I, for one, adore himbos and believe they deserve more recognition.

Urban Dictionary defines himbos as large attractive men who "tend to be not very bright, but usually extremely nice and respectful."

Notable himbos include Kronk from Emperor's New Groove, Sokka from Avatar: The Last Airbender, or Jason Mendoza in The Good Place. A himbo is the human version of a golden retriever — beautiful, incredibly well-intentioned, and dumb. Mr. Peanutbutter, the affable golden retriever in Bojack Horsemanwho manages to bumble through the series with little resistance from those around him, is the most literal interpretation of a himbo in pop culture.

But a Twitter user claimed the word "himbo" is problematic in a thoroughly ratio'd tweet on Sunday night.

"Himbo' is ableist," the tweet reads. "I find fetishizing someone's supposed lack of intelligence to be predatory. Why would you desire someone who seemingly has less power than you? Why is that sexy? Why is that different from praying on underage kids? It's not."

The tweet unleashed a flash flood of commentary around the word himbo, and what people find so appealing about them. As several Twitter users pointed out, the love for himbos isn't because of their lack of intellect, but their pure hearts and unabashed optimism.

The term "himbo" is adapted from its feminine counterpart, the bimbo. Derived from the word "bambino," Italian for child, the word bimbo was originally used to describe simple men as early as 1920. The word then became a misogynist barb against conventionally attractive women for being frivolous, with the portmanteau of "him" and "bimbo" applied to men in the 1980s. (Reclaiming the word bimbo, as a self-identified hot dumbass, is a whole other take.)

As a Tumblr user croons in a cover of Bonnie Tyler's "I Need A Hero," a himbo's "gotta be dumb and he's gotta be sweet, supportive, respectful, and kind."

Tweet may have been deleted

My roommate and I refer to the two cis male members of our quarantine bubble as our emotional support himbos. I call my cat, a 14-pound gentle giant who can't seem to figure out his puzzle feeder and instead waits for my three-month-old kitten to do the work for him, a sweet himbo. When I watched Netflix's The Half Of It, a movie about the blossoming friendship between a lovable but clueless high school jock and his introverted female classmate who pine for the same girl, I was delighted by the himbo representation.

Tweet may have been deleted

Tweet may have been deleted

A himbo is not to be confused with a simp, or men who will throw their support behind women in hopes of receiving sexual gratification. A himbo will support women not for the promise of sex, but because they genuinely believe in supporting women.

But what do actual self-identified himbos think of the discourse?

"Look whatever floats ur boat," Twitter user greyyerg4, who asked to go by his username for privacy reasons, wrote in a Twitter DM to Mashable. "If someone thinks I'm sexy cus I'm dumb that's cool."

For trans himbos, identifying with the word is gender affirming. Jeung Bok Holmquist, whose pronouns are he/they, said the idea of being a "hot dumb guy" is "very funny and appealing." By identifying as a himbo, he/they can let others know that he/they identifies with masculinity.

"The word himbo is just one of many dumb jokes I make about myself because like I said before, it is gender affirming to me and if I call myself a himbo then other people will begin to recognize that I like being called silly masculine names," Holmquist said in a Twitter DM. "Again it's a silly word! But it's something for me at least that's light hearted and silly about being trans."

Himboism is also tied to being as nonthreatening as possible. As Twitter user @sqiouyilu wrote in their himbo manifesto, a himbo is the "idealized safe man." Kam Burns began aligning with himbos because of his "helpless" way of flirting — before transitioning, he knew he could "get out of doing stuff by playing dumb" because he knew cis men "are actually really dumb and have massive egos."

"Since transitioning I keep forgetting that I can no longer be Like That and get away with it, but also I am a dumbass sometimes and I'm a bottom so it kinda fits with my whole chaotic 'IDK what I'm doing' persona I've created for myself," Burns said in a Twitter DM.

He added that he's "deeply afraid" of turning into the manipulative, controlling guys he used to date. Being a himbo is a rejection of toxic masculinity, while still embracing masculine traits.

"By that definition above, someone who's optimistic and assumes the best in everyone would have no motivation to manipulate or control others," Burns added. "I just feel like I very much give the impression that I don't know what I'm doing (cause a lot of the times I don't) as opposed to the way a lot of cis men are hyper-confident even when they maybe shouldn't be."

Celebrating himbos is simply celebrating a version of masculinity untainted by toxic aggression. Just as masculinity and femininity transcends gender identity, identifying as a himbo does as well. Anyone who is masc-aligned can be a himbo, so long as they are hot, dumb, and pure of heart. The social discussion surrounding himbos also spawned the gender-neutral term "thembo," for those who are non-binary but are still hot, dumb, and pure of heart.

A himbo may not be unintelligent. Much like their feminine counterparts, there are plenty of smart-in-other-ways himbos. Elle Woods in Legally Blonde, Hollywood's smartest bimbo, still embodied the unrelenting optimism and gullibility that many himbos also have.

That being said, calling someone a himbo without their input may be belittling, and you should wait until they identify with the word before doing so. But if you believe you're hot, dumb, and pure of heart, you might be a himbo.

And we love you for that.

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