BY FRANK HAVILAND

If you’re the proud owner of a penis you’ll be no stranger to vilification. Male babies who stoically refuse to cry are quite rightly welcomed into the world by a good slap from the head nurse; a salutary life lesson for things to come.

Ask anyone and they’ll tell you: men are useless. They can’t iron, can’t ask for directions, can’t cook, and can’t even piss straight. Even when they finally get good at something, they’re rarely praised. Men receive little credit for their impressive suicide conversion rates, their domination of the homeless market, or their early achievement of heart attacks.

Instead, the alliance of those wishing to beat young men into submission is overwhelming. It’s not just the feminists. From the advertisers who demean us, the female-dominated schools which give us poorer grades, drug us up on Ritalin, or routinely exclude us, the courts that sentence us unfairly and refuse to grant us custody, the shops that stick us upstairs out of the way, and the armies that conscript us.

We’re so dreadful apparently, that any feminist worth her hairy armpits wants us erased from the lexicon entirely. They might actually be doing us a favour on this one, since any word unfortunate to share a bed with the prefix ‘man’ becomes instantly pejorative (mansplain, manspread, manbaby).

‘Toxic masculinity’ (as manliness is now phrased), makes every Y-chromosome bearer personally responsible for all the ills of the world. Even in death, men are off shanting it up –  leaving women to pick up the pieces, as Hilary Clinton once famously put it:

‘Women have always been the primary victims of war. Women lose their husbands, their fathers, their sons in combat.’

For increasing numbers of men (and with no small encouragement from the State), the uphill struggle is just too arduous. With the freedom to self-identify as anything you like, more and more men are finding other uses for their Gillette razor. The ratio of M-F compared to F-M gender transitions is around 4:1, which rather suggests that being a woman is perhaps not as oppressive as we have been told.

Female privilege is a growth industry. Young female employees are now out-earning the men. They are preferred 2:1 in STEM fields, and even Women’s Officer positions are no longer exclusive to women. Sportsmen too are rapidly discovering that penectomies rather than PEDs are the way to go if you really want to improve your performance. (Thailand used to have a monopoly on gender reassignment, it’s a shame they never got around to patenting it).

It is with great regret therefore, to see that science has jumped on the patriarchy-bashing bandwagon. The APA recently issued ‘Guidelines for Psychological Practice With Boys and Men’, a very concise summary of which might be:

• Men are overly successful which is bad
• Traditional masculinity, measured by stoicism, competitiveness, dominance and aggression is harmful
• Men are self-sufficient and take care of themselves, which is bad
• Men take care of their loved ones, which is bad

Basically, it’s bad, bad, bad – without the Michael Jackson.

This week we discovered that Gillette had thrown its woke blade into the ring, and its bank balance down the toilet. The smart guys at Gillette had clearly decided that the world needed another political message. And so they issued one, informing men that they could no longer cut it as negligent, laid-back barbecuing, mansplaining rapists. It’s painful to watch, but you should – especially if you’ve got shares in Wilkinson Sword.

Masculinity is toxic, toxic for every man carrying the torch. Men die around five years earlier than women, assuming they make it to retirement in the first place. And sure they’re flawed, there’s no doubt about it, but they’re still the one and only line of defence we’ve got. Toxic masculinity isn’t much use when someone’s violated your safe space, or said mean words to you, but it’s who you call when there’s a real problem, every single time.

Toxic masculinity is the dustman, the sewer worker, the coal miner. It changes car tyres and rescues us from spiders. It’s what stands up to bullies, saves children from burning buildings, and goes to war. As triggering as you might find that, there’s nothing waiting to take its place.

It’s also a price willingly-paid by most men. They go out in the cold and the rain, work late shifts, and fail to take care of themselves – not because they’re useless, but because there’s something more precious safe at home in the warm, waiting to hug them when they come home. Men sacrifice for their families; it’s their purpose in life.

Not content with this shameful depiction of men, both the APA and Gillette failed to acknowledge the darkest secret of toxic masculinity: women simply can’t get enough of it. It is women’s unshakeable fascination with large, strong, muscular males which drives evolution, and has placed us in this ‘predicament’. Not only are women crazy about masculine men, but they are also able to discern a man’s masculinity from his face alone.

So the next time some effete, tight-jeaned pansy from marketing tells you how to run your life, politely inform him that the blame lies firmly at women’s door. Whatever you do, don’t lose your toxic masculinity – life’s a bit too much of a close shave without it.