Phallic metaphors and metonyms: Emerging meanings of Viagra and masculinity in news media

Symptoms of masculinity

Associated with specific traits, behaviors and aesthetic expressions, masculinity is often investigated as a matter of identity that pertains to both structural and social inequalities between men, and between men and women. As Jonathan Allan argues, it is “as if, somehow, masculinity is always already known” (2018: 185), as more dominant forms of masculinity are argued to lie in the flight from all things feminine, engendering masculinity and femininity with almost universal and static qualities. Contemporary studies on men and masculinity have often foregrounded how masculinity has multiplied into a broad range of typologies and ideals over time that men “may adhere, reject, or attempt to resist” through “their own engagement with a masculine identity” (Waling, 2019: 364). Such typologies prioritize focusing on how men navigate masculine norms and ideals that (re)direct men’s gendered embodiment according to the specific limitations and potentials that men are subjected to at different times and in specific contexts, centering masculinity as a matter of identity work inherent to the lives of men. In this article, I instead aim to shift the focus to the distributed nature of masculinity by drawing on Campana’s approach to masculinity as a “connectivity” (2015: 694) that arises in relations between human and non-human actors. I do so in combination with Fox and Alldred’s work on sexuality as an assemblage, which further highlights sexuality not as a characteristic of the individual body, but as a “productive flow of affect that links human and non-human” (2013: 781), to investigate how masculinity is assembled in news media in relation to mentions of Viagra.

Campana argues that masculinity emerges “through the connections between a series of objects and actors,” of which none “is the sole repository of masculinity” (Campana, 2015: 694). According to Campana, the distributed nature of masculinity lies in how it is “shared across bodies,” in which any one man’s claim to masculinity is not integral to him, but rather a “symptom” of “the composite of a larger set of masculinities” (Campana, 2015: 694). Campana hereby argues that while individual men may offer up accounts of how they navigate and manage their “individual masculine styles, identities and bodies,” these are reliant on “arts of management that are wide in scope and extending beyond the monitoring or care of individual selves and flesh” (2015: 693). In a similar vein, I consider the ways in which human and non-human actors become imbued with masculine phallic qualities as symptomatic of larger trends in the assembling of masculinity in relation to the medicalization of sexuality.

Engaging with the insights of Campana in combination with the concept of assemblage as developed by Gilles Deleuze and Félix Guattari (1987), Anna Hickey-Moody further argues that this focus on connectivity allows for a reading of masculinity as located in the “connections between things that are then identified as masculine” (2019: 42). Central to her approach is that the lived “experience of being a man is shaped by ideas of what ‘men’ are supposed to be like,” and these ideas are not emergent within the individual but rather governed by “media discourses and institutional expectations” that “teach gender ideals every day,” as a making of “assemblages of masculinity that interpolate bodies through systems of affect,” creating “particular capacities to act” (Hickey-Moody, 2019: 58). Within this framework, embodied acts such as penetrative sex can serve as a way “to prove or sustain masculine status,” but it is dependent on the co-constitutive relations between “social, geographical, and emotional geographies and material bodies” (Hickey-Moody, 2019: 2) to emerge as acts of masculinity. With Fox and Alldred’s (2013) work on sexuality as an assemblage, it is possible to extent this point – within the framework of assemblage, penetrative sex itself can be understood not as a result of an inner authentic sexuality unfolding, but rather a sexual capacity that is produced within the human body through the “affective flow between within assemblages of bodies, things, ideas and social insitutions” (2013: 770). Furthermore, the very status of Viagra as medicine intertwined in such flow, is not solely dependent on its chemical compounds, but on how “a tissue is affected, and how that effect is judged by human observers” (2013: 772).

Hickey-Moody points to how assemblages can be both conceptual and material at once, composed of the relations between material phenomena and ideas that do not emerge in any one location, which means that “discursive formations have a co-constitutive relationship to the material world” (Hickey-Moody, 2019: 38). Within this framework, one can comprehend the material world through its connectedness with “collective assemblages of enunciation” — or “through thought that expresses the material form” (Hickey-Moody, 2019: 38). This emphasis on the assembling of masculinity as a matter of connections is central to the present study, as masculinity emerges in relation to mentions of Viagra in media through the establishing of connections between Viagra and various actors and objects that are then engendered as masculine, enabled by enunciations of (im)potency that may build on human qualities, but here expand to encompass areas of the material world that are non-human, yet conceptualized through human qualities. However, this does not mean that masculinity and masculine sexual capacities are “unbounded” – they constitute highly territorialized sites, which, as I go on to demonstrate, is evident in the “limited repertoire” (Fox and Alldred, 2013: 781) of practices and identities available.

