“Alpha Males” Can’t Feel Love: A Discussion About Masculinity

A look at alpha males, traditional masculinity, feminism, and the horror of experiencing emotions.

I am not a big fan of toxic masculinity and “alpha male” culture. All of the nonsense that comes from the incel community and all the red pill people makes me sick. I don’t particularly care for the premise that all men should be stoic badasses, only experiencing a single strong emotion: anger.

I have written about this in the past, and it continues to bother me when I see the toxic nonsense that is American masculinity. I will never properly understand it. Growing up with mental illness, I was encouraged to talk about my feelings and express my emotions in therapy. The anger issue I developed was identified as a struggle, and the people in my life helped me work through it. The premise that I should keep my feelings inside, only displaying a stoic, blank exterior is absolutely foreign to me.

That said, I came across a fascinating notion the other day: the premise that so-called “alpha males” can’t experience the feeling of love, at least not properly. The more I considered it, the more it made sense.

Just to clarify, I will be referring a lot to males and men in a general sense. The vast majority of so-called “alpha males” I’ve encountered are straight, cis, heteronormative guys; this is what I am referring to for this article.

I will also be referring to love in a romantic sense, as in something experienced in a relationship with one or more people. I acknowledge that love can be experienced in a variety of ways, such as love between friends and love between family, and that some people do not experience romantic attraction; this is all normal, as people are different and have different experiences. I don’t judge ace/aro folx for not experiencing romantic or sexual attraction. For this article, I refer to people who intentionally shut off their emotional capacity to love, not ace/aro folx who do not experience that sensation in the first place.

Love towards someone requires you to be open and vulnerable with that person. You have to feel comfortable expressing yourself to that person in an honest way, and you have to be honest with yourself about how you feel about them.

The alpha male mentality is that you should never open yourself to anyone, that emotions are not a manly thing, and that you should assert yourself through dominance and aggression. Some even go so far as to eschew happiness itself, treating others with disdain and just generally being unhappy, angry jerks to everyone.

In that way, women are seen as conquests, objects to be taken and owned, as opposed to humans with emotions and feelings. To an alpha male, a relationship with a woman is an objective, the inevitable outcome of one’s masculinity and a trophy that shows one’s dominance over other men.

Because of this, love is not a consideration, or even something that they can experience properly. The notion of opening themselves up to someone on such a deep level is not something that they can do; to do so is unmanly and unmasculine.

Again, it’s not that alpha male types are unable to experience romantic love, it’s just that they shut themselves off from that feeling, seeing it as weakness. Vulnerability is unmanly — real men are strong and stoic, standing up in the face of danger.

There’s also a strong sense of homophobia in the alpha male perspective. The stereotypical gay man is an effeminate, limp-wristed type with a particular speech affect and an open, talkative personality. This is obviously something that the typical alpha male wants to avoid — being queer is unmasculine. Conveniently ignored is the fact that gay men come in a variety of shapes, sizes, and personality types. The fear is that a gay man will attempt to hit on the alpha male, which is unacceptable. Real men assert their dominance over other men; having a gay man flirt with you is emasculating.

There is also strong transphobia in alpha-male culture. The idea that one could be led on by a woman, only for them to turn out to be a trans woman, is a horrifying one to the alpha male. Derogatory terms like “trap” make this abundantly clear — trans women aren’t real women, they’re a man in a dress who has led the alpha male on. Like getting hit on by a gay man, this is emasculating, but also embarrassing, as a trans woman has employed “trickery” in their efforts.

Unfortunately, this has real-world consequences, as many people, particularly straight men, employ the gay/trans panic defense to defend their violent actions towards gay or trans folx. This defense is the premise that a gay man or trans person who might express an interest in a straight man would induce panic in that man, causing them to attack and/or kill that person because of that panic. The defense is thankfully banned in several states, as it is a tactic meant to play on the prejudices of the jury, but it is still legal in most of America.

Once again, all emotions aside from anger are ignored in these instances. What could be a simple, honest conversation between two adults is instead reduced to a violent outburst. Merely expressing disinterest is not enough for these men; as their masculinity has been threatened, they must respond with greater force to reassert their dominance.

Being an alpha male is rooted in a “traditional” sense of masculinity, harkening back to a time when “men were real men,” or some such nonsense. As with many things that use the word “traditional,” this is a mindset populated largely by right-wing men. They frequently congregate on spaces such as 4chan and Reddit on the popular Red Pill subreddit, co-opting the iconic scene from The Matrix wherein the red pill opens one’s eyes to the reality of the world — in this case, that feminism is evil and destroying western civilization.

