Abstract
Based on interviews with 30 men who are fans of My Little Pony and ethnographic observations at four My little Pony conventions, this article examines men’s engagement with feminized media as a form of hybrid masculinities. I identify two major subgroups of fans. The first utilized the brony community as a space that expanded the norms for men around emotional expression without challenging systemic inequality and distanced themselves from privilege by aligning themselves with a “gender defying” fandom. The second and dominant group expressed an aggrieved masculinity and engaged with the community as an explicitly antifeminist project, reinterpreting the show to assert hegemonic masculinity. This article contributes to understanding how men may articulate power through their engagement with feminized media and, more generally, expands the concept of hybrid masculinities.
My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic is the fourth-generation reboot of the My Little Pony franchise and the first time in its history that it has had popularity outside of its target demographic of young girls. This iteration of the cartoon was developed in 2010 by Lauren Faust as an empowering show for girls (Wilson 2012). The show quickly became a subject of discussion on 4chan, an online image board popular with young men interested in nerd culture and best known for its role in misogynistic attacks on women gamers and journalists as part of #GamerGate (Johnston 2014). Though the show was initially a target of derision, adult men began signaling their love of the show by adopting the identity of “brony” (Connelly 2016). Men adopting the bro/pony portmanteau developed into a community structured around My Little Pony in which fans discuss the show online, dress up as the characters at in person conventions, and produce, sell, and consume fan-made art. Although organized around a piece of feminine and feminist media, this community is dominated by adult men.
While media outlets have celebrated bronies as “gender rebels” who are reshaping masculinity by embracing femininity and celebrating love and tolerance of others (Angel 2012; Watercutter 2014), other popular critics view of the brony phenomenon as men invading one of few spaces for young girls (Nixon 2014). The body of scholarship on hybrid masculinities supports the latter perspective, arguing that men can utilize femininity as a way of concealing masculine privilege and perpetuating gender inequality. In this case, patriarchy in the guise of pastel ponies.
Scholars have examined women’s media engagement, particularly the “textual poaching” of fan-writing, as a way of bringing women characters out of the margins and introducing feminist themes to masculine texts such as Star Trek (Jenkins 1988; Hellekson & Busse 2014). Fandom has therefore been a central site of resistance for women against a male dominated media landscape. Bronies are a case that flips this, with men engaging with a feminized text and at times reshaping it to recenter both men and their interests. As such, bronies provide an opportunity to examine how men may articulate gendered power through their engagement with feminized media.
In this article, I examine how men engage with feminized media as a form of hybrid masculinities and, at times, as an explicitly antifeminist project. Based on semistructured interviews with 30 men who are fans of My Little Pony and ethnographic observations at four brony conventions, I find that bronies enact two distinct forms of gender politics through their interpretation of the show and their engagement in the community. While some men utilize My Little Pony to construct a “softer” masculinity that is in-line with much of the research on hybrid masculinities, the dominant group in the community reinterprets the symbols of the show to assert hegemonic masculinity. Based on these findings, I argue that hybridization through men’s engagement with feminized media can be a way of both concealing privilege and asserting hegemonic masculinity through the reinforcement of an aggrieved sense of masculinity. Through this, I extend the concept of hybrid masculinity by demonstrating how incorporation of marginalized gender expressions can at times be undertaken not only to conceal privilege but to directly reinforce hegemonic masculinity and undermine women’s empowerment.
Gender and Fandom
Fandom is defined by media scholars as active community around a piece of media, particularly one that treats said media as open to “manipulation, renegotiation, commenting, and revising” (Busse & Hellekson 2006, 6). While individual fandoms have their own in-group norms and meanings, such communities have a dedication to, and an open-text approach toward, media. Such communities have long existed but have become increasingly publicly visible, widespread, and accessible online.
An abundance of scholarship on fandom examines its connection to gender in that it emerged in part from women creating counter-narratives, inserting themselves into stories in which they were absent or retelling stories to be more empowering (Jenkins 1988; Bacon-Smith 1992). This trend has continued, with fandom serving a revolutionary purpose for women. As Hellekson and Busse (2014, 79) describe it, fandom has been a “project of working against the patriarchal grain and imagining a utopian, truly equal world” in which women and their stories are taken seriously.
