Manhood is an Environmentally Determined Socially Defined Concept

To be an individual and be respected as an individual in my opinion is the highest form of respect. Higher than to merely be a man or a woman, or to fit into a racial stereotype in order to win respect. To be truly respected as a person means you can be treated as a unique individual without any stereotyping getting in the way, without any gender expectations getting in the way.

Manhood in my opinion is environmentally determined, socially defined. In each society the environment is slightly different which means the social expectations are slightly different which means the definition of a man (based on expectations from childhood) will be different.

In 2019 gender is a threat to individualism

What do I mean by this? I mean to say that the concept of gender being biological is to try to remove the individual and force a certain identity. First let me provide some examples, in 2019 we have hormone treatments such as steroids. It may be true that biological males (defined as having YX chromosomes) is by probability likely to have higher testosterone levels throughout life than biological females (defined as having XX chromosomes). But we cannot define manhood by testosterone or hormone levels because any female can simply take steroids and have higher hormone levels than the average biological male and and any biological male can take hormones to have more hormones than the average biological female.

In other words due to technology there is no longer a biological limit to how much masculine or feminine hormones can be inside a person. So do we say a man on steroids is a "Superman"? No we don't because it's not determined by hormones or genes or testosterone level. Nor do we say female bodybuilders who take steroids are no longer female. This is because gender and biological sex are distinctly different.

The individual view

The individual view is simply to adapt to the environment in the best way possible. No need for gender, or race, or any designation. If a person is well adapted to an environment as an individual then they thrive in their environment. If they do not adapt well to the environment their their gender or race or how much or how little testosterone they have is not going to make a bit of difference. At the end of the day nature is about adaptation and technology helps the human species to adapt to the environment.

Humans who had to live in the mountains learned to make coats from animal skins and fur. Humans in the tropics or in the desert never needed to learn to make the same kind of clothing and instead had to figure out how to stay hydrated or how to deal with various wild animals. Humans who were hunter gatherers lived different from humans who were farmers. The role of each gender adapted according to what the needs were socially as determined by the environment they were in. Different tribes define manhood or womanhood in different ways because of the impact of culture.

As technology continues to evolve we will have different lifestyles. This means different requirements, roles, expectations. "Man" if the concept continues to exist, is always being updated and redefined. "Woman" also is always being updated and redefined. In other words it's not a static concept, and it's not universal across all cultures.

To be an individual first is to understand that being a "man" or a "woman" is merely a role taken as a means to an end. It's not the meaning of life for an individual to fit into these societal roles. The individual desires to simply be the best version of themselves regardless of these fixed roles. In other words if an individual is in a position where they have to take on the role traditional for men or for women then the individual can do so to some extent. Why? Because the goal of the individual isn't to "become a man" or "become a woman" or to act white or act black, or to act how others assume people of their demographic ought to act. The ideal of individualism is to be a unique person and be respected as a person.