Review of The Way of Men by Jack Donovan

The Way of Men Is a Trap: Violence, Brotherhood, and the Masculinity We Deserve Better Than

Jack Donovan’s The Way of Men has become something of a cult text in certain corners of the manosphere and alt-right-adjacent masculinity circles.

Lauded by some as a return to “true manhood” and criticized by others as dangerous pseudo-philosophy, the book centers on four tactical virtues—strength, courage, mastery, and honor—as the foundation of masculine identity. Donovan argues that masculinity is best understood not through cultural morality but through what men need from each other in survival-based, tribal environments.

At a surface level, some of these principles—particularly the value of brotherhood—may resonate with readers who long for connection in a world that increasingly atomizes men from one another. But once one looks beneath that appeal, The Way of Men reveals a far more troubling ideology: a vision of masculinity rooted not in complexity or pluralism, but in exclusion, violence, and a thinly veiled power-over framework.

Donovan’s emphasis on male bonding—what he calls the "gang"—is presented as the most authentic space for masculine expression.

In this vision, men are most alive when fighting for each other, physically defending a shared perimeter, and maintaining dominance hierarchies based on violence and competition. On one hand, it is true that men today are often starved for meaningful same-gender connection, and Donovan’s call to reclaim male intimacy (though never affection) taps into that absence.

But the brotherhood Donovan constructs is inherently walled off. His tribalism is exclusionary by design—only certain types of men are welcomed into this circle, and they must prove themselves through stoicism, aggression, and dominance. There is no room in his vision for vulnerability, care, or emotional depth. In fact, these are implicitly feminized and therefore treated as weaknesses.

As a anthropologist, the appeal of Donovan’s tribal masculinity is understandable, especially for men who have experienced alienation, emasculation, or emotional neglect at the hands of their fathers. Across cultures, when paternal care is absent or abusive, men often seek compensatory kinship patterns—fraternities, gangs, brotherhoods—where they can experience loyalty, structure, and a form of chosen belonging.

These “fictive kinships” are deeply embedded in human history: warrior bands, blood oaths, initiation rites, and male-only lodges have long offered a space for men to forge identity outside of family and state. Donovan taps into that primal longing—but redirects it into a closed circuit of violence, control, and suspicion.

What’s missing is the nuance that kinship doesn’t have to be based on force or fear. Male bonds can be both nurturing and strategic, both protective and affectionate. Donovan’s framework flattens this complexity, imagining all-male spaces as inherently militarized and emotionally austere. It doesn’t heal the father-wound; it merely builds a bunker around it.

Ironically, while Donovan vehemently disavows effeminacy and queerness, history tells a different story. Homoerotic and romantic bonds between men have been central to warrior cultures for centuries. In ancient Greece, the Sacred Band of Thebes was a military unit composed entirely of male lovers, based on the belief that men would fight more fiercely alongside those they loved. Samurai in feudal Japan engaged in wakashudō, a form of male mentorship and intimacy that often included sexual relationships. In parts of pre-colonial Africa, initiation schools among certain ethnic groups included ritualized same-sex bonding as part of warrior training.

These examples show that male physicality, brotherhood, and even sexuality have never been mutually exclusive. Love between men—whether platonic, erotic, or both—has historically strengthened rather than undermined masculine identity. Donovan’s refusal to acknowledge this lineage reflects not just historical ignorance, but an internalized fear that real connection might soften the hard edges he believes are essential to manhood.

It’s impossible to critically engage with The Way of Men without naming Donovan’s overt homophobia—an especially glaring irony given that Donovan is, himself, a gay man (tho he does not refer to himself as such.)

Rather than embrace a queer masculinity, Donovan disavows it, adopting an aggressive anti-effeminacy stance and asserting that men must avoid being seen as soft or "unmanly." Queerness is not merely absent—it is cast as antithetical to the warrior code.

This creates a deeply contradictory dynamic: Donovan preaches male camaraderie while also ensuring that it is never mistaken for anything intimate, loving, or emotionally connective. It reflects an internalized homophobia that warps male bonding into performative toughness, always vigilant, always armored. The result is a masculinity so brittle it collapses under the weight of actual human feeling.

At its core, Donovan’s book preaches a masculinity of control: control over one's emotions, control over others, and control over territory. He repeatedly emphasizes that to be a man is to be strong, forceful, and willing to kill. There is no space in this framework for intellectual or emotional nuance, for tenderness, for softness. In this world, to nurture is to be lesser. To seek peace is to be weak.

This model is not only reductive—it’s dangerous. It validates the idea that violence is essential to manhood, that power must be asserted over others, and that social complexity (e.g., multiculturalism, feminism, egalitarianism) is a threat to the natural order.

Donovan doesn’t argue for equality among men; he argues for hierarchy, with the strong at the top and the vulnerable at the bottom. Donovan’s masculinity is not a shared space—it is a dominion. His world is one where power is extracted, not cultivated; where survival requires subjugation; and where any deviation from his rigid script is met with suspicion or derision. There is no collective liberation in The Way of Men, only the freedom to dominate. His so-called return to primal values is not about connection—it is about conquest.

This "power-over" model is deeply regressive. It resurrects the worst instincts of patriarchal history and dresses them in tactical gear. In doing so, it turns legitimate critiques of modern masculinity’s aimlessness into justification for fear-driven exclusion, xenophobia, and control.

The Way of Men is not a manual for masculine flourishing. It is a manifesto for masculine containment—one that seduces its readers with promises of brotherhood and clarity but ultimately delivers rigidity, isolation, and suspicion of the other. Donovan offers a mirror, but only to a narrow slice of manhood, carefully curated to exclude the messy, the queer, the soft, the curious.

If masculinity is to thrive—not just survive—it must embrace plurality, compassion, and vulnerability as forms of strength. We need not build walls around brotherhood. We need to build bigger circles.

Masculinity doesn't need a gang. It needs a community.