Bronies as a group are primarily heterosexual, cisgender men, and are different from common scholarly conceptions of fandom in that they are a dominant group in conversation with a piece of media intended for a subordinate group. Research has examined how men make sense of masculinity through media, including how men understand men’s lifestyle magazines (Boni 2002), are influenced by the “ideal male body” presented in media (Hatoum & Belle 2004), and become drawn into misogynistic communities in the “manosphere” through social media (Ging 2017). However, comparatively little research has examined how men engage masculinity through media fandom. A notable exception is the work of Click et al. (2016) on men fans of Twilight, which found that men sometimes conceal their fandom to emphasize masculine, heterosexual aspects of feminized texts, ultimately compensating for the threat to their masculinity. Previous scholarship specifically on bronies has argued that they challenge masculinity (Hautakangas 2015; Miller 2018). However, a study of the sexualized discourse on the My Little Pony 4chan discussion board found that men discursively positioned themselves as disadvantaged in relation to women, facilitating reactionary, antifeminist gender politics in line with men’s rights movements (Bailey & Harvey 2019).
There is a need for more scholarship that considers how men engage with and make sense of media, particularly in spaces where individuals not only consume, but “talk back” to media. Men increasingly negotiate masculinity in relation to media, and fandom is a site where gender politics are enacted and negotiated. The rise of fandom allows us to better understand the different ways masculinities can be understood, shaped, and reshaped in homosocial groups to reinforce men’s power in novel ways.
Hybrid Masculinity and My Little Pony
Hybrid masculinities focus on instances in which men appear to challenge hegemonic masculinity on the surface, yet reinforce conceptions of conventional masculinity and, by extension, gender inequality (Barry 2018; Bridges 2014; Bridges & Pascoe 2014; Greenebaum & Dexter 2018). The practice of hybrid masculinity works to sustain inequality via three distinct mechanisms. First, “discursive distancing” allows men to position themselves as “outside of existing systems of privilege and inequality” and not part of the problem of hegemonic masculinity (Bridges & Pascoe 2014, 250). Second, men’s co-option of the aesthetics of oppressed groups (such as gay men) allows men to appropriate a victim status, distancing them from their privilege. This is often a consequence of privileged men feeling their identities are less meaningful or interesting than those of marginalized and subordinated forms of masculinities. Third, men fortify boundaries by “obscure[ing] the symbolic and social boundaries between groups” (Bridges & Pascoe 2014, 254).
Bronies are an example of men mobilizing hybrid masculinities. In the brony community, men can claim that they are part of a group that values equality and upholds the progressive principles of tolerance and acceptance. This in turn allows them to distance themselves from their masculine and heterosexual privilege and complicity in multiple systems of inequality. In particular, bronies frame gender inequality as the result of other types of men, not “good men” like themselves. This is also accomplished by adopting the style of love and acceptance, which Messner (2007) argues can be enacted as a “softer” form of patriarchy.
Men construct hybrid masculinities in a variety of ways, and contradictory expressions of masculinity may emerge within a single movement or subculture (Haenfler 2004). Thus, different groups of men may strategically incorporate femininities to different ends, perhaps reinforcing gender inequality in some cases and challenging it in others. It is therefore important to attend to contradictions that may exist within hybrid masculinities, particularly in how men incorporate femininities and engage with feminized media to assert hegemonic masculinity. In this article, I address two key questions: (a) How do bronies make sense of masculinity within the context of engaging with My Little Pony? and (b) How do bronies enact masculinity within the brony community? In doing so, I advance the scholarship on hybrid masculinities and men’s engagement with feminized media.
Data and Methods
I conducted semistructured, in-depth interviews with 30 men fans of My Little Pony, focusing on both their engagement in the community and their perceptions of gender, and on masculinity more specifically. In addition, I conducted ethnographic observations at four brony conventions. Interviews provided a window into individuals’ sense-making and perceptions, while observations demonstrated public behaviors such as how gender was discussed in official convention panels and the type of art that was sold in the vendor hall. Taken together, these data paint a broad and deep picture of men’s experiences within the brony community. Data were collected in 2017 and 2018, after the height of My Little Pony’s popularity in 2015 but before the show stopped airing in 2019.
I recruited interview participants from brony Facebook pages and in person at brony conventions. The study was advertised on seven Facebook pages found by searching “My Little Pony.” Facebook is home to many brony groups and provided me with access to fans who may not have attended conventions. Each group catered to slightly different populations, either in geographic region or in interest (art, music, etc.). Each group therefore offered me a unique entry point into the community and contributed to sample variation.
Participants ranged in age from 18 to 56. Twenty-six participants identified as White, while two identified as Asian American, one identified as Black, and one identified as Black/biracial. They had a mix of educational backgrounds—six had some college, 10 had a bachelor’s degree or higher, and six were current students. Most of the men were single and childless, although four were married and three had kids. The majority of participants identified as straight, though four were bisexual. Based on ethnographic observations, the above characteristics reflect those of the gender brony community.
