Discussions about masculinity have become increasingly prominent in recent years, particularly as societies wrestle with the struggles facing boys and young men. Loneliness, declining educational attainment, mental health difficulties, economic uncertainty, and changing expectations surrounding relationships and family life have produced a fertile environment for competing visions of what men should become. Some of these responses have been constructive, encouraging greater attention to male friendship, emotional health, physical well-being, and meaningful work. Others have offered something considerably simpler: men need to become tougher, more dominant, more competitive, and, quite literally in some cases, more testosterone-driven.

This latter vision of masculinity has become especially visible in contemporary politics and online culture. In July, US secretary of defense Pete Hegseth announced plans for the military to test testosterone levels among service members, presenting hormonal health as part of maintaining military readiness and physical performance. The announcement prompted a predictable mixture of serious medical discussion and exaggerated commentary about increased aggression and sexual behavior. More revealing than the medical debate itself, however, was the ease with which testosterone became shorthand for masculinity. The underlying assumption seemed to be that more testosterone meant more manhood, just as the language of “high-T” and “low-T” men has become common in certain corners of social media.

There are genuine medical conditions involving testosterone deficiency, and there are good reasons for men to pay attention to physical health. Yet reducing masculinity to a hormone level reflects a much broader confusion about what strength means. Many contemporary conversations about men oscillate between two equally problematic extremes. On one side lies the caricature of masculinity as inherently aggressive, oppressive, or dangerous. On the other is a revival of masculinity defined through dominance, sexual conquest, physical prowess, emotional aloofness, and competition. Buddhism offers a different possibility. It neither requires us to pretend that masculinity is meaningless nor asks men to prove themselves through domination. Instead, Buddhist traditions repeatedly redirect human strength toward the more difficult work of self-mastery.

This may seem surprising because the Buddha is commonly imagined in the modern West as an almost androgynous figure—peaceful, delicate, seated in meditation, and removed from the concerns of ordinary masculine identity. Yet scholar John Powers has shown that this image would have been unfamiliar to many early Indian Buddhists. In Indian Buddhist literature, the Buddha was frequently represented as the purusottama, the “ultimate man,” and the mahapurusa, the “great man.” He was described as exceptionally handsome, powerful, physically imposing, skilled in martial arts, admired by men, and attractive to women. His body was said to possess the traditional 32 marks of a great man, signs that distinguished both buddhas and universal monarchs.

These descriptions are so pervasive that Powers argues that masculinity formed an important, if often overlooked, dimension of early Buddhist representations of the Buddha. His body was not incidental to his identity. It communicated status, accumulated merit, moral accomplishment, and authority. The literary Buddha was not presented as a frail ascetic who had escaped masculinity, but rather as someone who embodied the highest ideals of manhood available within the cultural imagination of ancient India.

At the same time, the Buddhist understanding of the “great man” complicates any easy comparison with contemporary hypermasculinity. The Buddha’s physical perfection was ultimately meaningful because it represented virtues cultivated across innumerable lifetimes. The qualities that made him truly great were not domination, aggression, or sexual conquest, but wisdom, ethical discipline, generosity, fearlessness, equanimity, and liberation from craving. His strength was impressive because it had been brought under control.

This distinction is particularly valuable today. Strength itself is not a problem. Courage, endurance, confidence, physical fitness, competitiveness, protectiveness, loyalty, competence, and perseverance can all be admirable qualities. There is little reason for Buddhists to treat such traits with embarrassment simply because they have historically been associated with masculinity. What Buddhist ethics asks us to examine is the mental state from which these qualities emerge and the ends toward which they are directed.

Courage governed by hatred becomes violence. Protectiveness governed by fear becomes control. Competition governed by ego becomes humiliation of others. Sexual confidence without ethical restraint becomes exploitation. Physical strength without compassion can become intimidation. The same human capacities can therefore produce very different consequences depending on whether they are shaped by greed, hatred, and delusion or by generosity, compassion, wisdom, and restraint.

This provides one useful way of approaching the contested phrase “toxic masculinity.” The expression can easily become counterproductive when it sounds as though masculinity itself is the problem. Men and boys who are already uncertain about their place in society are unlikely to benefit from being told that something fundamental about themselves is suspect. Yet the phenomenon described by the phrase is real enough. Masculinity becomes harmful when manhood depends on emotional suppression, domination of others, sexual entitlement, refusal to seek help, contempt for perceived weakness, or an endless need to prove oneself.

From a Buddhist perspective, many of these behaviors look less like strength than forms of bondage. A man who cannot tolerate an insult without retaliation remains controlled by anger. A man who cannot admit fear because he worries about appearing weak remains controlled by fear. A man whose self-worth depends on sexual conquest remains controlled by craving. A man who cannot apologize because doing so threatens his identity remains controlled by pride. None of these conditions resembles freedom, however formidable the person may appear from the outside.

