Curious on the topic of emotions and males, are "Men" really MOSTLY blameworthy here?

Question

Just picking straws out of a barrel of hay here but I got a little curious. I read Fex Sairy's answer in a previous question and I wanted to progress further on this point.

Maybe I'm wrong when I listen to the news or read studies or listen to special investigations but there are a LOT of single mothers out there and dead beat dads. So, here's the problem. When a person says, "Boys are taught to hide their emotions", who exactly is teaching the children to do this? Can we say that it is a part of the so called "failed patriarchy" that existed or is this still continuing in this day and age?

Yes, I understand that men and women are both responsible....this I already understand...but really, do women hold more of a responsibility when it comes to raising boys, especially single mothers?

Lots of arguments can be made here and I'm very interested in seeing all sides of this argument...presumably from people who have or wish to have children someday in their life.

Answer 1

Most of the "deadbeats" are either A) below the poverty line and can't even house themselves, B) disabled or unemployed, or C) passing through deadbeat status temporally.

    While non custodial mothers the reason for there dead beats are A) they don't feel like they should have to pay, B) judge doesn't require them to pay,C) see A).

   Truth of the matter most of the media is bogus junk news's that often relay's on feminist research that is often quickly debunked.

    But the issue why fathers aren't involved in there children's lives is because of parental alienation. When over half of all PFA's are issued for reason's other than physical violence......

      Simply put why do mothers push good fathers out of there children's lives after a divorce would be an appropriate question.

    

      

Answer 2

Very good question! I think what a lot of people are referencing is the fact that boys are raised a little different then girls. For example, while growing up my father would talk to my brothers really harsh. If they cried about anything he would yell "Suck it Up!, how are you going to be a man if you're going to cry about everything". Thinking like a woman, I would feel really bad for them, for the simple fact that I knew all he had to do was look at me crazy and I would start to cry (so I could just imagine how they where feeling).

But my fathers discipline methods towards my brothers where a lot stricter and harsh than they where towards my sister and I (that was until we got older). A man can look at his son and tell him he had better not see a tear, where as he's more accepting of seeing his daughter cry (it's almost expected).

And I think that a lot of women take this method or discipline for boys and incorporates it into how they raise their sons. They understand how hard it is to raise a child on their own, so they want their boys to be just as tuff as the world they're being raised in.

Now, don't get it twisted. Because my household was not easy for the women either. Although my father had choice words and methods for my brothers, he had a way of dealing with my sister and I as well (that many felt where to strict or harsh). And I've noticed a lot of single mom's being tuff on their little girls as well; in an attempt to keep these young women from ending up the same way they did.

I think everyone now days are becoming immune to sensitivity or emotions. You almost have to in order to deal with the way things are today.

Answer 3

Men must act like men. Men are in control of their emotions.

Answer 4

When it came along, I was not buying into the 'sensitive man' craze.  Frankly, I still like a man to have more emotional control.  I understand that emotional repression is a dangerous thing - so I'm not suggesting that men should ignore their feelings.  But, as a woman, I can honestly say that I am more comfortable in the company of a man who does not cry at emotional times.  

So, therefore, I do find myself bristling when I hear boys cry and whine,  I suppose I am way off base with my feelings on this, and its a good thing I don't have children to s***w up with my views.  LOL.

You make an excellent point, though, with the correlation between the raising of boys by single moms and the continued suppression of emotion.  Sounds to me as though the modern theories about raising boys to be more expressive are just that - theories.  And that in reality, we still cling to historical beliefs about men hiding their emotions...

Answer 5

I've seen both parents enforce these stereotypes. But honestly, the best people to answer this question are YOU men. WHO taught you that showing emotion was unacceptable? Mother? Father? Both?

And only 16% of households are single parent households. Considering how pervasive this gender expectations is, I'm not sure that women are *more* responsible.

Answer 6

I never taught my sons to hold in their emotions, nor did their father, yet they did pick up the concept anyway.  Therefore I see it as something society is placing upon males, a burden in my view, that is harsh.  

I have noticed that many men, as they mature, are more able to show their emotions than they were when they were younger.  

I should point out that some women are also given the message that they should not show their legitimate emotions, though the taboo is certainly not as strong as it is for men.

It may depend upon the emotions we are discussing too...if its sadness, hurt, pain then society gives men the idea that if they feel those emotions they should hide them, particularly from other men.

