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23 13

Why is crying associated with weakness?

When I think something is funny, I laugh. Nobody thinks twice about laughing.

When someone makes me angry, I may say something unkind or respond defensively to some perceived threat or offense. Depending upon the severity, I may even respond violently.

But when I am hurting, either physically or emotionally, I can't cry. As a man, it's taboo for me to cry although between men there are painful events where crying is permitted (deaths).

So my question, mostly for my fellow men, what's so bad about crying?

ScienceBiker 8 May 27
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23 comments

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15

I am not a "fellow" man but I just want to say that it sucks that men are ridiculed for crying. It is wrong and it needs to change.

Agreed

13

Okay, not a man, but going to respond anyway.
I think that the "taboo" on males showing emotion is just another stupid societal construct. It promotes suppression of natural responses to stimuli, whether it's
physical or emotional.
It also leads to many males not being able to deal with their own feelings.
It promotes the bullshit mindset of "machismo", too.
Yeah, okay, it's best if I stay single. You don't have to tell me. 😛

8

It ain't bad and if it bothers some emotional constipate: fuck em.

8

I cry all the time. The memories bring tears

8

I see enough men express the opinion that crying should not be ridiculed. I say start doing it when you feel like it and gradually the norm will change. It takes courage to cry!

Yes it does my love....cause pressure bust pipes yo!

6

Hmmm... I cried when my mom died. Everygood thought I ever had hit me and the emotion hit me. I use to go to the nursing home and tuck her in at night after dad died. They shared a room together. She was like a child as I tucked her in. ....damn. i thought i was a tough guy when i was younger. It caught up to me when it was people i loved. Funny thing... didnt cry for the old man....

Most if not all Men,as young boys,attach to their Mothers(Nursing at the breast),guidance when older,while Dad's off to work(at least in the 50's,with stay at home Mom's). Watching Mom do the household chores,laundry,dishes,clean the home,and prepare the meals,that's why when Mom passes away the hurt is so deep.....

@ScienceBiker i havent in a long time.

6

I fell in love with my ex partly because he was so in touch with his feelings. But as our relationship continued, he developed the idea that he should "be a man" and he stopped not just telling me his feelings, but admitting he had them at all. This devolved into crippling depression, hoarding, and, eventually, four years of unemployment before I had had enough.

Cry if you have a good reason. Cry if you don't. Cry if you feel like crying. Cry because it's human. Cry because tears are made for washing away the ugly things we carry around with us.

Being vulnerable with the ones you love allows them to really see and accept you for who you are. And having that and being loved anyway... That is a reason to cry just from the sheer joy of it.

Being vulnerable with the ones you love gives them the option to really see and accept you for who you are. Or to see and reject you for who you are. Or to misperceive who you are. Or to not know what to do with your feelings or how to be present with them. Or to feel bad because they have a bunch of their own stuff to deal with and can't get past it to support you. Or any number of other outcomes, good, bad and indifferent.

Looking at the significant others in my life (my daughter, stepdaughter, stepson and wife), I would say, their ability to accept me for who I am averages out to about a 5 on a scale of 0 to 10. I would say that it has crept up to there from a 1 (marriage 1, ended in divorce) to a 4 (marriage 2, widowed) but at times threatening to drop back down to a 4 of late for various reasons. This has caused me to wonder if maybe I'm the common denominator there. Which produces a crisis of self-confidence. Which feeds an un-virtuous cycle.

I do miss my late son, who would have pushed my current score up to a 6 or 6.5. He was, ultimately, the one person in my life who really respected and believed in me.

People who can trust their peeps to the extent that they can be totally vulnerable and real are fortunate people. I'm not sure any of us are really "worthy" of it, but to have people reliably rooting for you and excited about / with you, that's huge. My focus is to be that person for the ones I love, reciprocated / appreciated / respected or not.

@mordant We are all worthy of love and acceptance. Period.

@Nottheonlyone Well in spirit I actually agree with you, but the problem is who decides who is worthy and what worthy means. Once you establish that you also establish at least the potential for unworthiness.

If "everyone" is worthy, then saying that you or I or Fred or Ted are worthy becomes a meaningless statement. It's like saying I'm special, just like everyone else.

I am not suggesting that we shouldn't be affirming and loving and kind ... I'm just not sure "all are worthy" is the path to that. I regard it more like the equal right to pursue happiness vs the right to happiness itself. I think (most) everyone wants social reciprocity, and should be afforded it so long as they are not sociopathic turds. I neither love nor accept Trump for example, and I think rightly so. Sure, he's probably the way he is in part because he was an unloved child, but ... a lot of other people were unloved as children and still aren't behaving like that.

@mordant I agree with you, too. But knowing that we are all worthy is not the same as saying we are all worthy of love from everyone. That's just not how it works. And while I don't think that's what you're saying, it starts with you. You determine your own self-worth, much more so than any outside source. And once you discover that, others are free to see it, too.

@Stacey48 Thanks. I've been learning. ?

I wish that was true in my family...I never was reassured it's ok to grieve or hurt or be disappointed....you have to suck it up! I sooo different. I tell em phuck em...and cry my azz off. I encourage our newer generation to get in touch with their feelings...it could save your life.

@Honey4Oshun Oh, I never said my family was okay with it, just that I am. And that's enough, that's all I need.