In this process, I furthermore turn to the work of Lakoff and Johnson (1980), as I find language is central in the governing of masculinity and in the enunciations of masculinity in relation to Viagra in news media. Specifically in relation to the workings of metaphors and metonymies as ways to conceptualize and create our social, cultural, and material realities. According to Lakoff & Johnson, the “human conceptual system is metaphorically structured and defined,” but metaphors are “not just a matter of language, that is, of mere words” (1980: 6). Metaphorical concepts allow us to grasp the world, making it possible to understand and experience “one kind of thing in terms of another” (1980: 5), whereas metonymic concepts use one entity to refer to another that is “related to it” (1980: 35). In examining metaphors and metonymies, one can thus gain insight into the connections that are deemed culturally intelligible, and what parts of a whole that become key to our understanding of a phenomenon; in this case, in news articles. Thus, metaphors not only order the world, but directs our attention, and through this, metaphors can guide our actions, insofar as they create our social realities (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980) — or, within a framework of assemblage, they may enunciate possible capacities for action. In the analysis, I therefore pay specific attention to how masculinity is assembled, as the circulation of Viagra is invoked as a metaphorical and metonymic concept that gives rise to reconfigurations of masculinity that foreground (im)potency, guiding our attention to specific parts of the male body in the assembling of masculinity in the connections established between human and non-human actors, which, in turn, becomes imbued with meaning.

The early news coverage of Viagra in Denmark

In 1998, Viagra was presented as a sensational new discovery in Danish news media, repeating international claims about the so-called Viagra effect. For example, one article claims that: “Some experts are so excited about the Viagra effect that they predict an increased life expectancy among men, because the quality of their lives will improve significantly” (Ulveman, 1998); another that it is “very likely that Viagra will result in more adultery, further prostitution, and increase the number of divorces” (B.T., 1998). Descriptions of the “discovery” of Viagra is also presented alongside its anticipated potential for both treatment and profit that further expands the findings of Loe (2004) concerning the initial US media coverage of Viagra, insofar as the Danish media also picked up on “Pfizer’s ‘official Viagra story,’ complete with market optimism about Viagra, Pfizer-generated statistics and scientific rhetoric” (Loe, 2004: 55).

In 1998, we are also introduced to a number of men’s opinions on and experiences with Viagra, and become acquainted with a wide range of affective responses to the drug: For example, Hugh Heffner is quoted for attributing Viagra with a sexual performance resembling what “you would like to think you could do in your 20s and 30s” (Pedersen, 1998), and in a personal portrait interview in Politiken, we hear of “Finn Hansen,” who argues that Viagra has already “revolutionized” his sex life:

..I was so happy when I was offered to become a test subject. The pills have not given me any side effects at all. They have been a revolution for our sex life, says Finn and smiles lovingly to his wife in the leather couch in their home in North Zealand. —Yes, it would have been incredibly empty to simply hold hands for the rest of our lives, she smiles back. The pills have given her husband back his self-confidence. (Svanholm, 1998).

The interview builds anticipation around the potentially revolutionizing effects of Viagra and promotes potential effects of Viagra on men’s sex life, and life in general, as the subject in question has not only regained his ability to get erect, but also regained his “self-confidence” and intimacy with his wife, demonstrating a process of “domestication” of the consumption of pharmaceuticals as Viagra here becomes intertwined with intimate parts of domestic life (Fox and Ward, 2008). In 1998, the speculations about the impact of Viagra also become linked to a wide range of effects separate from the human body, such as the preservation of animals, as certain species that are claimed to be popular in exoticized remedies for male potency may now be spared, as argued under humorous headlines such as “Why rhinos recommend Viagra” (Politiken, 1998). As Viagra became of interest to Danish news media, Viagra thus also became connected to a wide range of effects — and affects — that reached beyond individual men’s sex life, mirroring the emphasis on “affective health” and “affective potency” that is central to the marketing of lifestyle drugs and Pfizer’s own marketing of Viagra (Swenson, 2008).

However, over time, as Viagra continues to circulate in news media, its relevance no longer primarily pertains to its workings as a new pharmaceutical. As argued later on, the articles from 1998 primarily point to the widespread success of these narratives, even in countries such as Denmark in which direct-to-consumer advertising is not allowed (contrary to the US and New Zealand), but the news coverage in 2008 and 2018 point to how Viagra emerges to conceptualize human and non-human actors through a lens of potency. In the following, I focus on how the circulation of Viagra in Danish media points to the emergence of a new phenomenon in which pharmaceuticals in themselves come to function as metaphors to conceptualize objects, people, and other phenomena reassembling masculinity in relation to contemporary cultural anxieties about gender and sex.

