Boys and men need to know they can express their feelings without being made fun of.

mrmensplights · 2019-08-31T18:50:58+00:00

Stop telling men they aren't allowed to cry

This 'men should cry more' line is anti-science. There is a hormone produced in the pituitary gland called prolactin which promotes emotional crying/tears. Women have 60% more prolactin than men. There is another chemical called testosterone that inhibits crying. Men have 8 times more of it than women. Men don't cry like women because of biology. People observing that 'not crying' is manly is observation of a stereotypical male trait. It isn't creating the situation but rather it's a reflection of it.

Fellas I want you to know it's ok to talk about your mental health

I agree - but because society places an inherent value on women, the mental health industry is very geared towards women. The APA has cared so little for men up until now that they didn't even bother to discuss or produce guidelines for dealing with them until this year. Unfortunately, those guidelines demonize men and embrace the concept of 'toxic masculinity'. Ironically, in a way, the guidelines tell men to 'man up'. (You think you got problems? You're a privileged oppressor class!)

Stop telling men to man up

Men have to man up. Society assigns no inherent value to men. A man who never 'mans up' ends up dead, homeless, and in a gutter - and no one cares. Women have no concept of how far men can fall in society. Women don't realise the 'safety net' really only applies to them.

Meyright2 · 2019-08-31T11:26:15+00:00

One of the most hideous concepts comes under the banner of caring and wanting to help men. Feminists have largely recognized that people don't care much about men who share their emotions or vulnerability.

Their solution: Men you have to learn to share your emotions more. You know, the way women do.

Am I the only one who sees how condescending and arrogant not to mention unfair that is? The presumption that women are superior at it and men just don't get it. If only men were as clever and evolved as women, all their problems would go away. But feminism is fighting sexism, you know.

Share your emotions like a woman - but deal with the negative consequences like a man!

Some feminists at least recognize that it's harder for men to do so. But then they'll quickly add "but it's up to them, not anyone else". Ironically they're not realizing that they're expecting a kind of stoicism from men: Namely that they take the negative consequences of sharing their emotions and deal with them.

Here's the reality that feminists don't (want to) know:

For women, vulnerability is an asset. For men it's a liability. (source)

and

Stop saying ‘men need to talk more’ How many times have you heard “if only men talked more, or were more like women, there’d be no problem?” Or worse, men don’t talk because of “toxic masculinity?” Both these unhelpful approaches blame men, and fundamentally miss the point that we don’t need to change the way men talk, we need to change the way we listen to men – and talk to them on their terms. Worse, if we place the onus on men to self-present to current care provision (which they are half as likely to utilise as women) then there is no incentive to change the care provision itself – which is the real task in hand. (Source)

I see this feminist talking point more and more and even around here and I can't stand it. Stop telling men to show emotions more like women! For women being vulnerable is an asset, for men it's an liability.

2019-08-31T16:28:48+00:00

Testosterone mitigates and moderates emotion, and with 18-20 times as much of that hormone as women have, we are never going to display the same aggregate behaviour for emotion that women will. Even if we could magically rig a world where men and women were raised 100% identically, we still wouldn't be as emotional as women are.

We're not robots, and we do have emotions, but we process them differently, have different triggers and levels, and holding us to female standards of emotion simply isn't fair. It's no more fair than holding women to male standards of physical performance. Those gaps both come from the same hormonal difference. We'll openly acknowledge the latter, because it's visible, but we'll pretend the former doesn't exist, and all we have to do to 'fix' men is to socialize them like women, despite both issues coming from the same root.

It's bullshit.

Yes, encourage men to talk about their mental health. No, don't blame it on 'telling men to man up' as if it's just a problem with socialization.

2019-08-31T16:28:57+00:00

Men are fine with expressing their emotions. Their issue lies with people refusing to lend support because of the claim that "Women have it worse" and "White men are privileged" while sipping from their "Male Tears" coffee mugs.

Why bother when all you ever hear is how you are responsible for the oppression of women and minorities.

