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Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

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Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#61

Post by hkt »

dauertewigkeit wrote: post #51
ravenstine wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even if the material world didn't require this, it's required by a substantial portion of women, romantically speaking. Many women express their concern that "he never shares his emotions", but when he finally does express his emotions and what truly bothers him she finds herself unusually dry and loses respect for him. Some men never have to learn this the hard way, and they're fortunate. It's common enough that it'…

My experience is that they do not mean it. What they want is for the man to make her feel loved. What they do not want is for the man to express his deepest insecurities and make her feel insecure by proxy because she depends on him.

Style of communication matters. There are different modes of interaction and being a caregiver/care-receiver is one of them that doesn't mix well with being desired sexually. You can, however, switch between modes. This is in fact the basis behind the therapeutic approach of Transactional Analysis:

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Transactional_analysis

Personally I've encountered the thing you've described, and think where it went wrong was falling into a persistent parent/child dynamic instead of returning to an adult/adult one. I'm a bit wiser now and can confirm that once you recognise the modes you're falling into, you can shed the (toxic) ideas like "nice guys finish last" and start having deeper relationships.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#62

Post by rich_sasha »

red_admiral wrote: post #32
tivert wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> Girls on the other hand, all is well. > This is also far from the case. Yes, all is not well with girls, but I don't think they have to deal with an analog of the condemnation of "toxic masculinity" and messages that "their nature is flawed." I believe their problems are frequently blamed on external actors (e.g. beauty magazines, social media, etc).

Depending on the place and time, girls have to deal with being called too fat, too thin, not caring enough about their appearance, caring too much about their appearance, being too prude, being too slutty, and many other things. There is definitely a facet of "your nature is flawed" in a lot of them. You might be right that the question of who exactly is sending and spreading these messages has many answers and exter…

That's true actually. I put the "toxic masculinity" bit in a different pigeonhole to the whole "what women should be like". I can see an analogy.

One difference is that, I get the impression it's actually women doing a lot of not most of the "too fat/too skinny" bit. Sure, boys/men can be horrible to girls/women but tend not to get hung up on details. The details of "too slutty" etc seems to come from women, peer female friends, women's magazines etc.

In that respect I guess it's different, because it's a narrower critique. And it's, hmm, self-inflicted for lack of better word. Whereas with boys, it seems to come from women all around, and woke men too. Girls won't be told by their teachers (you'd hope!) that they are too fat or too skinny, but it's open season to tell boys they have a flawed nature they will have to spend the rest of their lives fixing.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#63

Post by icegreentea2 »

joemazerino wrote: post #23
icegreentea2 wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, I think the article would completely agree that society as it is right now is not a broadly accepting place for males to be open about their emotional needs. Which is why the call to action isn't for males to be emotionally open in general, but for fathers to try to have more positive and supportive interactions with their sons about emotional needs. And why the article's guide point is 'Encourage them to shar…

[flagged]

Sharing your struggles doesn't make you weak. Asking for help doesn't make you weak. You are struggling, and you look for help because you are in a situation where the challenge is beyond your means. Sharing and asking for help can be part of adaption and part of overcoming.

If one man has the resources within themselves to eventually learn to adapt and overcome to any situation, imagine how much stronger and how quickly you can become strong by combining the resources and understanding of many men.

Sharing your struggles and asking for help is NOT the same thing as "standing around crying about their struggles".

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#65

Post by dpifke »

jl6 wrote: post #11

> New research shows that when fathers are present and emotionally invested in children’s lives, they are more likely to develop a stronger sense of self-worth and excel in everything from school to relationships. Regardless of the debate on how tough (or not) love should be, the absent fathers issue seems like something concrete and impactful that we should be trying to address.

I think the "absentee father" issue would be easy to address: have the courts stop favoring mothers as custodial parents in divorces.

Of the divorced couples I know with children, the mothers were awarded custody in every single case, often over the strenuous objections of the fathers and other family members like grandparents (and in one case, even in the face of documented abuse by the mother).

I feel like studies on the effect of children who grow up with a missing parent need to somehow control for couples who split because of mental health issues. Otherwise, it's studying not the effect of the absent parent, but the effect of the behaviors of the parent who was granted custody, and some of those behaviors may strongly correlate with not being able to maintain a marriage or other partnership.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#66

Post by michaelt »

rich_sasha wrote: post #12

My impression is, men are stuck in a world where they are told not to be men. Toxic masculinity is perhaps a thing, but boys are told endlessly how they shouldn't behave and how their nature is flawed. Girls on the other hand, all is well.

> Girls on the other hand, all is well.

Girls, on the other hand, get told their body is flawed. Gotta constantly be on a diet, and spend like an hour a day on beauty stuff.

We are all victims of society.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#67

Post by hotpotamus »

voldacar wrote: post #49
rr808 wrote: post #31

Its interesting how in Ukraine and Russia and countries which really need soldiers and heavy security how males are treated. It seems in Western comfortable countries there isn't any advantage in being male, women can do everything just fine. Until someone invades, then everyone wants the thugs to come out and do their thing.

How are men treated there? I'm not sure what your point is. Most of us haven't lived in Ukraine or Russia.

[flagged]

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#68

Post by dang »

joemazerino wrote: post #36
caditinpiscinam wrote: post #29

As a black guy I don't remember a friend ever saying "black people suck" to my face. But I've heard people I'm close with, both women and men, say that "men suck" countless times. I think a lot of people who don't see themselves as "biased" still carry a lot of bias when it comes to gender, and it has an impact.

[flagged]

Please don't take HN threads into flamewar hell - gender flamewar or any other kind.

That's particularly important when responding to a thoughtful comment like the GP. I know the issue is emotionally difficult but, as the site guidelines say, "Comments should get more thoughtful and substantive, not less, as a topic gets more divisive." - https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#70

Post by NoZebra120vClip »

fullspectrumdev wrote: post #52
xdennis wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> slighting your identity I'm not a strong male, so it's not slighting anything. But I don't like it when basic truths are denied. If you look at Ukraine, pretty much all of the assault forces are made of men, the sex this paper considers fragile and vulnerable. Societies which publish such papers are lucky they are not under attack because they wouldn't last long if they put in front the sex THEY consider stronger.

The “assault forces” are male because of rather outmoded rules, the military is a slow beast to change even when getting invaded

I'm not sure what you consider as outmoded, but considering the biology of men and women, it makes perfect sense to send the men off to sacrifice in war while women stay home.

Women can bear children: this is a valuable advantage on the homefront and a huge liability on the front lines. Women get raped in wars, there's no getting around it. Women can stay home to bear children and care for the small ones and foster hope for the future.

While it is plain that fathers are good for children and having them around is a benefit, if a man must go to war, then it is better than a woman going to war. A man can procreate a child with his wife before shipping out. A man is unlikely to be raped or bear children when captured on the front lines. A society that has lost a significant portion of its fighting-age men is more likely to recover than one which has lost many child-bearing women, or both.

Furthermore, if you want to build a cohesive fighting unit (or a department in business or education or industry or whatever), you build it entirely of one sex. It is more efficient that way (no expenses on women's bathrooms or other facilities) and there is less conflict and drama (troops gonna have sex and women gonna get pregnant, and then they're both sent home?)

These are inherent biological factors and they have nothing to do with human rules, they are God-given and unchanging. These factors have been true for millions of years, and they are the basis for human rules on why men fight and women stay home.

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