For the ethnographic observations, I intentionally selected conventions for variation in size, region, and intended audiences. The conventions were Trotcon (Columbus, OH), Nightmare Nights (Dallas, TX), Everfree Northwest (Seattle, WA), and Bronycon (Baltimore, MD). The first two were smaller, catering largely to those within their respective regions, while the latter two were large and drew attendees from all over the world. This allowed me to observe different subsets of the community in order to examine potential variation in gender politics among these subsets. Everfree Northwest is known as being very family and kid-friendly, Trotcon caters more to adults, and the others are somewhere in-between. These differences were therefore a window into how the brony community might incorporate or exclude the intended audience of the show in different contexts, such as when adult fans made up the majority of the attendees versus a more mixed group. In conducting observations, I attended various official panels, sat in populated areas to observe dynamics between attendees, and had informal conversations with other attendees focused on asking for clarification on my observations or their opinions of aspects of the conventions. For instance, asking about the meaning of costumes, memes, or signs or their opinions on the items being sold in the vendor hall.
I analyzed interview transcripts and observational memos using NVivo software. This was an iterative process, beginning with initial coding of interview and observational data in which I reviewed my data inductively for patterns (Charmaz 2006). I then performed axial coding (Glaser & Strauss 1967), interrogating my data for themes related to the research questions of how bronies made sense of masculinity and how they enacted masculinity within the community. In this process, I reread my data and added to the initial set of codes, while sorting through previous codes for meaningful concepts that related to these major questions. Finally, I combined similar codes to develop a collective final set of themes that best reflected the major patterns in the data.
Findings
Two distinct forms of men’s engagement with My Little Pony emerged from the data. Some men discussed their identification with the show’s values, emphasizing emotional expression and connection with others. I term these men emotive interpreters. Other men were aggrieved remixers, whose involvement in the community was characterized by reimagining the show in aggressive and sexualized ways. These differences in engagement reflected differences in participants’ gender politics. Emotive interpreters expressed a level of feminist awareness, while aggrieved remixers held a persecuted sense of masculinity. These two forms of engagement speak to important differences in how men engage in hybrid masculinities, while simultaneously upholding men’s rights ideologies of men’s victimhood. Aggrieved remixing was the dominant strategy enacted by men in the brony community, suggesting that hybrid masculinity may sometimes operate not just to conceal privilege, but as an explicitly antifeminist project. Below, I outline these two forms of engagement and discuss attitudes toward masculinity and feminism within the brony community.
Emotive Interpreters
Emotive interpreters were primarily invested in the lessons of the show and the emotional connections they made through the brony community. My Little Pony and the brony community provided them a space where they could emote with others and follow different rules surrounding masculinity. These men claimed to be better men due to their experiences with My Little Pony, positioning themselves as enlightened and progressive as a result of their engagement with feminized media. They promoted the idea that bronies challenged “toxic masculinity” and were more in touch with their emotions and “feminine side” than nonbrony men.
When I asked how they became interested in My Little Pony, emotive interpreters often described finding the show at a time of emotional need or crisis. This spoke to the emotional role the show and the community played in their lives, giving them space to bond with other men and express themselves. For example, Jeremey (White, 23) explained that he was suicidal when a friend encouraged him to check out the show. “Without the show,” he claimed, “I’d be dead.” He said that the show improved his mood and helped him open up to his friends about his depression and thoughts of suicide. Similarly, Thomas (Black, 38) discovered My Little Pony four days before he had planned to kill himself and credited it with saving his life by giving him an outlet to “express my anger, hurt, and all that in a healthy way instead of keeping it bottled up.” Importantly, he described openly crying after watching the show for the first time, something he’d previously not allowed himself to do. As a testament to the meaning of My Little Pony in his life, he got a tattoo on his shoulder of himself, his wife, and their three children depicted as ponies in the style of the show.
While Jeremey and Thomas were the most extreme cases of men being brought to My Little Pony by crisis, they illustrate the general trend of grand, emotional narratives of how emotive interpreters discovered the show. Although Jake (White, 38) was not suicidal when he discovered the show, he started watching it and engaging with the brony community while his mother was in hospice. “Her cancer had come back the fourth time and at the same time I would come home in an absolutely terrible state and I’d watch some of these old episodes [on a livestream] and people would be asking ‘how are you doing’ and ‘how is your mom,’ ‘is there anything we can do for you?’” The fandom provided connection for Jake that was as meaningful to him as the show itself, although he also felt the show provided much needed positivity in his life.