If its anger then there is not near the stigma attached to men expressing it, while it is considered not ladylike for women.  This is why many women turn their anger into sadness.

Its such a multi-factioned question, its difficult to answer in only a few words.

Answer 7

So glad you asked:

"The Cult of Masculinity

Masculinity is the end result of genetics and upbringing, and neither trumps the other in regards to influence. Still, we should not underestimate the importance of the socialization process on males. Decades of research find that masculinity is a social construct that is inculcated upon males from their very birth. In particular, boys learn early on what is expected of them as "men," and research finds that families and society at large introduce several pernicious and oftentraumatic interventions to foster such development.

First, parents discourage the expression of emotions of vulnerability in male children. Fear and sadness in particular are unacceptable for males. I have witnessed enough parents respond to their crying sons as they pull away from the camp parking lot on the first day of camp by sternly telling them to "stop being a baby."

Second, males are taught to undervalue emotions indicative of caring and affection; females learn how to express warmth and affection, while males are taught to look upon such displays with disdain. Males do not learn how to connect to other people intimately and are even shunned for such displays; empathy and perspective-taking skills are not taught and are seen as unimportant for young boys.

Third, there is limited subset of emotions condoned for males, most notably anger, aggression, and instrumentality, defined here as using other people to meet one's own needs. Males who do not learn expertise with these emotions become the recipients of the scorn of other males and, often, society as a whole.

Finally, and the most traumatic, is the expectation of an early and abrupt separation from a mother. Girls, in contrast, are allowed a much slower separation from their mothers. They can go off to explore the world around them and return to a mother's succor when frightened, unsure, or simply in need of comfort. Boys are expected to rupture this maternal connection and mark themselves off as separate individuals early on in life; those that remain strongly attached to their mothers are pejoratively labeled as "sissies."

The end results of male socialization are distressing. Sadly, when biology is imprinted with societal expectations concerning the one acceptable code of masculinity, we create males with blunted emotional ability, who are incapable of intimacy, disconnected from others, and who live lives of quiet despair."

Answer 8

Society puts pressure on men not to show their emotions because it is considered not masculine, but at the same time men are held to higher standard emotionally. It's complete hypocrisy. This isn't something that we can blindly just pinpoint on the media.

Resources are not as readily available for males who experience some social trauma. There is a lot of talk about how a lot of females don't report rape and abuse that occurs to them, though true, there are a disproportionate number of males who do not either. So imagine the number of "broken" men being unleashed onto society. There is a lot of pressure on men to simply suck it up and move on.

Not only do we see this out in the media and society but a lot of people do not think about the conditioning males are receiving while in school. Most teachers are women. It is also unmanly to teach and care for children so a little boy is lucky if he has real, tangible male role models in his family then he is extremely lucky because he may not get a chance to experience one person to person otherwise. I'm not saying female teachers intentionally sabotage boys, but there are lots of boys deemed as having behavioral problems and sitting in remedial classes and schools who do not deserve to be especially if they have naive uninvolved parents. So they are taught something is wrong with their natural behavior when it is not the case. This is partly why I think boys are starting to lag behind girls in education.

Answer 9

It's a cultural tradition that has been around for a long time in some places, particularly in the northern European countries, and from them to the US and Australia and Canada, etc, with the hundreds of thousands of immigrants that arrived their from those places.

Who knows really why some parts of a culture 'take up' and others don't ~ in ancient times Norse warriors were buried with all their worldly goods, including their horses, but that doesn't happen today.

Yet the 'no emotion' thing lives on. Who knows why, but it definitely exists.

My father comes from a background where men showing emotions is fine, but he has gotten a hard time about this in Australia all his life. At school (he went to an all boy school) the other boys picked on him about it and as an adult his mates give him a hard time if he tears up.

As far as I know, no woman in his life has ever criticised him about it, but maybe along the line they did before my time.

It is also everywhere ~ school, storybooks for kids, amoing other people, media, if you look around you see the constant messages people get from all sorts of places besides their poarents.

If that didn't happen, we'd all just grow up being copies of our parents and never have an idea of our own culture ~ but culture is pervasive, we grow up IN it and surrounded by it, and often don't even realise it's there.

One thing is for sure, the 'boys don't cry' thing it is NOT innate or natural, it is definitely cultural (learned) behaviour, because it differs from place to place.

Therefore, it can be unlearned, or replaced as 'the standard' of behaviour.

Cheers :-)