Who has taught the boys not to cry, not to show strong emotions? Don't you think that it hurts to repress strong emotions or feelings repeatedly? If you teach them to be strong and show less emotion publicly, then you should advice this to both boys and girls. Although science insists that crying is natural, culture still sends messages that strong men don't cry.
We are teaching men to be more tough and emotionless by instilling the idea that they cannot show their emotion or fear visibly and should never cry publicly. We all have heard the parents or the guardians teaching the boys: "Stop crying or you are not a man." They also say: "You should not lose manliness by crying in front of everyone".
In ancient times, medieval warriors and Japanese Samurai cried during the times of epic tragedy. In western culture in some places, a man's capacity to cry indicated his honesty and integrity. Abraham Lincoln used strategic tears during his speeches which strengthened his speeches more. Despite all this, shedding tears is construed as a sign of cowardice for man.
Boys are taught to fight back and hurt people in order to show off their masculine traits. The family plays a great part in teaching the boys from early age how to flaunt their masculine power by fighting back with violence. After growing up with all these stereotypical ideas, the boys might commit some heinous and violent act which might create a great fuss. At that situation, the parents and surrounding people curse him for disgracing the reputation of the family. But this should have been carefully handled before - from the early childhood.
Suppose, there are a couple of boys who got involved in a dispute and quarrel and one of them just left the place without creating any violence. The whole gang will taunt him by calling him feminine, coward, etc. Don't you think this inspires the boys to create more violence and chaos? These gender norms can be understood through the notion of pedagogy which is the science of education, focusing on the socialization of children.
So it is essential to get rid of the harmful ideas and fill the heart of the young boys with the notion of love, care, softness, and politeness. Then it will make sense if they are taught how to respect women and not show harsh violence and dominance over them. We should stop teasing a boy when he needs to open up his mind and share sufferings by shedding tears.
But the convention is otherwise. When someone very dear passes away in the family, for example, parents, or siblings, the male members in the family are instructed not to shed tears or show weakness. Don't you think as a human being it gives them much pain to repress the strong emotions always?
Crying is important because it releases pain, helps individuals to heal and also allows feelings of happiness to be fully realized. So, let me suggest the male persons to "cry by yourself, which is also therapeutic". The social scientists found that the repressed emotions for a long time can trigger physiological changes that can result in high blood pressure and other problems.
Even former president Barack Obama wiped away tears when he was describing the toll of gun violence in the USA in January last. He got very much emotional while talking about the massacre of innocent children at Sandy Hook Elementary school in December 2012. Does it seem out of order or abnormal for a public leader to break down in tears publicly? I would rather say that people could connect emotionally and more seriously through this expression of Obama.
There are so many references to men bursting into tears in ancient Greek and Roman culture. The Old Testament is replete with references to weeping. Most importantly, did you forget the way we come into this world! Every child cries loudly irrespective of gender differences when he or she comes out of the mother's womb. So, men should cast off all the fetters of embarrassment and discomfiture and express their true and acute sufferings through shedding tears. You really do not need to become a stone man after a heart-breaking blow because you are allowed to cry, men.
What does it mean to be a man? Does it mean that the men and boys should constantly feel the need to prove their masculinity? Does it require concealment of emotion repeatedly? The problem is that we instil among boys the trend of not crying, not talking about feelings, and not displaying empathy. Statistics show the ratio of men committing suicide is more than women committing suicide. Why do people commit suicide? There might be various reasons but the strongest one is that they have powerful emotions that they don't feel they can share with anyone or that no one will listen to their acute problems.
Do we need real man and whom should we call real man? We need real humans with proper emotions and feelings. This is very much needed to stop violence, unnecessary war, fighting, aggressiveness, etc. So, let us be humans first and then we can think about masculinity traits.
The writer teaches English at a private university.
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