and the only way for men to get good is to spend $1000s of dollars talking to therapists, who are predominantly women.
or maybe… the apparatus of therapy is woman-biased and therefore it negates and legitimatizes men’s emotions and their expression. and the positive things men do in the world with their emotions must be shame and ridicule because they should submit to our belief that talk-therapy is the only legitimate form of emotional outlet…
You can flip that around and suggest that it’s normal and accepted for men to put effort into a hobby as a mental release, and this should be perfectly fine for women as well, but sometimes it’s not amd they are in the past seen as weird, abnormal, or hysterical for having interests.
But it isn’t normal and accepted for men to put effort into a hobby? It is common and clichéd to mock men endlessly for their interests? Like in this very post?
amd they are in the past seen as weird, abnormal, or hysterical for having interests.
I don’t think it’s ever been considered more weird, abnormal, or hysterical to crotchet as a gal than it has been to build bottle ships for guys. That is, sure, there’s been lots of BS around the type of hobby, it not being “gender-adequate”, but women not allowed to have hobbies? At all? What? Being too poor to have hobbies, sure, but that again is not a gendered thing.
Would’ve been more productive to keep it at “male depression and anxiety is underdiagnosed”, maybe also say “because therapists only learn about female-pattern symptoms”, YMMV on that being pushing a bit too far.
I will not comment on comments talking about men’s mental health getting downvoted in a post about men’s mental health and, should a definite pattern emerge, let that speak for itself.
The vast, vast majority of men (in the US, can’t speak to other cultures) need therapy. Just getting over internalized phobias is something the entire culture needs. Really, everyone needs therapy at some point and very few have a chance to get it, and fewer take it.
But in regards to this meme: men tend to need therapy more. The patriarchy (what society pushes as male “culture”) heavily represses emotional expressions and few men have an outlet to talk to their friends or family about their feelings. This leads to a lot of repressed emotions, lashing out, etc.
It’s impossible to tell. But my statement that pretty much everyone needs therapy, especially men, still stands.
That and it’s a joke meme not a personal attack. Because often men do engage in distractions instead of dealing with their feelings. Everyone does, but men have less-encouraged avenues to pursue dealing with it. This is meant to convey that many men are disadvantaged at dealing with issues, know the solution, but still refuse to try to fix it. It’s a common enough occurrence that this is a meme.
I’m a man. I’ve been to therapy. I went back to university and got my degree in my 30’s. Now I’m happy with who I am as a person. My hobbies are gardening, coffee, video games, and electronics. I volunteer as a tutor twice a week helping high school kids with their home work. Are you saying I should give all that stuff up and go back to therapy?
I’m not defensive about a meme. I’m challenging the assertion that everyone needs therapy. Therapy is what you need when you don’t know how to make yourself happy. If you don’t have a problem with that then you don’t need therapy. Telling people they need therapy when you don’t know anything about them is what offends me.
This is a generalized meme. It’s not really about anyone in particular. But tell me why this really engaged you and makes you feel like you need to challenge it. Perhaps you feel it fits closer than you’d like to believe? Does it remind you of something your parents said?
Not at all. I just resent the implication that someone having a hobby needs therapy and that this has anything to do with gender at all.
There’s also the connotation that this is somehow not the “right” hobby to have, and that’s also couched in offensive gender-laden language. That is simply uncalled for. It doesn’t matter what your gender is nor what hobby you enjoy nor any combination of gender and hobby thereof. Do what you love and anyone who tells you to stop can take a long walk off a short pier.
In therapy I learned all about mindfulness. About living in the moment and really paying attention to what I’m doing and really enjoying the activities I’m participating in. Lots of people figure that stuff out on their own, without therapy. I believe that if you figure that out and it makes you happy then you probably don’t need therapy.
But my statement that pretty much everyone needs therapy, especially men, still stands.
i don’t disagree per se, but i also don’t agree either, therapy doesn’t solve problems, unless they’re maladaptations, in which case it can be used to rectify them, otherwise it’s providing functional coping mechanisms to people who need them for things that they simply cannot function around.
But there is also a discussion to be had around whether certain maladapted behaviors are even a problem to begin with. Because arguably there is a larger societal problem with how we treat individuals, which leads to what are classified and defined as problems, but in reality, might just be someone trying to engage in something that they can’t engage in via healthy means. Alcohol and gamling aren’t a thing for everybody for a reason, but apparently society is a thing for everyone all the time, and anything other than that is “bad”
Oh and also we need enough therapists, to be able to therapy everyone, currently we have significantly less than we need, and college turn out rates are lower as of recent, than just about anything else. So uh, good luck recommending what is probably a distant future solution? Because we certainly don’t have enough people in the field now, and we definitely don’t seem to have many people wanting to go into the field themselves.
