Men's Mental Health Awareness
This really upset me (no pun intended)
Looks like a nice pro-feminism meme and seems pretty harmless right?
The part I struggled to accept is the use of the term ‘fragile masculinity’. A definition Google gave me for the word fragile,
‘the quality of being delicate or vulnerable’.
Masculine norms socialised into young men teaches them to avoid being seen as weak or vulnerable. This causes men all over the world to struggle in silence because they do not receive mental health support when they need it.
If the aim of this meme or quote was to promote feminism or help bring down the patriarchy it does quite the opposite. By reinforcing the norm that men should never express weakness, it only creates the type of men who sadly do perceive themselves as ‘above’ women.
Instead, men should be encouraged to admit their weaknesses or ask for help if they need it. Something I learnt while writing my dissertation is that men have so much to learn from women in terms of emotional expression and support seeking behaviours. So instead of putting men down, it would be more useful to have conversations about embracing our more ‘fragile’ parts in order to achieve gender equality.