The bolstering of intimacy between men and emotional expression that these men described can also be found in sports, where men are provided a socially acceptable space to connect with other men and emotionally invest in their teams (Messner 2002). Similarly, Christian men’s organizations such as the Promise Keepers (Barkowski 2004) and the mythopoetic men’s movement of the 1980s and 90s created space for men to emote. What is different about My Little Pony, though, is that its messages were not originally designed for men and are in fact contrary to those men typically receive about emotion and intimacy. And, instead of limiting men to be emotional in a narrow, socially sanctioned, masculine setting—such as crying when their football team loses a game—bronies were encouraged to live the lessons of the show in all aspects of their everyday lives. This was demonstrated by the Bronycon convention panel: “Keeping Friendship Magic: We’re Not Flawless.” This panel focused on “Explor[ing] the show’s themes of redemption and overcoming obstacles through the lens of social science. Discuss[ing] our expectations for ourselves, our heroes, and those around us.” At such panels, men openly spoke about their struggles making friends and the hardships they’d faced in their lives. Other conventions had panels about bullying, alcoholism, disability, and “rejecting toxic masculinity,” which encouraged attendees to open up about their emotions and apply the lessons of the show to their personal lives.
Men who took the messages of the show to heart felt that the show and the community helped them to better understand the experiences of others and become more open to those who were different form themselves (though they were often vague when referring to “differences”). They claimed that the show facilitated empathy directly through storylines on the importance of love and tolerance, often centering the characters learning to understand the perspectives of others and to celebrate difference. The premise of the show is that Twilight Sparkle, a young girl pony, must study the “magic of friendship” and learn “friendship lessons.” A recurring theme of these lessons is to embrace each other’s differences in personality and background and not judge others without getting to know them. Jake emphasized the importance of these lessons, claiming that they had led him to become a better person. As he explained: It’s not just about the animation and the characters, it’s really about the lessons…basically how to make friends, how to be a friend, how to keep friendships strong, how to make friendships with people who you don’t think you’d be friends with. You know, just the way of being a better person, being able to resolve conflicts…I’m almost 40 and I’m learning more about being a good person and a good human being now than I learned in about 10 years of crappy public schools.
Although the brony community is relatively homogeneous and largely made up of White, heterosexual men in their 20s and 30s, several participants stated that the community introduced them to people with different backgrounds with whom they otherwise would never have formed close and meaningful bonds. Men particularly discussed their interactions with gay and trans bronies as making a difference in their perceptions of gender and sexuality. Though these groups are a minority in the community, multiple participants mentioned that they knew quite a few bisexual, gay, or trans bronies.
Josh (White, 27) felt that meeting trans bronies was one of the most important aspects of his involvement within the community. He described meeting several trans people on the brony forums, saying, “I don’t think I had personally known a trans or genderqueer person before I started interacting with people on the forums. They would have a lot of discussion threads and topics about gender identity and that was really eye-opening…that changed my attitude and outlook a lot.” He added that being part of a “gender defying fandom” had played a role in shaping his perspective on gender and sexual minorities. Josh’s experience reflects the way many emotive interpreters positioned themselves as more progressive due to their experiences within the brony community, as well as the position of privilege that many bronies came from—being that they were themselves largely cisgender and heterosexual and had not needed to consider the plight of LGBT individuals.
The lessons of the show run counter to societal messages men often receive about masculinity. Instead of competition and dominance, empathy, acceptance, and cooperation are promoted as the ideal regardless of gender. Of course, “softer” forms of masculinity do not necessarily challenge power structures, but may instead reinforce inequality while obscuring privilege (Heath 2003; Messner 2007). This becomes particularly clear in the case of participants who reinterpreted the imagery of the show to make it primarily about men and their interests.
Aggrieved Remixers
Unlike emotive interpreters’ emphasis on expression and connectivity, aggrieved remixers reinterpreted the symbols of My Little Pony to assert hegemonic masculinity. These men reported being drawn to My Little Pony primarily out of a desire for entertainment rather than to fill an emotional need; and they often discovered the show because it was popular online or through friends. Some initially watched the show as a joke, but this eventually led to sincere enjoyment. Fan-made artwork and fanfiction were often more important to these men than the show itself, meaning that the symbols and imagery of the show were more important to these men than its themes.
By reinterpreting the show through the sexualization of characters or introduction of violent themes, aggrieved remixers reinterpreted the show to be more congruent with conventional entertainment aimed at cis men, which is often (hetero)sexually explicit, violent, or gory. However, regardless of the specifics, it had the effect of asserting the adult nature of online and in person spaces in which it was present and, by extension, men’s power within those spaces.
