This week’s prompt is:
“Learning to wear a mask (that word already embedded in the term “masculinity”) is the first lesson in patriarchal masculinity that a boy learns. He learns that his core feelings cannot be expressed if they do not conform to the acceptable behaviors sexism defines as male. Asked to give up the true self in order to realize the patriarchal ideal, boys learn self-betrayal early and are rewarded for these acts of soul murder.”
― bell hooks, The Will to Change: Men, Masculinity, and Love
Really happy that my parents taught me that it’s good to show feelings. Must suck to not be comfortable to to so. Maybe that’s one of the reasons why I feel easier with women than with men, the gap is smaller since there is more emotional vulnerability.
My parents were not great at this.
I remember growing up my dad was afraid playing with GIJoe and my sister’s Barbies would make me gay, I already wasn’t into sports and I always wore my heart on my sleeve. I remember an uncle saying I would turn out to have “limp wrists” (which was a stereotype of gay people) if we weren’t careful…
I don’t know how or when things changed but over a couple decades things changed a lot. My dad now is very openly emotional and has taken up selling his own art (which he never would have considered manly when I was a kid – weirdly poetry was the only “manly” art in our house). The whole family is very accepting of queer people and other cultures too.
I’m glad things have changed, my relationship with my dad is better than ever and we’re both happy. I won’t say I don’t have scars from growing up with the fear that doing what I liked and showing emotions would make everyone hate me. My heart goes out to actual queer folk and what they go through.
My brothers got a lot more of the attitudes OP mentions and are a lot more typical of your “don’t show feelings” men and it kinda tears me up. I can see when they feel vulnerable and they just shut things down.
I was lucky, especially considering the country and time I grew up.
But I als feel that it’s changing a lot. Younger people are much more open and better at communicating their feelings.