Men Crying

Well, I'm going to have to disagree there. I don't associate "strong" with "not crying." That doesn't apply to men any more than it did for myself as a teenager when my boyfriend was killed. You know how, if a motor has too much to do, it burns out and quits? For instance, you can't put a sewing machine motor into a pickup truck, and expect it to do the job. Not crying when my boyfriend died, and later my daughter, wasn't me being strong. It was my emotional motor burning out.

I think it is perfectly acceptable and I wish it was seen as such.

Your husband may have low T. But he'd still have a lot more then the average woman.

Not crying has got nothing to do with being hypermacho either. Many men think of crying as a weakness because it is. Why? Because you're showing a weak moment about yourself. The whole idea that crying is a sign of strength is a nonsense. Most people who say that are those who are too weak to hold the tears back so they need to justify it in some way by putting those down who don't cry or see them as weak.

I'm not saying you're doing that btw. There's nothing wrong with not crying. It's a bit of a myth that people who don't cry very often are not in touch with their emotions also.

I think in our culture we tell boys that it isn't okay to cry. To throw some dirt on it and move on. We say crying doesn't solve anything. At least that is how I was raised. I think this is why a lot of men react in anger more often than sadness or tears. I think we have all seen some man get bad news and start cussing or throwing things. It is just a react to the feeling and trying to express them in a way they were taught.

Myself, I was never comforted when I cried. Not that my dad didn't care, but I think he was trying to say that crying was appropiate for whatever was going on. Before long I quit crying, well I quit showing a lot of emmotions when bad stuff happens. I just freeze up and don't feel anything. I remember when I was told my dad died. I was at my uncle's house and I got the call. Afterwards I just sad there. I think I felt sad, but I don't recall feeling much. Just an emptiness and void of emotions.

Maybe this is a product of upbringing or maybe it is just my own mental issues. I think if I could just cried I would have processed it better. The grief just got added on to the depression and misery I was already trying to hide and pretend wasn't there. Eventually all of that emotion came out as sadness, self hate, depression, withdrawing and a lot of punishment I did to myself because I didn't know how to process things.

Our society wants men to be tough and take it on the chin and keep fighting, but is that better than sheding a few tears and acknowledging tragedies in life. I think if some men could process emotions we would have less suicides, less alcoholism, and maybe some happier people that can get over things in thier lives. My brother is the oposite of me. I view myself as caring, compasionate, maybe too self sacrificing for others. He is child like, self centered, lashes out with anger at everything, takes the easy way out.

He has what i I would call the typical macho reaction to most things. Myself I would say I am stoic on the surface. Deep down in is a flood of emmotions that I don't know how to let out.

I wish I could find a guy like that.

I feel that if someone is biologically capable of crying (health permitting of course) then clearly there is a purpose served by that. Whether you're male or female suppressing emotions that are painful and difficult is never healthy - it only leads to an expression of the difficulties in other ways, with some being even more damaging to your health. We live in progressive times, not as progressive as i personally would like but men crying should never have been an issue let alone now.

Sorry, I'm just never going to agree. I don't see crying as weakness, and I don't see not crying as strength. In fact, people who are willing to cry seem emotionally stronger to me, because they don't care who puts them down for it. "I'd better not cry, because if I do they'll think I'm weak and call me names," is itself a sign of weakness, because that showing that you are afraid of disapproval. "To heck with what others think of me, I feel the need to cry and I'm going to," is much braver, as I see it. They don't fear disapproval, and that is strength in my opinion.

And I know from personal experience that there is plenty wrong with having some devastating tragedy happen, and not being *able* to cry. Let's remember, although I am a woman, I went through many years of my adolescent and adult life where I was unable to cry, no matter who died. It didn't do my head any good not to be able to release those feelings. So I'm not saying this just because I'm too weak to hold it back myself, and I'm justifying my weakness. I know what I'm talking about.

Totally agree with you, I think the exact same way!

Yes but once again you assume two things that aren't true of everybody

1. Man don't cry because they fear of disapproval.

Not always the case. Many men and a smaller minority of women don't cry because they don't feel the need to.

2. People who don't cry are not in touch with their emotions.

For some people this is true, but not for everybody. Some people express emotions differently or use different emotions to solve problems they're dealing with.

I also ask you though. Is there anything wrong with a man being macho? It's seems almost like a dirty word. It's seems more and more into todays society acting manly is frowned upon. Men should be in touch with their emotions they say. Men should cry they say. Why?

Women are in touch with their emotions more because they need to be. Men think more with logic over emotion. If I said to you women should think more logically and not be overly emotional I would probably not be viewed as having a popular opinion. Well the same goes with men and logic.

Most people do NOT sit down and cry in the middle of an emergency, it's rather a split between trying something or being passive, at least in my culture. It's quite normal that an emotional reaction comes afterwards or we wouldn't have survived as a species. That goes for females also.

Also you assume a man has to come save his woman or whomever you are suggesting he is saving. In my clan we pull for each other and and ourselves as a group.