What we need is a society and environment that aligns with human nature.
Yes, I’m in therapy and I take meds. But I sure as fuck didn’t need any therapy and meds during the 6 months I worked as a hiking and horseback riding guide in a Provincial Park in British Columbia.
Agreed. Most of us need therapy because we are in an aggressively hostile society. In a humane society, we’d only rarely need therapy when traumatic and rare events occurred, or similar instances.
i think it’s less that men need therapy, though older men, particularly those above 30 probably do, the problem with young men right now is not therapy, it’s a lack of societal engagement from them, presumably because society doesn’t really know what to do with them, or doesn’t really understand how to deal with shifting tides.
the problem isn’t engagement, it’s the lack of the fulfillment of the social contract.
what is the point in engaging for them if they aren’t going to be rewarded with good jobs, homes, families, and a sense of progress and security? there isn’t any. so they give up. at least the bottom half do. For the top quartile of men, those things are still on offer.
I don’t really like the traditional interpretation of social contract theory, it’s very Pavlovian, which works, but seems rather dystopian. Works well for conceptualizing society, but doesn’t build a productive one i think. Like you said, we need to give men something to do, something to work for, and something to enjoy. And outside of that, they need a place in society that they can exist, without limitation. Because currently, there isn’t really a space for them. Arguably there isn’t one for women either, so addressing both of those would be beneficial.
Why would someone assume these people needed therapy in the first place?
because men are bad, and women are good.
and the only way for men to get good is to spend $1000s of dollars talking to therapists, who are predominantly women.
or maybe… the apparatus of therapy is woman-biased and therefore it negates and legitimatizes men’s emotions and their expression. and the positive things men do in the world with their emotions must be shame and ridicule because they should submit to our belief that talk-therapy is the only legitimate form of emotional outlet…
You can flip that around and suggest that it’s normal and accepted for men to put effort into a hobby as a mental release, and this should be perfectly fine for women as well, but sometimes it’s not amd they are in the past seen as weird, abnormal, or hysterical for having interests.
But it isn’t normal and accepted for men to put effort into a hobby? It is common and clichéd to mock men endlessly for their interests? Like in this very post?
I don’t think it’s ever been considered more weird, abnormal, or hysterical to crotchet as a gal than it has been to build bottle ships for guys. That is, sure, there’s been lots of BS around the type of hobby, it not being “gender-adequate”, but women not allowed to have hobbies? At all? What? Being too poor to have hobbies, sure, but that again is not a gendered thing.
don’t let reality get the way of the ‘man = bad woman = good’ narrative.
women have always had hobbies and been hobbiest, at least among the upper classes. just as men have.
and the poor women had to work to the bone, just like the poor men.
Ok buddy, I think you pushed it a bit too far…
Would’ve been more productive to keep it at “male depression and anxiety is underdiagnosed”, maybe also say “because therapists only learn about female-pattern symptoms”, YMMV on that being pushing a bit too far.
I will not comment on comments talking about men’s mental health getting downvoted in a post about men’s mental health and, should a definite pattern emerge, let that speak for itself.
You realize you can just get a male therapist right?
They do exist and a lot of them will relate to male emotional expression where it isn’t just outright toxic.
The vast, vast majority of men (in the US, can’t speak to other cultures) need therapy. Just getting over internalized phobias is something the entire culture needs. Really, everyone needs therapy at some point and very few have a chance to get it, and fewer take it.
But in regards to this meme: men tend to need therapy more. The patriarchy (what society pushes as male “culture”) heavily represses emotional expressions and few men have an outlet to talk to their friends or family about their feelings. This leads to a lot of repressed emotions, lashing out, etc.
These guys are not lashing out, though. There is no discernable connection between somebody taking an interest in trains and avoiding therapy lol
the disconnection is that they are spending money on trains, not on therapists.
That is a hilariously bad reading of what this meme is about.
fuck ya hobby i guess.
It’s impossible to tell. But my statement that pretty much everyone needs therapy, especially men, still stands.
That and it’s a joke meme not a personal attack. Because often men do engage in distractions instead of dealing with their feelings. Everyone does, but men have less-encouraged avenues to pursue dealing with it. This is meant to convey that many men are disadvantaged at dealing with issues, know the solution, but still refuse to try to fix it. It’s a common enough occurrence that this is a meme.
