How did this western societal idea of how a man should act, and what emotions are appropriate to show come about? How far back in western history does this idea of limiting men’s ability to emote honestly go? And how did these ideas change over time?
It’s interesting to me because I feel like these traditional and limited roles that western society puts on men (and women) are just that traditions. That it’s just something “that we do because past generations did them.” So my curiosity is why did past generations have these societal rules in place? was there a legitimate reason for it, did having men be almost robotic even in the privacy of his home and around his family have some necessary and important reason? If so is that still necessary today?
Edit: had this posted on c/asklemmy but it was suggested this was a better place for this question.
The reason I used robotic instead of stoic in my initial post is that I see stoicism as less about refraining from emotions but learning how to control emotions. That is recognize that you are human and you will have a wide variety of emotions, and you should have all of those emotions. But with stoicism the goal is to recognize the emotion you are having and not allow it to control you.
You can be mad or even fucking piss off angry but you should still have that higher, separate thought that control the emotion and allow it to come out in ways that don’t create a negative impact on yourself and others.
My post was more about where in history did the western culture evolve to punish men from having any emotion beyond anger, ambivalence and to a limited degree humor.
When my life turned upside down and a lot of shit happened I got interested in Stoicism to the point I even read a bit of Seneca.
I never felt it as a way to be emotionless or a way to hide or suppress emotions , but rather as a way to just accept my them and “yeah, I see and acknowledge I feel like crap, no need to go crazy about it” (in my situation). It brought an understanding to me that not everything that happens is about me personally and I stop fighting what I can’t change to put my focus where I can have an influence.
Warning: this is not a definition of stoicism, but what I took away from it for myself.