Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The male suicides: how social perfectionism kills

mosaicscience.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

321–330 of 359 posts

Re: The male suicides: how social perfectionism kills

#321

Post by theorique »

Lawtonfogle wrote: post #275
curun1r wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you're right about society's role, but I see a much more pernicious tendency that I think damages boys and, eventually, men. Society teaches boys to bottle up their feelings. "Be a man" means be strong, and don't show emotion. Crying is a sign of weakness. And god forbid you talk about your emotions...that's a female thing. But the thing is, those activities are what allow us to be vulnerable and what allow u…

There is two sides to this equation. Men need to be taught to express their emotions, but society needs to be taught to be just as accepting of a man who expresses his emotions as one who is stoic, if not more accepting. As it stands, you can teach men to express their emotions all you want, but as long as the stoic man is valued more, we are going to have problems.

Part of the issue is the question of who moves first - individual or society. A man who expresses his emotions, in a society where this is not valued or honored, is going to lose social status. I would not want to teach my son to be that "first man" and take that risk.

Additionally, the specific emotions being expressed matter a lot. I would lose a lot more respect for a man if I saw him crying inappropriately in a business situation (assuming the situation didn't warrant it) as opposed to if I saw him get angry and shout inappropriately.

Re: The male suicides: how social perfectionism kills

#322

Post by theorique »

falcolas wrote: post #216
kazinator wrote: post #199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In a TV show in which people are portrayed as unusually smart (not merely normal), most of them will be male.

And hampered by social ineptitude completely out of proportion to their increased intelligence, to the point where they depend upon someone of the opposite gender to lubricate their social interactions.

Are you referring to the "nerd blackface" of Big Bang Theory?

Re: The male suicides: how social perfectionism kills

#323

Post by dragonwriter »

theorique wrote: post #322
falcolas wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And hampered by social ineptitude completely out of proportion to their increased intelligence, to the point where they depend upon someone of the opposite gender to lubricate their social interactions.

Are you referring to the "nerd blackface" of Big Bang Theory ?

Not only do I disagree with the description of Big Bang Theory as "nerd blackface" (and, in fact, find that description offensively trivializing of the actual nature and impact of blackface, but that's getting tangential), but clearly the description is more applicable to Scorpion, in which, unlike Big Bang Theory:

1. All the hyper-intelligent characters that are part of the main recurring cast are male (BBT has a 4:2 gender ratio in the characters portrayed as unusually intelligent),

2. The one female character that is part of the team with those characters is a female who is explicitly part of the team to, as described upthread, "lubricate their social interactions." (BBT has a range of social ineptitude among the intelligent characters, including one of the intelligent female characters as particularly socially inept.)

3. Is, rather than a deliberately and overtly ridiculous sitcom, a drama billed as reality-based.

Re: The male suicides: how social perfectionism kills

#324

Post by dragonwriter »

lazyant wrote: post #198
SoftwareMaven wrote: post #10

The demonization of all things male has had a pernicious effect on boys and men over the last 20 years. I've seen it negatively impact friends and, worse, my own boys. Oone of the best things I ever did was cut the live TV feed and the commercials that only show men as drunken idiots, drunken leches, or bumbling idiots (notice: drunken and idiots is a repeating theme). As a society, we need to come to terms with masc…

Yes, name a tv show where the man is the idiot and the woman the smart or normal one (all of them). Name a sitcom where the man is smart and the woman an idiot (none of them, and 'Married with children' doesn't count, they were all idiots. Of course I'm not advocating portraying women as idiots).

> Name a sitcom where the man is smart and the woman an idiot

Big Bang Theory, kind of (its a sitcom, all the male main characters are intellectually "smart", and the not-smart main character is female, though there are also two "smart" female characters, as well.)

