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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

#861

Post by Neil44 »

ycombobreaker wrote: post #821
Neil44 wrote: post #744

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're not wrong but at the same time she otherwise seems to do a good job with my daughter which I'm keen not to in any way get in the way of by making this about me.

It's not about you, though; it's about all of the fathers that will follow you. Does your partner see this dynamic as well? Will she support you by redirecting conversations to force your inclusion? That's where I would start, if you don't want to throw her under the bus with her admin.

Your point is correct of course and I have considered that. Where my partner stands is complicated because I share parents evenings with my ex, whose support I can not rely on to put it mildly.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#863

Post by jncfhnb »

commandlinefan wrote: post #838
prepend wrote: post #780

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I have a similar sentiment. I remember growing up with jocks and bullies and really not identifying with the whole “group showers and snapping towels at asses” masculinity not pleasant and spent a lot of time getting beaten up or avoiding being beaten up. So at first I liked the pushback against toxic masculinity as I didn’t like jerk men. But then the concept expanded to everything. “Mansplaining” isn’t something un…

> not identifying with the whole “group showers and snapping towels at asses” masculinity Me, neither. And, in fact, I've never met anybody who did. Have you ever noticed how many of the movies we grew up watching were about a "shy, sensitive boy" who "wasn't like the jocks" who ended up getting the girl in the end? Ever notice how that trope appealed to almost everybody? That's because that's how everybody remembers…

The high school jocks in the showers is a generational thing as well as a regional thing. It may not match your experience, but it is/was real.

Your belief that everybody felt like the shy sensitive kid is wildly out of touch.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#864

Post by Workaccount2 »

lapcat wrote: post #826
rich_sasha wrote: post #769

This comment will probably be lost but hey maybe someone will read it: We inherited a world where for many generations, men were hostile to women. It was unfair and needed rectifying. But increasingly, we fixed it by normalizing hostility to men. Overemphasis on "toxic masculinity", hyper focus on promoting outcomes for girls while doing nothing of the sort for boys. Plenty of various "Women in X" supporting each oth…

> But increasingly, we fixed it by normalizing hostility to men. Overemphasis on "toxic masculinity" "Toxic masculinity" is self-criticism. We men are harming ourselves, and the article discusses this. For example, "Fathers are also more likely to sing to and soothe their toddler daughters at night when they cry." Both girls and boys have emotional needs, but we're ignoring the emotional needs of boys. We expect boys…

>to bottle up any problems and never show weakness. That's toxic masculinity. Toxic to ourselves.

Women have a strong expectation for men to be this way too. Ask a room full of men their experience with being totally emotionally candid with their SO and you'll hear the same "she left me" refrain ad-nauseam. Go look up the reddit threads when this topic comes up, the comment volume is insane. Many guys reading this have their own story too, I know I do.

But I don't even blame women either. They are just acting by natural instinct. And so are men. I think it's a fools errand to try and uproot instinct.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#865

Post by lapcat »

Workaccount2 wrote: post #864
lapcat wrote: post #826

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But increasingly, we fixed it by normalizing hostility to men. Overemphasis on "toxic masculinity" "Toxic masculinity" is self-criticism. We men are harming ourselves, and the article discusses this. For example, "Fathers are also more likely to sing to and soothe their toddler daughters at night when they cry." Both girls and boys have emotional needs, but we're ignoring the emotional needs of boys. We expect boys…

>to bottle up any problems and never show weakness. That's toxic masculinity. Toxic to ourselves. Women have a strong expectation for men to be this way too. Ask a room full of men their experience with being totally emotionally candid with their SO and you'll hear the same "she left me" refrain ad-nauseam. Go look up the reddit threads when this topic comes up, the comment volume is insane. Many guys reading this ha…

> Women have a strong expectation for men to be this way too.

Agreed. Although I would say that mothers tend to be more emotionally available than fathers to their sons. The problem is that "momma's boy" is considered an insult.

(Incidentally, there's been some discussion in the comments to this article about divorce and child custody, i.e., which parent should get custody. But nobody seems to be discussing which parent the child would prefer to live with.)

Regarding women's attitudes toward men's emotional needs, there's likely a crucial distinction between "son" and "sexual partner", where neediness is much more acceptable in the former.

> I think it's a fools errand to try and uproot instinct.

Disagreed. What separates humans from the rest of the animals are civilization, rationality, science. We should aspire to more, not less.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#866

Post by NoMoreNicksLeft »

Karunamon wrote: post #843
NoMoreNicksLeft wrote: post #494

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

> Your idea of rehabilitation is "hey, we're going to try to be nice to lowlifes, and they'll suddenly become upstanding citizens" This is a strawman. You have no idea what their idea of rehabilitation is, in fact they only shared that our balance is out of whack. And it is. What we are doing now, with mass incarceration and barely-humane conditions DOES NOT WORK . In fact, it would be hard to intentionally design th…

> You have no idea what their idea of rehabilitation is, in fact they only shared that our balance is out of whack.

Either their definition is the same as the popularly known definition, or it is a worthless definition.

The popular definition is "whatever defects of personality caused the person to commit criminal acts have been mitigated entirely or reduced to the point that the risk of recidivism is negligible" or something like that.

Is there another definition any sane person should care about?

> What we are doing now, with mass incarceration and barely-humane conditions DOES NOT WORK.