An example of this reinterpretation at work at the conventions was the “Artist Alley After Dark,” a late-night vendor hall where pornographic or “not safe for work” (NSFW) art was sold at Trotcon. This room was otherwise set up like a smaller version of the usual vendor hall, the only difference was that all of the art for sale took the form of highly sexualized cartoons. I described the event as follows in my field notes: Behind the first booth is a man in his mid-20s drawing in a sketchbook…he has a portfolio in front of him displaying some of his prints. It is open to a picture of Rainbow Dash with her legs spread showing off her genitalia. The next table seemed to be hosting a mini-party of their own and had a huge stash of alcohol taking up one side of the table and a handwritten sign that read “shots here! Alcohol free with ID”…this isn’t just where people buy art, it’s also where they are coming to hang out, drink, and leisurely browse.
The after-hours party atmosphere at the conventions was a draw for some men. Luke (White, 19) described the Artist Alley After Dark as “thrilling” because people were open about what they were into, even if others might find it weird. He said that he got drunk the first time at a room party and then went to buy a NSFW body pillow. The point of the Artist Alley After Dark for him was not the art itself, but more the atmosphere of sexual openness and heterosexual fun. At the same time, the titillation of these late-night events was less about sexual attraction than it was the fraternity-like atmosphere. For example, there was an event in which “badly written pony erotica” was read aloud for laughs and mocked by panelists. Being able to drink and sexualize “girls,” even if those girls were cartoon ponies, was perceived as just being a fun part of homosocial bonding with other men (Bird 1996).
The significance of cartoon ponies being the objects of this sexualization should not be understated. None of the participants expressed sexual interest in the sexualized art. Instead, men discussed it was being “funny” or “fun.” Though participants did not express the discourse of shame and sexual failure reported by Bailey and Harvey’s (2017) study of the MLP board on 4chan, men simultaneously described enjoying the sexualized imagery while distancing themselves from it. For these men, it was important to let me know that this was “fun,” not serious and not a fetish—similar to the abject sexuality in Bailey and Harvey’s study. The purpose of the sexualized artwork in convention spaces, however, also represented an assertion of men’s presence and the privileging of heterosexual desires within the community.
All of the conventions had a “keep it PG” rule during the day, manifested in signs asking attendees not to swear and censoring of NSFW art in the vendor hall. Though some sexualized material still made it into the vendor hall during the day (i.e. body pillowcases of scantily clad anthropomorphized ponies), this was policed by convention staff and sometimes covered up or taken down. For instance, a booth selling t-shirts that said “hung like a horse” was told to put a small post-it note over the “n” in “hung” on their display shirt in order to comply with convention rules. Still, the themes of some of the conventions were less “family friendly” than others. The theme of Trotcon in 2017 was “Fallout Equestria,” a reference to a popular fanfiction that places ponies in the postapocalyptic world of Fallout, a first-person shooter video game. The convention hall at Trotcon was decorated with ponies dressed in armor with guns and many attendees wore paintball armor and other quasi-military attire. Even as sexualized images were censored by convention organizers, violent themes were allowed or encouraged, even during the day.
In general, guns and fighting were popular themes in men’s costumes and artwork at all four conventions I studied. Men often blended cutesy imagery of the show with military themes. For instance, men dressed in purple camouflage and paintball armor carrying airsoft rifles painted pink with butterflies on the magazine intended to evoke Fluttershy’s “cutie mark” (design on the character’s hindquarters). Such blending was discussed by participants as a fun way of merging their interests, though it was also a way of asserting hegemonic masculinity while embracing the aesthetics of the show. Guns in particular are powerful symbols of masculinity, and their presence asserted masculinity within these spaces.
In addition to art and costumes, fanfiction was an important way that men reinterpreted the show. Fanfiction may be viewed as a way of rewriting a show to be “more responsive to [one’s] needs, in order to make it a better producer of personal meanings and pleasures” (Jenkins 1988). Fanfiction was originally written by women as a way of creating feminist role models and exploring stories and themes unavailable to them in mainstream entertainment (Jenkins 1988). Men’s MLP fanfiction serves a similar purpose, creating stories that are more responsive to men’s interests and needs. However, in doing so, they also often actively dismantle the feminist themes of the show, ironically doing exactly the opposite of early women’s fanfiction. That is, instead of reinterpreting entertainment dominated by men to give voice to previously untold and unexplored women’s stories and/or perspectives, men are taking a show for girls and rewriting it to be about men’s stories, perspectives, and experiences.
