Nicholas Petracca
WMST 101.01
Individual Research Paper
Dr. Gillespie

Violent Masculinity:
How American Society and Media Glorify Violence in the American Youth

By it’s anthropologic definition, masculinity is anything that men think and do. It is anything that men think and do to other men. And lastly, it is the idea that some men are innately, or are acknowledged to be, more macho than other men (Guttman 93). When we consider those in their childhood and adolescence stages, even though they aren’t men, they are nevertheless affected by the constructs of masculinity.

In this paper, I intend to show how American Society and popular media combine to construct a masculinity norm that glorifies violence, especially among teens, adolescence, and children. Before we look at how masculinity can lead to violence in our culture, we must first unearth how masculinities are constructed, both by mainstream media and by societal norms. Perhaps the most crucial aspect of masculine and feminine studies is that gender is a perception that is socially constructed (Craig 2). Academics are cautious to separate sex—a purely biological difference—and gender—a label that is used to illustrate the essential qualities that society attributes to members of a particular sex. As a result, masculinity becomes a term that we must explain. It is widely recognized that American society and popular media are responsible for shaping masculinity, so it is only logical to that these two institutions be of primary focus when determining how men, their culture, and their relationships are represented (Craig 3) Perhaps the most crucial factor in influencing how masculinity in American is perceived, media contributes to the constructions of masculinity by systematically defining our culture’s gender norms through the effects that its numerous outlets have on our collective