It's doing exactly what it's supposed to do. It's just that the thing it's supposed to do isn't rehabilitation, and never was. And you'd have to be a seriously naive person to have ever swindled yourself into believing anything else.

1. Punishment of the wicked.

2. Sequestration of the dangerous.

3. Deterrence of the tempted.

> In fact, it would be hard to intentionally design the system in a way that does a better job of increasing recidivism

We could just let them out early, so they'll do it again. It would increase recidivism nicely, since given a (more or less) fixed population of criminals in any given time period, they'd be outside prison for longer periods of time where they have the opportunity to do it again. If in a span of 10 years an armed robber spends 8 years in prison, he only has 2 years in which to commit crime.

Let's just let him out after a weekend, so he has 9.9.

We could even call it rehabilitation, because you know, if we don't make him so miserable surely he will magically transform into some excellent citizen.

> Our government spends billions and trillions of dollars on things which have less utility.

This weakens your case, it doesn't make it stronger. "We're already spending trillions on other things" means there's less available to spend on this. Not more.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#867

Post by pierat »

motohagiography wrote: post #75

We don't need a critical theory of boyhood, we just need to stop institutionally empowering people who hate their dads. I know many good men, and the defining characteristic of every single one of them is that regardless of who their father was, they accept him, and by extension they accept themselves. If you are still mad at him or have contempt for him, I recommend considering how it's manifesting in your beliefs a…

My dad did the following when I was growing up:

At 5yo, he threatened to take me to the sheriff's and adopt me out because I was "horrible".

Was told constantly to "man up", and ignore any sort of emotions I was having.

He also beat me. Naturally, that was perfectly acceptable in the 80's, even in public. Instead, it was called "spanking".

He would buy toys, then take them away to take a hammer to them, or otherwise destroy them in front of me.

Told me that I'd never amount to anything and that I should just join the military cause thats where stupid people go.

Anything bad that happened to me was always my fault. Didn't matter what it was. My fault.

It also didn't work out that my mother was/is an enabler and a narcissist (and, well, abused by him too).

I don't care what people call this. Patriarchy, etc. Those're just labels. But did they hurt me until I figured out how to undo the damage of childhood? Damn straight they did. And I wont perpetuate these abuses on any other.

And I've met people like you, motohagiography , that defend these sorts of abuses as the general mantra "man up". I find defending obvious assaults and child abuses to be disgusting.

And, well, burying my dad did finally put a nail in that coffin, so to speak.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#868

Post by jncfhnb »

haswell wrote: post #837
space_fountain wrote: post #820

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Imo I think this comment would have had more weight behind it for me before recent political events and before Roe vs Wade was overturned. I don’t believe in easy answers and I don’t claim to be able to experience life from the other gender, but cat calling is still common in the US. Women still get payed significantly less than men. Women still have much higher risks of sexual assault. We just decided to roll back c…

This is not a zero sum game. We can acknowledge that there has been regression or no change in some areas without any bearing on the negative outcomes of over corrective attitudes towards men. Food for thought: the types of men who are likely to rely on macho masculinity and the abuse of power dynamics are the least likely to be phased by an undercurrent of anti-male sentiment. Sensitive men, the men who are not prop…

I don’t agree. “Sensitive men” are acutely aware of the behavior of “toxic masculinity men”. It’s not a behavior that exclusively affects women. It affects everyone. I can’t say I’ve ever felt threatened by this concept as a guy.

Semantics get messy and people can use terms however they want but the basic to me feels obvious and just. It is no surprise that such men don’t have their emotional needs met. But there are layers upon layers of issues that create this circumstance.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#869

Post by hgomersall »

KptMarchewa wrote: post #851
hgomersall wrote: post #797

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We're currently undergoing a mass experiment in what happens to children if they are denied sun exposure. I guess we'll discover the outcomes in a few years.

Nordic countries are regularly denied sun.

That's simply untrue: https://www.ndsc.ncep.noaa.gov/uvspect_web/Polar/

Moreover, people of Nordic ancestry tend to have paler skin, which is arguably an adaptation to the low levels of UV.

Re: Ignoring boys' emotional needs fuels public health risks

#870

Post by nzach »

xiphias2 wrote: post #704
globular-toast wrote: post #678

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know if this was considered in the film (I haven't seen it), but the difference between how men's and women's issues are treated is quite obvious to me. It's due to an imbalance in the care matrix. If we think broadly about who cares about whom, it goes like this: * Men care about women because they want to mate with them, * Women care about women because it's in their own best interest to look after each oth…

In every species female is the selector, that's how natural selection works. Generally in a group of healthy young population with 50% sex ratio, about half of the men are selected, and they help eachother. But in the online dating / birth control age this ratio has gone more extreme, and there's no real ,,parenting advice'' or emotional need support that can help, just accepting the new normal for everyone, and comp…

>In every species female is the selector, that's how natural selection works.

Maybe that is true if you are only talking about mammals. But it is certainly not true in general.

Here is an example directly from Wikipedia:

"In the size dimorphic wolf spider Tigrosa helluo, food-limited females cannibalize more frequently. Therefore, there is a high risk of low fitness for males due to pre-copulatory cannibalism, which led to male selection of larger females for two reasons: higher fecundity and lower rates of cannibalism."[0]

This means that in this species of spider is the male who applies the selective pressure.

You can look into sexual monomorphism/dimorphism to find more examples.

[0] - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sexual_dimorphism

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