Emotions, Men, and Violence

So, we have a society where guys are not allowed to feel.

And yet humans are inherently emotional creatures. But if a man shows emotion he's "emo" or gay or weak. Supposedly guys are the protectors, but we are not even allowed to protect ourselves. Not where it really matters. We're not allowed to protect our feelings because we're not allowed to have feelings.

This of course does not work.

Men bottle up emotion until it boils over, and then lash out with violence. The brutality of men against other men and against women and children is a symptom of the sickness of a society that does not allow men to be what they are, emotional creatures. Beings with actual feelings, that they can have and can express freely.

Because we're not allowed to have feelings or taught how to express them in a healthy way we go out and find unhealthy ways to do so.

The worst part about this is this is expected behavior. It's even encouraged to a certain point, coddled, excused, normalized.

Somehow beating your girlfriend or wife is just part of "being a man" it's macho to give a girl a black eye because she was out of line. When a guy attacks a girl he's just being a man instead of a dysfunctional emotionally crippled child who never grew up.

Because this whole mess permeates the entire fabric of our society it's almost impossible to deconstruct. It's defended by both men and women as the way things are. Women are taught to be clingy, emotionally dependent, while men are taught to be detached and emotionally shallow.

This is a distortion of both sides.

The question of what to do about it I think begins with making people aware of how things are. Perhaps if people were more aware of the violent consequences of this broken system, there might be some hope that it might change in the future.

It's not enough to be against violence, you have to understand what got us there to begin with to know how the system can be unraveled.