I don't think crying is because you have a male or female body. In cultures where females can't cry, they don't either. And seems like a strong consensus a woman can cry whenever and a man can cry at funerals (barely). I find both extremes absurd.

Totally agree.

To answer your questions, yes, "macho" disgusts me. Maybe it doesn't disgust others, but I don't like it. Nothing turns me off faster than that strutting, growl-and-beat-on-the-chest Alpha male persona. You know, funnily enough I was watching Eddie Murphy's Dr. Doolittle 2 yesterday, on DVD, and there is this scene where Dr. Doolittle is teaching Archie the bear and Lucky the dog how to (supposedly) be more attractive to females. He explains that women like their men to be Alpha, large and in charge, and he demonstrated how to walk and talk with what to me seems a very cocky and conceited attitude. I gagged. Not this woman! I think back to the 1990's and the original Power Rangers. Everyone was gaga over Tommy, the hunky athlete. Me, I much preferred shy, awkward, geeky Billy. Going back even farther, to the 1970's--Fonzie would NEVER have gotten me to run squealing into his arms by snapping his fingers at me! I probably would have gone after Potsie instead.

But I do agree that there should be a balance between logic and emotion, for both men and women.

And you entitled to think that. I'm not here to tell you what to think, but I'm not surprised you and quite a lot of other women think like that. Macho is a dirty word. Someone who acts macho is often thought of as a misogynistic, arrogant jerk. The thing is it's not always the case.

I will say also that being a bit arrogant or self-centered isn't a bad thing for a man to be. Everything in moderation.

^^Having grown up with two brothers and an uncle not much older than we were, and observing their interactions among their friends, I noticed even in childhood that boys around 12 or so go through this phase where they want to add something like "the great" or "esquire" to their signatures and self-introductions. My brother took it a step further and signed his letters "the great king." Along with this attitude, I remember a friend of my brothers boasting to them, within my earshot, that he dumped his girlfriend because he had found out she's a virgin, and he wants a girl that will put out. Yeah, right. His voice hadn't even changed yet. "Oh, that's just boy talk," my mother dismissed it.

Disgusted me then. Disgusts me now. Why anyone would find "arrogant and self-centered" the least bit attractive, I can't figure out. Every time I encounter one of those, I thank God I am married to my husband and not them. He isn't hypermacho, only emotionally stunted. He is barely able to cry--I would have thought not at all, if it weren't for the cat, and that's the only time I've ever seen it in the six years we've been together--but at least he doesn't consider other men weak if they do. He knows he's the one with the issue, not them.

But let's bear in mind there are different situations being discussed here. One is simply not being emotionally inclined. For instance, I felt nothing watching movies like Titanic and Bridges of Madison County, when others around me were squalling their eyes out. It's another matter entirely to actually feel the urge to cry, but hold it in because "crying is a sign of weakness," and you seem to be advocating that, at least for men.

Arrogance to the extreme is a bad thing. It's bad for the person who is arrogant. However a small bit arrogance is fine. In terms of being self centered, the majority of the people in the world are anyway.

Crying is a sign of weakness. For a man I believe for sure it is. Despite saying that, everybody cries or has done so in the past and if it for something like funerals, it's understandable. A man who is crying all the time like your ex for example, I would consider him to have a weak mind. Sometimes though it could be something like severe depression, in which the person needs help for that.

Look I know my opinion isn't very popular but that is my thoughts on it.

I think we're in agreement about my former (not ex, he's deceased) husband. He was not healthy. Witness the fact that he died of a brain aneurysm only four days before he would have turned 48; obviously something was wrong with him. I'm sure he also suffered from untreated depression. In addition he had ridiculously high blood pressure, so there goes releasing emotions as a means of keeping that under control, right?

But I can't get behind the notion that ALL crying is ALWAYS a sign of weakness. It's the generalization of it that puts me off. Whether happy (the birth of your first grandchild) or sad (your best friend's funeral) I think there are good reasons, and they are respectable. I would never criticize someone or call them weak for crying under those circumstances. Again, not feeling it is one thing, while feeling it but holding it in so you won't be considered weak is another.

I believe we're drawing the same conclusion, but from different directions.

So... an emotion is weakness... then what is mental illness?

Are you replying to me?

To anyone who had that idea.

I'm resurrecting this thread because something pertinent happened while I just had to spend the last eight days in the hospital.

During a group therapy session containing two men and about a dozen women, one of the men remarked that he was close to tears. The other reassured him, "Hey, real men cry."

Every woman in the room applauded.

Wow that's great, I totally agree that real men cry! . And thanks for resurrecting the thread from the dead lol!

Sometimes I get this feeling in some cultures it is more important to be a man than to be a human.

Everyone should have a right to cry. Whenever they want to and whenever they feel the need to. Tears are natural. They are a right, not a privilege.

Works both ways, I think. I feel that some cultures put too much emphasis on women being "feminine" rather than individuals.

I agree. I'm human first. (Even if I do have some alien DNA )