An example of the centering of men’s stories and perspectives can be found in a popular category of fanfiction that inserts Anonymous—a generic everyman who serves as a stand-in for the reader—into the world of My Little Pony or, conversely, has the ponies enter his world. Luke (White, 18) described one of these stories that he particularly enjoyed called “Adopting Fluttershy” about a man who adopts a character from the show. According to Luke, the main character tries to be a good dad, but is eventually convicted of sexually molesting Fluttersy; though he was set up because “the girl he was dating was a crazy bitch and was essentially trying to lock him up.” The fact that one of the characters form the show is in the story is almost completely irrelevant. Fluttershy’s character is a passive participant who could be any young girl; her thoughts and feelings are not central to the story. Instead, the story is about a man cast as a sympathetic victim of charges of sexual abuse. Though this is an extreme example of flipping the script of the show, it is illustrative of the trend as a whole.
Through reinterpreting the show, aggrieved remixers diffused the feminist characteristics that most threatened hegemonic masculinity through recentering men in My Little Pony. Given that the show was intended to be empowering for girls, it is meaningful that many men collectively reduce the characters to sexual objects or deny them agency in art and
The Gender Politics of Bronies
Men’s engagement with My Little Pony and the brony community corresponded with divergent perspectives on gender. Emotive interpreters expressed a greater awareness of gender inequality and sensitivity to women’s experiences. In contrast, aggrieved remixers compensated for their proximity to gay or feminine aesthetics by emphasizing heteromasculine aspects of the fandom. That is, babes, booze, and guns. These men also expressed views that were either explicitly or implicitly antifeminist. Aggrieved remixers both downplayed their own privilege (and men’s privilege more generally) and expressed anxieties about masculinity rooted in a perception of women’s gains at the expense of men.
Men’s perceptions of gender were apparent in their responses to the question of whether they thought being a brony as a man was different from being a brony as a woman. Brandon (White, 29), an emotive interpreter, was particularly sensitive to the issues he felt women likely faced in the brony community, stating: Yes [it is different], if nothing else because of demographics. The conventions at least are heavily skewed male. I work in software, which is an even more heavily skewed industry and, you know, have heard some of the tales of how that affects women, people who are in a minority demographic of that culture. Just stuff I’d never think of…having people talk over you…getting passed up for stuff. People question your competence and expect you not to be assertive. All kinds of terrible things you hear about as a guy and you’re like “wow”…I would love to talk to female bronies and have them say “nope, everything is wonderful, I feel like one of the herd,” I just don’t expect that to be the case.
Emotive interpreters also expressed a more expansive view of masculinity, though one that did not meaningfully challenge hegemonic masculinity. As Thomas (Black, 38) explained, “I’m definitely manly and masculine, but I’m also in touch with my femininity, which is why I’m not afraid, why I’m not telling that guy over there that he should not be wearing that dress.” He identified men who judged other men’s gender presentations as being insecure in their own masculinity and being “in touch with his femininity” as bolstering his own claims to masculinity. A lack of concern with being perceived as masculine, as a result of self-professed confidence in one’s own masculinity was echoed by Josh (White, 27), who stated that, “I’m not really interested in being masculine…I don’t feel that concerned with whether or not people perceive me as masculine.” Emotive interpreter’s lack of investment in being perceived as masculine was a way of symbolically distancing themselves from hegemonic masculinity. At the same time, this distancing from hegemonic masculinity was itself a way of bolstering men’s masculine credentials and used as evidence of their security in their heterosexuality and masculinity.
In discussing gender in the community, aggrieved remixers often discussed gender primarily in terms of the stigma faced by bronies for being men who liked something intended for girls. This was utilized to construct a sense of victimization. Cody (White, 18) described the stereotype of bronies as being “older, probably overweight, neckbeard, probably live in [their] parents’ basement, got nothing to do, that kind of thing. I’m sure people think it’s a pedophile thing. Gay, too feminine, something like that.” These stereotypes were gendered, implying that men who like My Little Pony must be sexual deviants or social outcasts. The positioning of men as victims was particularly clear in the way such men discussed the differences between men and women in the community, as they often contrasted the stigma faced by men to what they perceived as women’s freedom to like the show without criticism. As John (White, 26) put it, “girls can get away with anything…they can probably have all the [My Little Pony merchandise] on them that they want, in public, and not get mocked…but us guys, we’ve gotta watch out for everybody.” Similarly, Liam (White, 37) echoed this sentiment, saying, “girls don’t have to deal with that stigma, they can like [My Little Pony] and no one cares.” These men were not reflective about the root causes of these differences, attributing them to women’s ability to “get away with anything” rather than identifying the stigma against men’s femininity as related to the patriarchy.