The rise of Viagra as a metaphor

In 2008, we see how Viagra is increasingly mentioned as a proxy for other phenomena that have little to do with its chemical properties. For example, Viagra come to function as an “orientational metaphor” (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980: 14). According to Lakoff and Johnson, orientational metaphors give concept to spatial orientations that “arise from the fact that we have bodies of the sort we have and that they function as they do in our physical environment” (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980: 14). In the case of Viagra, the pharmaceutical brand name emerges as an orientational metaphor when functioning as a proxy for rising. The potential physical effects of Viagra’s chemical compounds, and its ability to “rise” the penis, is used as an onset to humorously describe things that are presented as in need of being “raised”. For example, rather than saying that stocks are not rising, it is noted that “There isn’t much damn Viagra on the stock market these days” (Høy, 2008). Similarly, the coming of spring, and its ability to raise one’s mood, is described as “nature’s answer to Viagra” (Rosendal, 2008). Another example lies in an article including a quote of Italy’s prime minister at the time Silvio Berlusconi, as he has allegedly said that a new building was looking “impotent,” thus being “in need of Viagra” (Akbar, 2008).

This use of Viagra as an orientational metaphor reproduces a more general tendency in the workings of metaphors in which “up” is often associated with a wide range of positive affects and states of being. For example, happiness, control, and status are generally perceived as an upwards orientation, such as: “high spirits,” “he couldn’t rise above his emotions,” or “his power rose” (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980: 15-17). As Lakoff and Johnson (1980) have argued, such orientational metaphors are rooted in both our physical and cultural experiences, and, in the present example of “Viagra-as-rising,” we see how it is not only the male erection that becomes imbued with cultural meaning through the circulation of Viagra in media —the metaphorical workings of Viagra further reproduce a cultural notion of the erection as a stand-in for power, success, and progress. However, whereas the examples of Lakoff and Johnson (1980) show how metaphors are embodied, as they emphasize the functions of the body, I here expand these insights by arguing that the circulation of pharmaceutical brands and processes of medicalization can impact how we understand the physical world, and in addition the development of the metaphors we use to conceptualize it. In other words, when we modulate our physical capabilities, our metaphors may change.

The potential physical effects of Viagra do not only pertain to the physical act of rising, but also to other physical phenomena, for example as a proxy for hypermasculine hardness, growth, and pleasure in the description of specific objects. Viagra’s linking with penile hardness and growth gives rise to several mentions that conceptualize various forms of machinery that are hereby coded as masculine. For example: “Together with the potent edges of the hood of the car, it is visual Viagra, which gives the driver a sense of sitting in a much bigger car” (Velling and Haugaard, 2008), or: “the deep growl peps you up, and accelerations and overtakes are pure Viagra for the soul” (Skaaning and Larsen, 2008). Similarly, the interwovenness between masculine potency and hardness with Viagra emerges in the description of a car, as masculinity emerges in the connections between different elements:

This car is testosterone on wheels, Viagra beat into steel from Stuttgart, and muscle power of the kind you only find in gyms with shady back rooms and anabolic steroids in the pill jars. Macho is the only term that covers it. (Velling and Haugaard, 2008).

In examples such as these, in the invocation of Viagra as metaphor, the findings of Loe become particularly relevant, as Loe has argued that Viagra was originally presented as a “biotechnological wonder” (2001: 114), which, early on, became associated with a variety of technological metaphors. According to Loe, both consumers and medical professionals made comparisons between the workings of Viagra with cars, steel, or weapons, here attributing “masculine characteristics such as power, resilience, hardness, and strength to the Viagra penis,” through which they came to construct “Viagra as a tool for producing masculinity, and enforcing social meanings” (Loe, 2001: 115). Thus, the initial metaphors employed to conceptualize the workings of Viagra and its effects on our understanding of men’s sexual function, continue to circulate — albeit in new ways further distanced from its function as a pharmaceutical with a potential to affect human tissue. In Danish media, this is illustrated in the workings of these metaphors for a wide range of objects and, as I will argue in the following, also for men.

“Human Viagra”: Flaccid and failed, or hard and successful?

The use of Viagra as metaphor is not limited to physical objects; it also emerges in descriptions of men. Here, the invocation of Viagra as metaphor and metonymy in relation to specific men (or groups of men) also come to demarcate the lines between masculine failures and successes through its associations with both potency and impotence.