6

I tend to cry the in presence of something beautiful more often than something sad. I didn't cry for a long long time. the disintegration of a marriage and the rebuilding of me, and now i do cry. I don't want to in front of a big crowd, but a few friends, it's cool.

5

Not a thing is wrong with it intrinsically. Very cathartic to let it out as deeply as possible and I can’t imagine holding it in is good for anything other than permanently storing emotional trauma in your muscle tension. However I feel it’ll turn off most women if you cry in front of them whether they intellectually would judge you for it or not. It’s just an instinctual desire to feel like a man is level headed and capable of protection that it sorta messes with. Everyone says you shouldn’t be afraid to do it, but at the same time no one necessarily wants to see it. And that’s fine. I regard it as a sneeze for the proverbial soul. Little messy n try to keep it off peoples clothes but if an irritant gets agitated it’s gotta be expelled, no healthy way around it.

5

Good question. Crying is part of being human - like laughing.

4

Not a damn thing is wrong with crying. That sort of macho bullshit should have died in a fire long ago. Men have feelings, just like everyone else. The only people without feelings are psychopaths.

4

There's nothing wrong with it. I think the way many men are socialized places a stigma on crying.

Even though I heard "big boys don't cry" a lot growing up, it had little to no effect on me. I sort of view crying - both for happy and sad reasons - to be as valid an emotion as all the others.

4

Nothing

4

Babies and women do it . Then add a bit of mysoginy and there's a myth of weakness made

3

It's a natural function, and I think it's unhealthy to suppress it.

3

The taboos seem to be breaking down in Europe, at least. It is becoming more common to see men expressing their emotions with both happy and sad tears - both footballers and members of the crowd at football matches, is one example.

3

I too have been socialized (though not as overtly as some) to disassociate enough from feelings of sadness, disappointment and betrayal to not cry, which is to say, I'm mostly unaware when I'm sad, disappointed, or hurt. So it manifests in some other way, like irritability, irascibility, impatience, and a lot of "you've got to be fucking kidding me" self-talk.

While at least intellectually I know I have to work myself out of this, I'm not sure where to go with it. In my virtually universal experience, no one, including my immediate family, wants to know my feelings and considers them a burden and a wet blanket. So everything points to continuing to stuff it all.

And it's not just me. My current wife reached some tipping point around the time we met where she became disassociated from her feelings, mainly because of emotional overload. Her prior marriage was abusive, and involved both substance abuse on her spouse's part, and a grinding fatal illness capped by a fatal car accident. At the same time, there was a shit-ton of unwanted drama coming from her father, monster-in-law, both siblings, and one of her children. So her brain just said "no more" and shut it all down. At first it felt weird, but after awhile it felt protective (which it doubtless is). I am also widowed with a similar laundry list of personal grief / loss / tragedy / disappointment culminating in my adult son's death a couple of years ago and now I am in the same boat.

In theory we both probably need therapy but it's difficult and expensive to find effective therapy and to fit it into our work / life balance in hopes of an uncertain outcome while simultaneously keeping up all our other obligations. Right now for example her son is living with us during the time between college and grad school and needs mentoring and help with his own issues; his need for non-conflict and serenity precludes us banging around in our mental closets looking for answers that may or may not ever come.

I do get tired of simplistic notions like crying = weakness or even that weakness = despicable, but that is how the world turns. Beat people down and then kick them for BEING down. Offer them a lick and a promise rather than real answers, rinse and repeat.

It's made worse by living in 'Murica, where it's all your fault somehow if you're on any sort of hard times. Reminds me of a saying I once saw posted on a factory foreman's board many years ago:

When you feel like crying
And want to quit
Don't run to me ...
I don't give a shit!

3

Showing vulnerability can have serious negative consequences, but being unable to have a release can have them too.
I'd say cry if you need to, but not at the drop of a hat. Just as I trust you'd repress your rage before making a decision to hit someone, don't be consumed with sadness before assessing the whole situation.

2

Nothing. I often shed a tear with my clients (i'm a psychotherapist).

1

Well I cry enough for you...I've cried all my life despite family shunning me for it...I cry if I'm happy, angry, sad...snotty nose and all .I don't apologize for either. Its liberating for me and cleansing...I think if I didn't relieve myself emotionally when I got angry I'd be writing this post from sing-sing...crying is good for me...After the rain the Sun comes....hallelujah!??????

1

Nothing is wrong with it. It's all perception though. I don't have a problem with men crying as long as you're not crying because a lone snowflake came out of the sky and melted on the ground to never know life outside of the time it went from the sky to the ground. Actually, I would look at you weird if you were a male or a female and you did that lol

Somehow it got twisted with men showing emotion and it turning into them being wimps.

1

It indicates your emotions are out of control.

0

First it's important to say crying isn't bad, though our Society judges those who cried very harshly. The basic idea is that as men we are meant to display strength that all time because we have the job of being protectors. We are expected to overcome pain and weakness. Crying is an acknowledgement of our pain in our weakness it is an admission to those things which we are not permitted to display. It's all an extension of that Macho caveman idea of what a man should be. Thankfully the eras are changing and it's becoming slightly more tolerable for men to cry at least among those they trust.
I feel comfortable crying in front of those I have a personal relationship with, though I would not feel comfortable doing it in the workplace or in public. Chances are if I absolutely had to I would go to a bathroom or such.
I honestly believe that would be more socially acceptable for a man to destroy someone else's property in public then it is for him to cry in public; in fact it would even raise less question as to the mental stability of the man.

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