Aggrieved remixers also distanced themselves from male privilege by asserting that the community was completely egalitarian, suggesting that bronies were above gender inequality—the gender equivalent of “I don’t see race.” When asked about gender within the community, Luke (White, 18) explained that while “people are sexist” in the wider society, “in terms of the brony community, there’s no sexism.” By aligning themselves with a community that purported to be equal, men were able to strategically claim to be unrelated to the problem of sexism. For some men, this went even further by claiming a gender-blind attitude. Cody (White, 18) stated, “I’m not really interested in gender and race…I think people are just people. Gender and race aren’t really worth thinking about, there are just bigger things to think about.” In this way, Cody could ignore gender inequality while claiming to be egalitarian. This is similar to the “abstract egalitarianism” frame espoused by many men’s rights organizations (Palmer & Subramaniam 2017).
Men contrasted egalitarianism with feminism, which many aggrieved remixers claimed to be against equality. Cody stated that he considers My Little Pony to be the opposite of a feminist show because it promotes equality, saying that feminism now feels that “equal is not good enough anymore, they want more.” He added: It is more difficult to be a man these days because there’s a two-to-one chance a woman will be hired [for a job] because there’s pressure to hire women, so you don’t have a chance of getting a job if you’re a man. Now they are trying to focus on women’s education and stuff like that more than men’s. It’s getting to a point where it’s getting kind of ridiculous, where it’s hard to be a man without feeling that you’re doing something wrong.
Anxiety about the state of masculinity as a response to feminism was shared by several aggrieved remixers. Austin (White, 25) flatly stated that he is “very antifeminist.” He explained: “I want equality for women, but I think getting rid of things like due process, having different expectations for girls and guys, I think those are quite toxic, but that’s exactly what modern feminism is.” Interviews were conducted during a time when the #MeToo movement was in the news, and men often expressed concern about sexual harassment claims. This is illustrated in Austin’s reference to “due process,” as well as John’s (White, 26) passing comment referring to “all the lawsuits coming across for men doing things men do.” Though John declined to elaborate about what he meant, Austin discussed his concern at length: A lot of feminists are able to, on the mere accusation, completely cripple men’s careers. And that is actually going on now…many private companies are firing people for mere allegation when no, we live in a society where rule of law is supposed to exist, and an accusation is not proven…that’s what I mean where masculine traits are being turned into a hindrance…like now if I’m in a conversation with any woman, I actually have to record those conversations and document them for later in case they come back on me to prove that nothing sexual has been said. So, in that sense, yes, it is harder to be a man.
Anxiety about masculinity and the difficulty of being a man in society extended beyond a sense of threat. Some aggrieved remixers expressed concern about not being able to attain the masculine ideal, which they described as being athletic, strong, and financially stable. While Jordan (White, 22), who was in the process of joining the Navy, was able to achieve the first two masculine qualities, he found financial success elusive. When asked what it meant to be a man, he argued that it required “taking on a little more brute force responsibilities, picking up jobs, don’t be some bum in your mom’s basement.” After some hesitation, he admitted that he still lived with his parents, but added that he “helps pay what I can.” He described a history of struggling to make ends meet and being laid off, which is what led him to the military. Being able to be a provider was a key aspect of masculinity for him, one which he struggled to accomplish. Similarly, Nathan (White, 19) considered “being responsible for yourself” a central tenant of masculinity. At the same time, he found that because of what he perceived as a flagging economy, “financially it is more difficult to be a man these days.”
None of the men above discussed their anxiety about masculinity as influencing their interest in My Little Pony. Instead, they described being drawn to the show because it was popular, fun, and provided community. However, how they interacted with the community was shaped by their gender politics. Men who were anxious about the erosion of traditional masculinity engaged with the show and the community in a way that distanced themselves from privilege while creating a space where they could be dominant. By transforming the show into something about men, they created a space for themselves where they held power, a space organized around their interests where they could enact a fantasy of dominance. The sexualization of the characters diffused the threat of feminine empowerment that they were intended to represent while also creating a fraternity-like environment where men could celebrate hegemonic masculinity. The addition of violent themes allowed them to similarly celebrate masculinity and to communicate ownership of the space through the introduction of masculine symbols, such as guns.
The prosocial values of the show were important to embrace for emotive interpreters, and the open-mended, “come as you are” ethos was apparent at conventions. It was not unusual to see people dressed in fursuits (animal mascot costumes common among the furry subculture) or drag, both of which the community seemed to accept or even celebrate. Signage often proclaimed that the conventions were spaces where participants could be themselves and reinforced the show’s messages of love and tolerance. However, the community as a whole did not passively parrot the messages of the show, but instead co-opted and transformed them. For instance, a popular slogan on buttons and apparel (as well as online memes), is “I’m going to love and tolerate the shit out of you,” demonstrating an injection of aggression into My Little Pony’s values.