BittyMitty · 2019-08-31T12:09:09+00:00

How about teach them how to cope with difficult situations?
Having an emotional outburst, certainly isn't the way to respond to adversity.

That's what you get, if you teach boys to behave like girls.

iloveyoudeft · 2019-08-31T17:18:29+00:00

Okay but I'm still not gonna talk about it. Why? Cause no one cares anyway 🙃

grandpa_stalin_37 · 2019-08-31T12:43:22+00:00

Dude you are supposed to say WOMAN aren't supposed to say "man up". If a dude you know tells you that it might be alright but when a girl says it she criticizes your masculinity.

nelsonbt · 2019-08-31T14:08:55+00:00

There are signs up at my work expressing tolerance for mental illness. I think they’re sincere on the part of the person who ordered them up.

Although it is conceivable that they are meant to virtue signal.

Even if the manager truly believes the sentiment, the sentiment is not universal. So when an employee calls in sick four days a week for depression, not every manager is enlightened in their response.

And when there are rules preventing discrimination, like removing someone who misses work for depression, humans are really resourceful when they consider fixing a problem to be mission critical and more important than a new progressive idea of tolerance. So they don’t get rid of an employee for discrimination. They find or manufacture another acceptable way to do it.

Which makes those signs about tolerance for mental health a trap. For this reason, men fully disclosing their troubles indiscriminately is also a trap.

2019-09-01T12:57:53+00:00

Well meaning, I get it but... This is such a nuts idea. It all just makes me feel like everyone’s taking crazy pills.

Surely this ‘men need to show their emotions’ theory should at least be thought about before people adopt it? Because it clearly hasn’t in any way at all.

When we suggest a theory isn’t the idea that we then look for evidence that refutes that theory? Then if we find any we re work the theory to fit the reality and try again or dispense with it? Right?

If men not expressing their emotions is the reason for the suicide rate then it would have spiked 150/200 years ago. The historical documentation of the Victorian era irrefutably shows men were far less willing to share and far more maligned for it back then. The weight of that evidence is frankly undeniable.

Moreover and more importantly this so called monopoly on emotions that feminists seem to be claiming is refuted immediately by one or two fairly well known bits of evidence. Shakespeare anyone? Beethoven? Mozart? Keats just really struggled to get in touch with and express his emotions did he? Lord Byron? Robert Frost? Like... Nearly all music with lyrics written by men? How is this obvious counter not front and center?

It’s just completely laughable as an idea which seems to actually have traction with apparently intelligent people from newspaper editors to politicians but it doesn’t require very much thought at all to show it can’t be the truth. How in the hell did we get here? Don’t buy this shit gents. Repeat after me...

There. Is. Nothing. Wrong. With. Men.

SiskinLanding · 2019-08-31T11:35:25+00:00

I stress this to my male friends all the time. The social constructs that prevent men from expressing themselves in healthy ways is literally lethal.

I do a lot of work around mental health and, since I've increased how vocal I am about it, I've had a number of men contacting me privately to have conversations they just don't feel they can have with anyone else. It will never stop making me angry that so many men feel they just don't have anywhere to turn when they are overwhelmed or in crisis.

2019-08-31T19:29:33+00:00

Sadly, no matter how much people say this, it will be a long road until the stigma fades. Even if they say this, people are still going to look disgusted by the sight of a male crying, at least for now. Sadly.

thrway_1000 · 2019-08-31T15:36:49+00:00

BS propaganda.

PanderjitSingh_k · 2019-08-31T13:34:07+00:00

Why on earth would I want to emulate one of the most contemptible characteristics of women?

They should learn to not indulge themselves in emotional display and to not burden others with their toxic feelings.

Title	Boys and men need to know they can express their feelings without being made fun of.
Author	KartikeyQWERT
Upvotes	220
Comments	20
Date	August 31, 2019 11:04 AM UTC (6 years ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/MensRights
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/MensRights/comments/cxuqcn/boys_and_men_need_to_know_they_can_express_their/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/MensRights/boys-and-men-need-to-know-they-can-express-their.870171 https://theredarchive.com/post/870171

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