I welcome you to my blog and another wonderful edition of the Hive Learners featured post. The world has been operating one-sidedly since time immemorial, one-sidedly in the sense that women get to cry and express emotions, and it is seen as a normal thing to do, but the moment a man expresses emotion, it is seen as weakness or a weird thing to ever happen. 90% of people walking the face of the earth see opening up for a man or crying as a wrong thing to do; you don't even try it with some, no matter how heavy it might be. You are expected to carry it all bottled up.
I grew up around a dad that enjoys reggae music, and there was one that goes, "Big boys don't cry, but sometimes I cry. I said I cry. As a man, don't allow that stigma where the world makes you feel like expressing yourself or being emotional means you are weak.
Sometimes they don't just expect you to carry it all; they expect you to carry it all perfectly without complaints, without a word, just carry it and move on because you are a man. Today we have more men committing suicide because they have been forced to carry things they cannot actually carry, and at some point since no one wants to hear them cry, lament, or complain, they feel the easy way out is suicide. During high school I had two classmates lose their dad in the space of two weeks; they did not die by accident or get killed, they both committed suicide. Being the man of the house comes with so many responsibilities, and you are expected to carry them well.
When investigations were carried out, it was discovered that one's father was in a huge debt, and the loan shark was already on his neck to pay up since his loan was past due and almost 3 months late. He had begged for an extension in a text message found in his phone, but the loan shark declined and replied with a threat about coming to take properties from his house and even close down his wife's shop until the loan was paid in full; two days after receiving that text was when he committed suicide. Some even have partners who don't support them, and they cannot be open to their partners either because they also have partners who believe men should not be weak.
Many men are faced with so many problems but have no one to open up to and no one to run to for help, and since the world has made them believe that opening up, crying, or being emotional is a sign of weakness, they are forced to keep all those problems to themselves. They have been made to believe that the world does not care about your emotions as a man; you just have to find a way around it, and today we have men walking around the streets and going about their activities with a heavy heart, one that if they let out the weight, they might feel light and better.
We have to start now and create a world where men are comfortable opening up, a world where men can be emotional and not get looked at in a certain way when they express emotions. We have to find a way to see men being emotional as a normal thing, the same way we see women being emotional. Men are humans too; they can break when stretched beyond their limit, which makes giving them room to express emotions very important. The stigma that being emotional for a man is weakness has to stop.