While there were two distinct groups who held differing perspectives on gender, aggrieved remixers appeared to dominate the conventions. Sessions on emotional well-being and self-improvement were present at every convention, and such sessions certainly appeared to be both gender inclusive and “safe spaces” in which people connected on an emotional level—there were even sessions on unlearning toxic masculinity. However, these attracted far fewer crowds than sessions on more hegemonically masculine topics such as “Ungulate Fighting 101” (a panel about a fan-made fighting video game featuring ponies) or “Keep Calm and Kill the Princesses: How I Learned to Love Stable 005” (about Fallout Equestria). Though emotive interpreters made up nearly half my sample, they either were not the majority at conventions or not as loud. In this way, aggrieved remixers largely shaped the atmosphere at conventions and, as such, the brony community as a whole.
Based on ethnographic observations, women existed on the margins at the conventions. Those on panels were often tokenized or romantically linked to high-profile men within the community. Additionally, women largely disappeared from the conventions after 9pm, suggesting a discomfort with the fraternity-like atmosphere of late-night sessions. Some emotive interpreters spoke to these issues, expressing concern about the idea that bronies might alienate the intended audience of the show. Josh lamented the “sense of entitlement” of “adult male fans that just kind of assume the show is only for them.” NSFW content in particular was a point of division among men in the community, especially the concern that kids would stumble upon it. Although such content was widely available at conventions, emotive interpreters insisted that it was part of the “darker side of the fandom” more generally and perpetuated by a small minority. The creation of a dichotomy of “good” versus “bad” bronies allowed emotive interpreters to position themselves as “the good guys,” set apart from the problem of gender inequality in the community. And despite the insistence that the practices enacted by aggrieved remixers were part of a small minority, either in numbers or influence, these men were actually the majority.
Conclusion
These findings demonstrate variation in how men construct hybrid masculinities through their engagement with feminized media. The two groups I describe above, emotive interpreters and aggrieved remixers, are substantively different and stemmed from two distinct perspectives on masculinity and feminism. Hybridity is always understood as containing multiple practices. However, the practices of aggrieved remixers reinforced power in ways that have not been widely discussed in the literature on hybrid masculinities—particularly in incorporating femininities in an explicitly antifeminist manner. If Bridges and Pascoe (2014) are correct in asserting that hybrid masculinities are an increasingly common way for men to respond to shifts in power structures, then as scholars we must unpack what these practices mean for the future of gender and power relations.
Emotive interpreters fit with much of the previous work on hybrid masculinities, utilizing the brony community as a space that expanded the norms for men around emotional expression without “challenging the systems of inequality from which they emerge” (Bridges 2014, 80). These men were also able to distance themselves from privilege by aligning themselves with a “gender defying fandom” that celebrated loves and tolerance, and by contrasting themselves with “bad bronies” who appropriated the show instead of taking its messages to heart. While these men had more profeminist views and claimed that the show transformed them or made them “better,” they illustrate how men can adopt the veneer of progressive masculinity through their participation in fandom surrounding feminized media.
Aggrieved remixers engaged in the type of reinterpretation and revision common to fandom, refashioning the show to be more relevant to their interests and needs as adult, heterosexual men. These practices have historically been associated with women writing themselves into masculinized, mainstream media. In this case, men are writing themselves into feminized media, resulting in the juxtaposition of guns and cartoon ponies. The introduction of the heterosexual male gaze through graphic fan art depicting female characters, as well as the infusion of violent themes, asserted hegemonic masculinity. These men expressed a sense of men’s victimhood, and they used the stigma against men’s femininity, specifically as it related to stereotypes about bronies, as evidence of this victimization. Crucially, these men identified feminism, not patriarchy, as the root of their victimization. As part of this, they aligned themselves with reactionary, men’s rights-oriented gender politics.
The current scholarship on hybrid masculinities has primarily focused on how privileged men incorporate marginalized gender expressions to enact symbolic distance between men and hegemonic masculinity. In the case of bronies, however, the gender politics of the community as a whole were shaped by aggrieved remixers, despite the presence of those enacting hybrid masculinities in a more conventional way. The brony phenomenon may be viewed as a form of appropriation or co-option, taking a potential empowering show for girls and making it about men. The consequences of hybrid masculinity in this case transcend abstract reinforcement of power, highlighting how men can incorporate marginalized gender performances—including engaging with feminized media—as an explicitly antifeminist project.
Footnotes
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank the editors and anonymous reviewers, as well as Linda Renzulli, Jo Reger, Rachel Einwohner, Carolyn Perrucci, and Trenton Haltom for their helpful comments on previous drafts of this article.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests
The author declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
