Of all the things I hate about the mental health professions (and the things I hate about the mental health professions are legion) one of the most infuriating is the manufactured narrative that men are emotionally challenged.
Men are emotional gods. It’s why we have the founding fathers of psychology, not founding mothers. It’s why all the greatest playwrights, poets and artists are and always have been men. It’s why throughout history those who have broadened the depths of human understanding and emotional awareness have almost invariably been men. It’s why society turns to men to address women’s emotional needs, not the other way around.
Men’s emotional acumen is so profound because men are charged with mastering their emotions versus being a slave to them. It is the masculine way to experience feelings, as deeply and profoundly as any woman, but to act and react rationally. It is intellect over emotion – The very definition of mental health.
Some might ask, “Well, if men are so healthy, then why the suicide disparity?” That’s an ignorant question if there ever was one. We have a suicide disparity because the world uses men up and sees them as worthless when they’re spent. It’s not because they don’t know how to express themselves. It’s because as a society we have yet to find a way to treat them that isn’t abusive, exploitative and cruel.
If men need to learn anything in the emotional realm, it is how to tell the world to go fuck itself and to take care of themselves. And to do it despite the way the world reacts.
Trying to shame men into self-indulgent, aimless emoting like women isn’t going to help.
