Republican men have angry views about their own masculinity.
By Juliana Menasce Horowitz and Kim Parker
The status of men in American society has been at the center of recent national political conversations. Some people have spoken out about what they perceive to be attacks on traditional manhood, while others have warned about what they see as “toxic masculinity.” More broadly, many have expressed concern about how men are doing socially and economically.
Amid these conversations, we asked 6,204 U.S. adults about their views on men and masculinity. Our survey covered traits people think are valued too much or too little in men these days; how acceptable they think certain behaviors are in men; and how they think men have fared relative to women in various aspects of life. The survey was conducted Sept. 3-15, 2024.1
Key findings
Relatively few Americans say people have negative views of masculine men.
25% say people in the United States have mostly negative views of men who are “manly or masculine.” This is smaller than the shares who say people have mostly positive views of masculine men (43%) or that views are neither positive nor negative (31%).
But among Republican men, 45% do think people have negative views of masculine men, and the vast majority of those who feel this way say this is a bad thing. Much smaller shares of Republican women (24%), Democratic men (20%) and Democratic women (13%) say people view masculine men negatively. (Republicans and Democrats include those who lean toward either party.)