It is not about me or my relationship.
There will be no gut-gushing or trash-airing here so kindly zap back into etcetera etceteroo mode before you carry on reading.
Thank you! :)
Now, whilst I was struggling and failing to read one of my textbooks, I suddenly had this itch to find out the answer to the following questions:
1 - Because boys can't cry, do girls automatically assume (in a difficult situation) that there's no way a boy could ever feel as badly as they do?
But...
2 - If boys can't cry, then can they ever get as upset as, or more upset than, a girl who is boohooing away in front of them?
And...
3 - What do boys do when they feel like that (given that they can't cry)?
And finally...
4 - Do boys automatically see girls as manipulative because girls can turn on the water-works whilst they can't?
Notice I said boys can't cry as opposed to boys don't cry. Because I don't really think boys have any options when it comes to crying. You can't cry if you're a boy. You just can't!
Okay you're allowed to cry if someone dies or if you're in excruciating pain or if something terribly terrible happens (and that something terribly terrible would have to be something that would make a girl faint from the pain, or lose her mind were she in your shoes).
But boys are not allowed to cry about the things that girls cry about all the time.
If a boy started to cry because of a relationship/other issue, his girlfriend (even if she too was sobbing her eyes out at the time) would stop in her tracks and ask herself what kind of a wuss she had ended up with!
It has never even occurred to me to ask these 4 questions before. I guess I always assumed that boys could never get as upset about something as girls could, that they were desensitized somehow.
But then I really started to wonder (when I was reading my boooring textbook) where the basis for that conclusion came from. Why have I always assumed that a boy could never ever get as upset as me? Societal role-play and all the psycho-babble aside, are boys not human beings too?
Even with animals, do female dogs love more easily than male ones? Not necessarily. And do they feel the pain of abandonment more than male dogs do? Is there any proof that shows they do? Those sad-looking, abused and ill-treated dogs on the RSPCA/Animal Shelter adverts that crop up on British TV at this time of day, are they all female? Is not one of them male?
13 comments:
Thank you! :)
I have read through the post.
The following comment does not get past (1) cos I think boys can cry and I do not believe any boy who cries is a wuss. My late father did cry especially when I got naughty. And I mean real tears!
Have to dash, will be back to comment further.
1. Yeah boys cry. But you're right - often they don't.
2. No they don't get as upset usually. But when they do get upset, they REALLY get upset.
3. What do they do? They shut down emotionally and become weird robotic freaks.
4. Yes. All men think women are manipulative. And I think they like it. In fact, the more manipulative one is, the better one's success rate with men!
(Kind of explains why my success rate is so rubbish...)
HA!
Snuffy
I am proud to know boys who cry. They are not wuss and never will be in my eyes.
@ timmy, please come back! I need to hear more about this crying dad. How naughty are we talking here? :)
@ mademoiselle sand, girlina, to see you here is indeed an honour. hehe. and please don't feel special, boys were crying like bitches over me too some years ago, but i still believe that real men shouldn't cry. maybe this is just my hysteric talking? who knows?
@ snuffy, hello hello, i read your blog the other day didn't i? great stuff. are you so sure about no. 4?
@ cm, i suppose this is another point we differ on. but i'm finding it very interesting to hear what everyone thinks.
o woman. i don't feel special when i see a boy cry, i only feel weary. weary weary weary. because when you make someone cry it means that you've been bad and hurt them. again. i don't think crying/ not crying is a gendered thing, but an individual indication of how much a body can take of someone else's harshness. i don't think i've met many boys who conform to general expectations of how boys behave or feel. i think maybe boys are raised to meet certain 'norms' of emotional behaviour for their gender but end up shrugging it off because these things are rilly rilly hard to conform to without dying or something.