(This is funny for two reasons. The first is that the Wachowskis have noted that it is an allegory for trans folx and transitioning, as both of them have since come out as trans. The second is that the concept of the red pill as a right-wing term has been co-opted again, with a variety of increasingly niche “pills” being adopted by Twitter denizens of all stripes and relegating the red pill meme to the back seat of general internet nonsense.)

Of course, the premise of “traditional” masculine roles harkens back to a time when America was “great,” i.e. the post-war 50s, when the husband was the breadwinner and the wife did the housework and child-rearing. Of course, this was a time when women weren’t people and non-white folks didn’t have rights, so the concept of America being “great” at this point in history is entirely dependent on being a white man.

Now, of course, we are at a point where women are in the workplace, BIPOC folks are protesting racism and injustice, and “cancel culture” and the #metoo movement are taking powerful men down left and right. Feminism and wokeness are threatening the poor, innocent white men who fear the idea of experiencing what women and BIPOC have experienced since the Declaration of Independence was signed.

Suddenly, being an assertive, angry man isn’t acceptable. On the left, men experience a range of unmasculine emotions. They laugh, they cry, they go to therapy, they talk about how they feel, they express their love for their partners in sappy, romantic ways, and they broadcast it all over social media for the world to see.

Meanwhile, the alpha males and “real men” are getting canceled by angry feminists who can’t stand a little bit of harmless locker room talk (read: sexual harassment). It’s no longer okay to catcall (sexually harass) women, no longer okay to give them a smack on the butt (sexually harass/assault them), and no longer okay to take home drunk women at the club anymore (rape them). Husbands can’t even keep their spouses in line (commit domestic violence) or convince their wives to sleep with them whenever they want anymore (commit spousal rape). “What is the world coming to?” they lament.

In the twisted perspective of these alpha males, men are avatars of stoicism and assertiveness, the prototypical action hero to be strong and save the day, while women are the objects of their attraction, prizes to be won and had. In my mind, the idea that men are expressing emotions is simply an acknowledgment that men are people, just as the idea that women have agency over their bodies is the acknowledgment that women are people.

The idea that women are people and not objects that are defined by men is more common these days — for most of history, women have largely been defined by the men in their lives, but that is starting to change. However, I think this “traditional” view of masculinity treats men as something other than people as well. People experience emotions and feelings, they have complex personalities, wants, needs, hopes, fears, and vulnerabilities. Traditional masculinity strips all of this away, leaving a largely emotionless husk whose sole purpose is to assert dominance and take by force or coercion.

To be human is to be weak, and traditional masculinity doesn’t allow for weakness. In the way that women are seen as less than people, mere objects, these men often see themselves as more than human. They have transcended the need for emotions and therefore transcended their weakness and vulnerability.

However, weakness and vulnerability are important pieces of connection. When we have friends, we open ourselves up to them in some way, exposing parts of ourselves that we don’t show the rest of the world. This is even more so with romantic partners — often, being in love means baring yourself to that person, showing them your soft underbelly and allowing yourself to be vulnerable around them. Without this display of weakness, relationships often don’t go beyond surface level.

I often wonder about the people I’ve met who take the traditionally masculine approach. Some have spouses, who I would assume they are open with, but heck if I’ve ever seen it. Others have been burned romantically, often due to their views or approach to masculinity, and instead treat women as mere lust objects, things to be had and to have sex with, but without any meaningful connection.

Personally, I cannot imagine not talking about my feelings, expressing myself to the people close to me and the world as a whole. I write all manner of things and post them here, exposing my mind to anyone who will read about it. I dislike and strongly disagree with the alpha male and traditionally masculine viewpoints. Everything I’ve learned in my life about expressing my feelings tells me that these viewpoints are unhealthy at best and destructive at worst.

I honestly don’t expect to convince anyone who feels like traditional masculinity is the right way to go. I write whatever I want here as a way to vent and as a writing exercise, not to convince or convert people. I”m sure some people would be upset about this article, but if you are, then you are, then you probably haven’t looked through my catalog of articles. There’s a lot of stuff there that makes my political stance pretty clear.

This, like so many other things, is just an extended rant about something I find distasteful. There are many nuances that I haven’t covered, but I’m rapidly approaching 2,000 words here and I don’t have the time or inclination to write much more.

I hope you’ve gotten something of use from this. I know that it’s been cathartic for me, and even if nobody reads this, I’m glad to have written it. And, if you didn’t enjoy it, thanks for reading anyway. I look forward to ignoring your hateful comments.

And remember: don’t be a jerk to people. It costs you $0 to be nice, so be nice.