Edit: lol. Lemmy is really full of insecure men.
I’m a man. I’ve been to therapy. I went back to university and got my degree in my 30’s. Now I’m happy with who I am as a person. My hobbies are gardening, coffee, video games, and electronics. I volunteer as a tutor twice a week helping high school kids with their home work. Are you saying I should give all that stuff up and go back to therapy?
… You went to therapy. This isn’t about you.
But if you’re this defensive about a meme? Lol yeah probably bud.
I’m not defensive about a meme. I’m challenging the assertion that everyone needs therapy. Therapy is what you need when you don’t know how to make yourself happy. If you don’t have a problem with that then you don’t need therapy. Telling people they need therapy when you don’t know anything about them is what offends me.
This is a generalized meme. It’s not really about anyone in particular. But tell me why this really engaged you and makes you feel like you need to challenge it. Perhaps you feel it fits closer than you’d like to believe? Does it remind you of something your parents said?
Not at all. I just resent the implication that someone having a hobby needs therapy and that this has anything to do with gender at all.
There’s also the connotation that this is somehow not the “right” hobby to have, and that’s also couched in offensive gender-laden language. That is simply uncalled for. It doesn’t matter what your gender is nor what hobby you enjoy nor any combination of gender and hobby thereof. Do what you love and anyone who tells you to stop can take a long walk off a short pier.
In therapy I learned all about mindfulness. About living in the moment and really paying attention to what I’m doing and really enjoying the activities I’m participating in. Lots of people figure that stuff out on their own, without therapy. I believe that if you figure that out and it makes you happy then you probably don’t need therapy.
i don’t disagree per se, but i also don’t agree either, therapy doesn’t solve problems, unless they’re maladaptations, in which case it can be used to rectify them, otherwise it’s providing functional coping mechanisms to people who need them for things that they simply cannot function around.
But there is also a discussion to be had around whether certain maladapted behaviors are even a problem to begin with. Because arguably there is a larger societal problem with how we treat individuals, which leads to what are classified and defined as problems, but in reality, might just be someone trying to engage in something that they can’t engage in via healthy means. Alcohol and gamling aren’t a thing for everybody for a reason, but apparently society is a thing for everyone all the time, and anything other than that is “bad”
Oh and also we need enough therapists, to be able to therapy everyone, currently we have significantly less than we need, and college turn out rates are lower as of recent, than just about anything else. So uh, good luck recommending what is probably a distant future solution? Because we certainly don’t have enough people in the field now, and we definitely don’t seem to have many people wanting to go into the field themselves.
men doing shit is them dealing with their feelings. it’s not distraction.
men are not women. talk therapy doesn’t work for them
Insane take. Just weirdly pushing a double standard for no reason.
Exactly, just like the meme posted above
Uhhhhhhhhhhhh, no.
It probably does in many cases, but it’s not the only way nor is it universal.
What we need is a society and environment that aligns with human nature.
Yes, I’m in therapy and I take meds. But I sure as fuck didn’t need any therapy and meds during the 6 months I worked as a hiking and horseback riding guide in a Provincial Park in British Columbia.
Agreed. Most of us need therapy because we are in an aggressively hostile society. In a humane society, we’d only rarely need therapy when traumatic and rare events occurred, or similar instances.
deleted by creator
i think it’s less that men need therapy, though older men, particularly those above 30 probably do, the problem with young men right now is not therapy, it’s a lack of societal engagement from them, presumably because society doesn’t really know what to do with them, or doesn’t really understand how to deal with shifting tides.
the problem isn’t engagement, it’s the lack of the fulfillment of the social contract.
what is the point in engaging for them if they aren’t going to be rewarded with good jobs, homes, families, and a sense of progress and security? there isn’t any. so they give up. at least the bottom half do. For the top quartile of men, those things are still on offer.
maybe?
I don’t really like the traditional interpretation of social contract theory, it’s very Pavlovian, which works, but seems rather dystopian. Works well for conceptualizing society, but doesn’t build a productive one i think. Like you said, we need to give men something to do, something to work for, and something to enjoy. And outside of that, they need a place in society that they can exist, without limitation. Because currently, there isn’t really a space for them. Arguably there isn’t one for women either, so addressing both of those would be beneficial.
They weren’t faulting the men. They were saying society itself has largely disengaged from young men.