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Vegan men and hybrid masculinity

Profile image of Jessica GreenebaumJessica Greenebaum
https://doi.org/10.1080/09589236.2017.1287064
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13 pages

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Abstract

If eating meat is equated with 'masculine traits' of emotional stoicism, strength and virility, do vegan men threaten the concept of a stoic and domineering view of hegemonic masculinity? This research explores how 20 vegan men explain veganism in relation to patriarchal, hegemonic masculinity. We argue that vegan men engage in hybrid masculinity by modifying values associated with veganism and femininity to align with traditional masculine standards. By doing so, vegan men contest the narrow definition of hegemonic masculinity but fall short of challenging gender inequalities.

Key takeaways
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  1. Vegan men challenge hegemonic masculinity by redefining traits associated with femininity within a masculine framework.
  2. Research explores how veganism is perceived in relation to gender norms and masculinity among 20 vegan men.
  3. Hybrid masculinity allows vegan men to adopt traditionally feminine values while reinforcing their masculine identities.
  4. Vegan men emphasize health and strength to counter stereotypes about masculinity and veganism.
  5. Stigma around veganism persists, but male visibility in the movement enhances its credibility.

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Greta Gaard

Men, Masculinities, and Earth, 2021

Many scholars offer diverse yet mutually-reinforcing critiques of Euro-Western cultural constructions of masculinity. They note traits of maturity-as-separation, with male self-identity and self-esteem based on dominance, conquest, workplace achievement, economic accumulation, elite consumption patterns and behaviours, physical strength, sexual prowess, animal “meat” hunting and/or eating, and competitiveness. These traits represent discourses of appearances (strength and size), affects (work ethic and emotional strength), sexualities (queer or trans vs. cis-gendered heterosexual), behaviours (violent and aggressive), occupations (valuing career over family and housework) and dominations (subordination of women and children). In this chapter, I reject abstract individualism, noting that feminist eco-masculinities would recognise that all human identities and moral conduct are best understood through relational networks. I argue that these contra-hegemonic forms must be explored through cross-cultural and multicultural perspectives to protect against privileging any specific race, region, or ethnicity. Such eco-masculinities must recognise and resist the identity-shaping economic structures of industrial capitalism, its inherent rewards based on hierarchies of race / class / gender / age / ability / species / sex / sexuality, and its implicit demands for ceaseless work, production, competition, and achievement. With ecofeminist values at heart, the eco-masculinities proposed here reach beyond merely rejecting the bifurcation of hetero-gendered traits, values and behaviours. Instead, they enact a diversity of ecological behaviours that celebrate and sustain biodiversity, ecological and interspecies justice, eco-eroticisms, ecological economics, playfulness, and direct action resistances to corporate capitalist eco-devastations.

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Meatless meals and masculinity: How veg* men explain their plant-based diets
Mari Kate Mycek

Food and Foodways, 2018

Scholars have found that assumed connections between meat eating and performances of masculinity are perpetuated across the American public sphere. However, food expectations and choices are constantly shifting and evolving over time. Recent cultural shifts in the middle and upper-middle class American foodscape that moralize "good" eating as choosing local, organic, and eco-conscious foods, prompts the questioning of their social effects for vegetarian and vegan men, who hold a previouslystigmatized consumption identity. This article analyzes qualitative interviews conducted with twenty vegan and vegetarian men in a semi-urban area of the southeastern United States to better understand how they conceptualize and explain their food consumption identities in relation to their broader identity practices. I find their performances of masculinity often defy the conventional feminization of meatless diets, while also upholding gendered binaries of emotion/rationality and current tropes of white, middle-class masculinity.

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