I agree with mr Independent monkeys (that is a very weird name i must say!!!).A guy who cries is not a Wuss.Far from it. (obv I am not saying he should be turning on the watertaps half as much as his girl o),but sometimes somethings hurt men so deep,they just cant help it but shed a tear.One day my mum's car broke down on d highway but her phone wasnt working.My dad didnt see her till like 1am at night by which he had rounded up the whole policeforce and all that..He cried around 11pm when it was too much for him.and i thought it wasnt a sign of weakness.jus an example.(obviously i also dont expect a man to bawl,more like silent tears.even I dont bawl!)
2. also,because boys dont cry doesnt mean the guy doesnt feel the pain as much as the girl...nahh,he might even be feeling the pain more.
3. some men walk away, some men just sit for a while and are quiet,some get their 'lets fix this' gear on,some go and do something exertive like run or play footie,other men just hold you real tight.
4.It depends,does she turn on the waterworks @ everything, say for example,if she doesnt get bbq sauce with her chicken at the takeaway?lol
some really good comments above. Men (macho or otherwise) do cry, and often, though maybe sometimes about silly things (did you not see all the Southampton supporters blubbing their eyes out yesterday, as their team has just been relegated).
For myself, I cry, sometimes ridiculously easily about quite maudlin things..
Mohammed Ali always makes me cry when I see footage of him - I cry for the uttelry unique combination of poetry, bravery and a struggle for justice that his life entailed. My father cries, much more easily than my mom. Everytime I say goodbye to him on my way back to Nigeria, he starts crying.
Southampton is still in coca cola championship league seeking promotion in the play offs, perhaps u mean Sheffield Utd..... sorry bitchy... Boys dont cry , cos- *What is it Good 4?, Absolutely Nothing, huh haaaa * sing along now
What may I add, let me see. Ok, like Jeremy, its weird but my late dad cried, much more easily than my mother...
What did I get up to, you ask? Ok, exactly stuff like this!
Well, crying isn’t exactly like my pastime or anything. But we all cry. Be it for Lion King or The Champ. Closeted or out of the closet. Some more some less. Weather boy or girl.
Though on the average, girls cry more than boys. Am wondering if it’s because we are built differently or just some learned behaviour from societal expectations. I cry, without shedding tears. Except sometimes for my left eye (it has a mind of its own). I was going to suggest on the former post that I consider crying MAJOR drama but that aside, crying can be the better thing to do (I wanted to say easier). It’s expressive and all and helps your mental state. It’s better than bitterness. And madness. Long and short, boys cry. For me the softer things get me there quicker: Don’t go an extra mile with the personal sacrifice thing. I ll be like “God she shouldn’t be doing that for me”… then buckets.
Plus injections! Don’t even bring a needle near me. Nivaquine injection when I was 9 made me certain… I ll be faithful with anti malaria.. but injection?? ‘No ma... pls nurse… aunty?? Pls.. don’t choock me injection..give me chloroquine .. the one that will scratch my body.. don’t choock me… pls!!!.. Then the oceans will unleash a Tsunami. Both of them.
you know i stopped to think why i thought guys crying was wuss-like on tuesday (partly because my mother and godmother attacked me for this post... lol), and i realised it wasn't the way the guys were crying, or the fact that they were crying, or what they were crying about that annoyed me. it was the GUYS themselves. if someone has already begun to disgust you, surely they'll look wuss-like to you whatever they do! think i need to do a part deux to this post too and explain! lol.
Interesting post..I know some guys here say they cry, but it's really hard for me. Somebody said it was very therapeutic a while back, and I've tried my best but can't! Not even when my favourite uncle died. It's actually not a good feeling at all. You feel like letting it out but you can't...don't know how actors do it o...
Speaking from personal experience,we do cry.
Just usually in private.At least that holds true for me.And never for very long.
Because crying a lot of times is an expression of helplessness,of an inability to avoid or alter the circumstance causing us pain.
And the wuss argument does play a part because let's face it;we guys have fragile egos:).Even the nerdiest of us want to look like Arnold"The Governator"Schwarznegger to those we care about.Or at least like Will Smith:)
And then we sublimate:we get drunk,go clubbing,get in a fight.Anything to get our mind off our problems.Which are usually female.I mean,why else would a grown ass man cry?
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