Re: The male suicides: how social perfectionism kills

#325

Post by jongraehl »

curun1r wrote: post #32
SoftwareMaven wrote: post #10

The demonization of all things male has had a pernicious effect on boys and men over the last 20 years. I've seen it negatively impact friends and, worse, my own boys. Oone of the best things I ever did was cut the live TV feed and the commercials that only show men as drunken idiots, drunken leches, or bumbling idiots (notice: drunken and idiots is a repeating theme). As a society, we need to come to terms with masc…

I think you're right about society's role, but I see a much more pernicious tendency that I think damages boys and, eventually, men. Society teaches boys to bottle up their feelings. "Be a man" means be strong, and don't show emotion. Crying is a sign of weakness. And god forbid you talk about your emotions...that's a female thing. But the thing is, those activities are what allow us to be vulnerable and what allow u…

So long as the 'stoic' lack of words isn't an obvious-to-all sullen pout, I can't think of a reason anyone would react negatively to someone who fronts satisfaction in a group setting. Rather, it's over-sharing and over-complaining that will repulse (except in the mutual dance of [platonic or otherwise] intimacy+trust).

Re: The male suicides: how social perfectionism kills

#326

Post by Lawtonfogle »

theorique wrote: post #321
Lawtonfogle wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is two sides to this equation. Men need to be taught to express their emotions, but society needs to be taught to be just as accepting of a man who expresses his emotions as one who is stoic, if not more accepting. As it stands, you can teach men to express their emotions all you want, but as long as the stoic man is valued more, we are going to have problems.

Part of the issue is the question of who moves first - individual or society. A man who expresses his emotions, in a society where this is not valued or honored, is going to lose social status. I would not want to teach my son to be that "first man" and take that risk. Additionally, the specific emotions being expressed matter a lot. I would lose a lot more respect for a man if I saw him crying inappropriately in a b…

There is a cost of the man to move first. There isn't a cost for society to be more accepting. Seems like society should move first.

Re: The male suicides: how social perfectionism kills

#328

Post by jongraehl »

esthlos wrote: post #51

I'd like to offer a different perspective. Suicide is a violent crime, the killing of a human being. Now, if we believe Wikipedia, then around 90% of homicides in the US will be committed by males. It seems reasonable that the male-female ratio should be about the same in the UK. Then a 0.8 ratio of male to female suicides could be accounted for by the increased male homicide rate alone. The Wikipedia page: http://en…

Perhaps men access certain modes of physical violence (guns?) more easily, but how are the psychological states of murder and suicide related at all? I understand amok/revenge murder-suicides but most suicides aren't that. "Violent crime" doesn't seem like a useful way to carve up reality here.

Re: The male suicides: how social perfectionism kills

#329

Post by kazinator »

dragonwriter wrote: post #323
theorique wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you referring to the "nerd blackface" of Big Bang Theory ?

Not only do I disagree with the description of Big Bang Theory as "nerd blackface" (and, in fact, find that description offensively trivializing of the actual nature and impact of blackface, but that's getting tangential), but clearly the description is more applicable to Scorpion , in which, unlike Big Bang Theory : 1. All the hyper-intelligent characters that are part of the main recurring cast are male ( BBT has a…

I agree with you.

Firstly, blackface used white actors painted black, unnecessarily. Comedy cannot use real nerds, because real nerds cannot act. Non-nerds depiciting nerd characters are used for the same reason that, in acting, non-surgeons portray surgeons, non-pilots portray pilots and non-US-presidents portray US presidents. Blackface is offensive even when the actual portrayal the black characters is balanced, simply because of the discrimination against black actors which prevent them from getting the roles.

The nerd stereotypes in BBT are not single-faceted, and they are not offensive to nerds. In fact, nerds love BBT. Most of the characters on BBT are "real" in the sense that people can relate to them.

Something that might satisfy a reasonable definition of "nerd blackface", if there is one, might be, say, The Revenge of the Nerds (1984).

Re: The male suicides: how social perfectionism kills

#330

Post by gress »

airtonix wrote: post #317
Lawtonfogle wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is two sides to this equation. Men need to be taught to express their emotions, but society needs to be taught to be just as accepting of a man who expresses his emotions as one who is stoic, if not more accepting. As it stands, you can teach men to express their emotions all you want, but as long as the stoic man is valued more, we are going to have problems.

No, just no. You're asking people to act weak and unstable. You're promoting a path that leads to unconscious confidence in decisions you make. Every decision is wrong, but it's your job as the one who has their shit together in the shit-storm to choose the least fucked up choice.

Expressing emotions doesn't imply weakness or instability.
Post reply on HN