The analysis of 360 comments among 24 different hockey fight videos revealed several prominent themes related to masculinity and violence. Toughness emerged as the most significant form of masculinizing discourse, with commenters praising players’ ability to play through injuries and commending their overall ruggedness. However, this valorization of toughness appears to be declining in more recent years. As perceptions of players’ toughness have waned, new problematic themes have arisen, including the use of feminizing and homophobic language to insult and critique players’ perceived lack of masculinity. Additionally, some commenters employed warlike rhetoric, comparing the hockey fights and players to soldiers and warfare in an effort to emphasize the violent, masculine nature of the sport. These three themes – toughness, feminizing/homophobic discourse, and war comparisons – shed light on how masculinity and violence are interpreted by hockey fans.
