails have been discarded.
The flagrant crackdown on reproductive rights, the derogatory comments directed at Vice President Harris—seeking to infantilize and demean her by conflating her with a prostitute—the obsolete tropes that confine women to the hearth and home, reducing our value to our ability to bear children, and the moral crusade against affirmative action, which frames minority access and excellence as threats to a presumed social order, all perpetuate a force rooted in the fear of the ‘white man on top’ as the unchallenged ideal of societal good. This vision is not only upheld but further reinforced within the manospheric canon.
The Trump campaign, by both asserting its roots in and cultivating an increasingly unregulated manosphere, set the stage for the nurturing of a fiercely loyal — yet ironically fragile — following. Trump’s speeches devolved into a tangled web of baseless claims and erratic tangents, with his supporters and those comprising the crusaders of his campaign spewing racialized and sexist attacks at those who challenged the manosphere’s unstable foundation.
This volatile behavior found its anchor in the actions of young, predominantly white men attempting to navigate their masculinity within a mediated sociopolitical landscape that not only permitted but actively fostered the spread of bigoted and unprecedented rhetoric. It comes as no surprise then, that its foundation, at least in this instance, stood firm.
Many of us, myself included, watched these sneering events unfold from what now seems to have been the peripheries of the manosphere, clinging to the all-too-tangible hope that its core would eventually cave. And while our expectations this time proved misplaced, as its untested power remained unyielding, such strength is ultimately illusory — a petty manifestation of patriarchal panic. Though the manosphere has indeed amassed strength in numbers, history has shown — though not without resistance — that structures founded on exclusion and fear inevitably erode, and in time, its fragile nature will fracture under the weight of its own cowardice.
Eve Iulo is a third-year in the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences. She can be reached at [email protected].