TW
Men’s mental health is an often overlooked societal issue. This seemingly obvious issue is less obvious than it might seem at first, with many people being ignorant of its existence or denying it exists at all. Mental health as a whole has become a more prevalent issue over the past several years, but not in an equal way. Many people have had encounters with mental health issues either in themselves, their friends or their family. However, men’s mental health has been glossed over for reasons passing my understanding.
If you think men’s mental health isn’t a problem, you should dissuade that notion promptly. There is this societal construct that “boys don’t cry,” but like many societal constructs, it’s outdated and harmful. Men have minds, they have challenges, they have struggles and they have mental states, just like any other person. People need to pay attention to this because these boys will eventually grow up to support society, and it will collapse without them.
Improving mental health is a long and involved process, and many people don’t know how to do it with men because they don’t know anything about it. This knowledge gap is not limited to women or non-binary people. Many men don’t know either because they vehemently deny that there’s anything wrong with them or genuinely don’t know or think they need help. Men are often struggling with challenges that they don’t tell you about because society has taught them that they will be perceived as weak and ridiculed if they do reveal that they have problems they struggle with. Society wants men to project an outward face of calm and control—to be unphased by any problem and to solve it without much difficulty. This is an example of a challenge that weighs heavily on most men: unrealistic societal expectations and unintended toxicity.
Everyone has had unrealistic expectations placed on them at least once, which isn’t pleasant. The pressure is stressful and causes your mood to deteriorate, and when you inevitably fail to meet the expectations, you feel as though your self-worth is diminished. Even if many people don’t have these expectations of men or don’t mean to, they are societal and therefore inescapable.
Unintended toxicity is also highly harmful to men’s mental health. For example: other movements, such as the feminist movement (purely as an example), have commendable goals but sometimes fail to consider the negative consequences of their behavior. More specifically, sometimes the people involved might try to raise awareness of an issue and say something like, “we need to stop men from assaulting women” which isn’t inherently incorrect. I would argue that it’s 100% true. However, the phrasing “we need to stop men,” is highly vague and can make male allies or innocents feel as though they are being alienated or accused, even if they know that isn’t the intention. This is simply because they are fundamentally male, and they don’t like being discriminated against because of something they had no control over, much like everyone else. I would suggest alternative ways of speaking that are more clear on who strictly they pertain to. This little bit of extra effort goes a long way.
Whether you’re a man, woman, white, black, poor, rich or any other kind of person, we all have mental health. Nobody’s is more or less important than anyone else’s. As such, it is important to not forget that when interacting with anybody, and to remain conscious of the negative effects your actions might have on someone else’s mental health. After all, it’s just following the golden rule: treat others how you want to be treated.
