Thursday, 13 October 2011

• Reply To: I Can’t Stand a Man That Cries

  

  Recently, there was a post on Datingish where a woman displayed an annoyance and animosity towards her ex boyfriend and him crying. Even going so far as to say as that she was repulsed and disgusted by his behavior. Now, something I don’t believe she properly conveyed was that this was more along the lines of a distaste for emotional abuse, which is what her ex was doing, rather than just simply despising all instances of men crying. Now, I replied to this in favor of the post but received quite a bit of flak; looking back on it I probably could’ve phrased it differently but the feedback was both hilarious and insightful. What I hope to do here is clarify a few matters and provide some sort of mutual understanding or discussion.

  Firstly, let’s agree upon a basic point.

  Men tend to be viewed or associated with logic.

  Women tend to be viewed or associated with emotion.

   

  Unfortunately, when the topic of gender bias or one receiving criticism for excessive emotion (as women often get a lot of flak for) people immediately become heated and instead of actually discussing the matter they just go on an emotional tear. Much like what happened on the commentary board.

  The initial point I want to make is that I am not against people displaying or being emotional. But I will say that there are levels that I would deem to be healthy and others that I would view as unhealthy, the same thing applies to how these emotions are communicated.

  The second point I would like to make is that whether or not people like them, gender biases and stereotypes do exist. Going into a rage or childishly mud-slinging at one another is not going to allow for a common ground of understanding to take place. With that, let’s acknowledge the fact that men are still generally raised with the premise of “Boys don’t cry” whereas with women it’s deemed to be perfectly acceptable and often encouraged to be emotional as well as cry.

  Speaking for the male gender for a moment, I’ll fully acknowledge the fact that we are not always in sync with our emotions nor are we emotionally aware/available; in fact I’d go as far as to say that we aren’t doing nearly enough with regards to that area. I often hear women complain about this, rightfully so, but then they get angry with these men, which just hinders any progress or resolving the issue. Instead of tearing into us could we talk and have a calm discussion instead? And understand that it could take your man awhile before he even starts, much less; get’s the hang of it.

  Speaking to the male gender for a moment, guys it’s perfectly acceptable to have, be, and display emotions besides our usual repertoire (anger, laughter, and lethargic).

  Now, what is and is not a healthy level of emotion and communication? Well obviously are many views to this so I’ll just give two examples.

   

  #1: My mother was always deemed as an “emotional” person. Her brothers, sisters, and parents just said “Oh that’s just the way she is”. I can recall at the age of three where one day we were playing and laughing and then as I spilled something she became enraged and began chastising and yelling at me, then a few minutes later she burst into tears and ran off to seek comfort from my father. Needless to say that I was perplexed at the time and years later it turns out she was clinically depressed and had bipolar disorder.

  #2 My Godfather and his wife have a great marriage. I’ve stayed over their house a number of times and it’s obvious that the two are in sync on almost every level. At the age of five I remember snooping about their house in the wee hours of the morning. I heard them speaking and being the curious pain in the ass that I was, I eavesdropped. At first they talked about the mundane – how was your day, how was work, did you get the mail, etc. But after that there was interesting discussion where the two discussed how they felt lately. It turns out that my spending so much time with them had actually caused my Godfather to become quite upset and depressed because I was a reminder that they didn’t have any children, in fact I could almost swear that I heard him crying for a few seconds. His wife of course comforted him, they talked about it, and she went into how she was feeling lately with regards to that topic, their relationship, and just her as a person.

  Note: I am not saying that all unhealthy forms of emotion/communication are due to a mental disorder.

  Personally speaking, I AM emotionally distant and unavailable and it’s definitely something I need to and am working on because I know it’s unhealthy. So at the moment I’m trying to build friendships by properly communicating how I am feeling rather than just going with the passive aggressive route. And furthermore I’m taking time to pause at moments and actually see and be aware of how I’m feeling; that and meditation on the side.

  So in summary, to both men and women it’s perfectly okay and acceptable to be emotional. I will add though that people need to look at their emotions more often and understand why you’re feeling that way, then communicate that to the proper person (likely your SO). And just because you are in a very emotional state or consider yourself to be an emotional person does not mean you have an excuse for poor behavior, there WILL be consequences for your actions.

  Your thoughts?

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