The mentions of Viagra in Danish media can, among other things, be used to say something about aging men and masculinity. In one example, the Danish tv channel “TV 2 Charlie,” which is known for primarily targeting an elderly audience, is labeled “the-blue-hair-and-Viagra-channel” (Palle, 2018). Here, Viagra becomes a proxy for elderly men. We also repeatedly hear about Viagra in relation to Hugh Hefner: Introducing a series about the playboy, it is mentioned how he is “still fighting fit,” “servicing his interchangeable harem,” with “the help of Viagra” (Ekstra-Bladet, 2008). With the sentence “well done, Hef,” such potent achievements are framed as celebratory. In another example, a (positive) review of a concert with the singer Tom Jones, who had his musical breakthrough back in the 60’s, the title reads: “The sound of Viagra” (Treo, 2018). While Viagra is not mentioned a single time in the article itself, it becomes a stand-in for Tom Jones in the headline, which serve as a case of metonymy. According to Lakoff & Johnson, metonymy is closely related to the metaphor, but it “serves the function of providing understanding” through the use of “one entity to stand for another,” in this case Viagra as a stand-in for an elderly, but capable performer (1980: 36).

The choice of entity, as is the case with metaphors, are not simply random symbolism: It tells us something about how we understand the world, and the specific part that “we pick out determines which aspect of the whole we are focusing on” (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980: 35). Thus, by using Viagra as an entity for Tom Jones, his sexual vitality becomes emphasized as the dominant characteristic that defines him along with his age. Furthermore, since “metonymic concepts allow us to conceptualize one thing by means of its relation to something else” (1980: 39), it further emphasizes how such an assembling of masculinity is dependent on the repeated connectedness between specific ages, genders, things, and people, as to form such relations. Through this, cultural understandings of aging masculinity emerge, enabling metonymy, as well as metaphors, which foreground how potency is a central responsibility for aging men to remain “forever functional” (Marshall, 2002: 59). This conceptualization of aging masculinity should be understood in relation to contemporary dominant narratives about aging men and sexuality in which men are encouraged to consume sexuopharmaceuticals to maintain lifelong sexual function and “perform comparably to, or better than, younger versions of themselves” (Gurevich et al., 2017: 425).

The emphasis on potency as central in the presentation of aging men is also evident in descriptions of men of other ages. For example, the famous actor Wayne “The Rock” Johnson, a muscular, tattooed, and bald man, is depicted in a picture alongside a large caption reading “VIAGRA” across his chest. In the article, we learn that he is considered “a potency pill for any flaccid Hollywood movie” (Roliggaard, 2018). Here, Viagra becomes a metaphorical concept to emphasize success as a masculine accomplishment, as a stand-in for the actor. He is presented as an embodiment of masculine success in a constant state of potency that spills over into his surroundings.

However, Viagra can also be invoked to conceptualize failed masculinity. Take for example, the description of “Porno-Lasse,” a Danish male porn star attempting a comeback in 2018, in which he is described as “standing on a parking lot in the middle of nowhere by the entrance to a car dealership,” whilst holding a “carrier bag filled with beer cans,” as he exclaims that he has “taken Viagra today” (Kamp, 2018). In contrast to the imagery of “The Rock” he is instead depicted frantic and tired, rolling a joint or hanging over the railing of his balcony. In this case, Viagra is invoked to emphasize his impotence; his masculine failure to perform sexually, and more generally to perform successfully, as he is set up for failure in his attempts at a comeback in the porn industry. Central to the description is his need for Viagra to momentarily attempt to return to potency —not for sexual pleasure, but for success — yet he inevitably fails. He does not embody Viagra, why Viagra is not a stand-in for Porno-Lasse: He can consume Viagra, but he cannot be Viagra, and thus he inevitably returns to his default flaccid state, in both an affective and physiological sense.

The relations between Viagra and the portrayals of these men exemplify how Viagra can serve as a powerful metaphorical or metonymic concept that works to assemble masculinity by connecting Viagra with various human and non-human actors that then become valorized as masculine. Viagra thus invokes notions of “affective potency” (Swenson, 2008): Emphasizing sexual vitality despite aging, and a sexual vitality that far exceeds actual sexual acts, enables an assembling of masculinity in which the penis not only becomes a proving ground for masculinity, but where a hyper-potent trope is invoked to describe men who are always able to perform, as Viagra becomes a state of being, although it is not accessible to all men.