As Candice Helfand-Rogers writes, this macho stubbornness can have real costs for men, too: “Overtly ‘girly’ products like lotions are avoided by men—and that includes sunscreen, which has contributed to higher rates of skin cancer, and more deaths from it, among men.” (The Story Exchange)

The Buddhist path therefore offers a different model of masculine strength. It asks us to become capable of experiencing powerful emotions without automatically obeying them. It asks us to recognize anger without allowing anger to determine our actions, to acknowledge fear without being governed by it, and to experience desire without turning another person into an object. These capacities require discipline of a kind that is frequently more demanding than the outward performances of toughness celebrated in popular culture.

Compassion belongs within this model as well. Modern masculine culture has often treated tenderness and vulnerability as qualities that weaken men, yet anyone who has cared for an aging parent, comforted a frightened child, supported a grieving friend, or remained present with someone in severe pain knows that caring can demand considerable courage. The ability to remain open to another person’s suffering without fleeing from it or becoming overwhelmed by it is not softness in the pejorative sense. It is a form of strength.

Buddhist practice similarly requires forms of vulnerability that many men have historically been taught to avoid. Practitioners acknowledge ignorance, confess wrongdoing, ask teachers for guidance, depend on communities, and cultivate sensitivity to suffering. The development of compassion requires allowing ourselves to be affected by others. None of this demands that men become passive or timid. Rather, it suggests that genuine strength eventually becomes secure enough that it no longer has to advertise itself.

A mature man can therefore be strong without needing others to feel weak. He can be protective without becoming controlling and confident without becoming arrogant. More importantly, he can become someone around whom other people feel safe enough to be vulnerable. The abhayamudra (gesture of fearlessness) depicts the Buddha’s hand open and outwards, offering peace and a promise of safety. This gentle repose offers a vision of masculinity for Buddhists far from anything found in contemporary culture.

The importance of such examples becomes particularly clear when considering boys and young men. Much public discussion focuses on what young men are hearing from influencers, podcasts, social media personalities, politicians, and the loosely connected online communities sometimes described as the “manosphere.” These spaces can provide a sense of belonging and occasionally offer useful messages about discipline, exercise, responsibility, and purpose. However, they can also transform insecurity into resentment and teach young men that status, wealth, muscularity, sexual success, and dominance are the final markers of male worth.

Condemning these messages will accomplish relatively little if adults cannot offer compelling alternatives. Boys learn what masculinity means not only from what they are told but from what they see. They watch how fathers speak to partners, how coaches treat losing players, how teachers respond to mistakes, and how older men behave when embarrassed, frightened, rejected, or angry. They notice whether adults ridicule weakness or assist those who are struggling. They notice whether men can apologize, ask for help, show affection to friends, lose gracefully, and treat women as equals rather than prizes or adversaries.

In this respect, the Buddhist tradition’s emphasis on exemplary lives remains relevant. The Buddha did not merely teach doctrines. Buddhist literature portrays him as embodying those teachings through everything from his speech and posture to his relationships and overall manner of moving through the world. His life became his teaching. Whatever historical embellishment later generations added to the Buddha’s biography, the underlying insight is powerful—virtue must become visible in conduct.

Early Buddhists could imagine the Buddha as an “ultimate man” without imagining him primarily as someone who conquered other people. His most consequential victory was mastery over the forces within himself that generated suffering. This offers an alternative to both the rejection of masculinity and its reduction to muscularity, hormones, dominance, or social status.

There is no need to abandon the aspiration to raise strong boys or to become strong men. The Buddhist contribution is to ask that strength become ethical, compassionate, disciplined, and wise. Physical health, courage, competence, and resilience all matter. But a truly admirable man should also be capable of kindness, vulnerability, restraint, and power without domination.

Our culture is already teaching boys what it means to be a man. The only real choice is whether thoughtful adults participate in that education or leave it to algorithms and influencers. Buddhism offers us a demanding standard to place before them—not a masculinity organized around proving one’s superiority, but one built around becoming trustworthy, courageous, compassionate, and free.

That would be a form of manhood worthy of being passed on.

References

Powers, John. 2009. A Bull of a Man: Images of Masculinity, Sex, and the Body in Indian Buddhism. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

See more

The military’s testosterone plan, a Fox News host’s ‘joke,’ and the real issue at hand (USA Today)
Men Are Lonelier Than Ever. The “Toxic Masculinity” Debate May Be Making It Worse (Men’s Journal)
The Work of Helping Young Boys Grow Into Good Men (The Story Exchange)

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