For many people, quarantine took a massive toll on their mental health. This drew attention to the fact that people’s mental stability was deteriorating worldwide due to the isolation accompanying the COVID-19 pandemic. I decided to look into this issue, but as per usual, I got sidetracked. although the information I uncovered was not directly linked to the depression caused by quarantine, it was related to mental health, specifically men’s mental health.

Did you know that in 2020, there were over 800,000 reported suicides in the United States? It may seem as though this number discredits the severity of suicide as this number accounts for a very small percentage of the 300~ million people in the US, but when focusing on who constitutes this number, one serious problem becomes clear: the number of men who commit suicide is MUCH higher than it should be. In fact, according to the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention, in 2020, 3.88x more men died from suicide than women.

When I read this, I was confused because mental health disorders like depression are the leading causes of suicide. Why is this confusing? Well, women are 2x more likely to be diagnosed with depression than men. I assumed that because more women are diagnosed with depression, then more women would commit suicide. Clearly, I was wrong. This got me thinking, and I discovered the biggest factor contributing to male suicide: toxic masculinity.

The term man as a noun can be defined as, “an individual human, especially an adult male human,” (Merriam-Webster.) But man can also be defined as “one possessing in high degree the qualities considered distinctive of manhood (such as courage, strength, and vigor.)” (Merriam-Webster.) If being a man means that one must show a sense of manliness, then a man cannot cry, a man cannot be sad, and a man is not allowed to show any emotions that will undermine the hard exterior they have built. This is what it means to be masculine. But being masculine is not always a good thing.

The second definition of the term man has become a standard for men worldwide, and to be honest, it is completely unrealistic. These new standards are what is now known as “toxic masculinity.” You may be wondering, what does this have to do with men’s mental health? The answer to that question is: Everything.

“Toxic masculinity is what can come of teaching boys that they can’t express emotion openly; that they have to be ‘tough all the time’; that anything other than that makes them ‘feminine’ or weak.”

This would explain why fewer men are diagnosed with depression because traditional male gender roles have discouraged emotional expression for as long as anyone can remember. If a man is truly depressed, they are more likely to try to self-treat their symptoms or suppress their emotions rather than seek out help for fear of being called weak.

Repressing emotions is one of the most unhealthy ways to deal with mental health issues, which means that if a male experiences depression due to a traumatic incident, they are less likely to get the help they need for fear of being judged. This lack of help is what leads countless men to pursue drugs and alcohol to make their pain go away. But, these bottled-up emotions are also the reason why many men commit suicide. Why should a man out himself and appear weak when he can make the pain go away with one bullet?

It is messed up that we have made men feel like they must maintain a hard exterior when it is natural for them to feel emotions, but unnatural for them to bottle them up. We have made it so that feelings and emotions are feminine things, even though men experience them too. Even I have been brainwashed by toxic masculinity. I remember in middle school, this one boy started crying because this girl was making fun of him. She eventually ended up saying things like, “Real men don’t cry,” and, “man up.” Thinking back, I realize how messed up this was because instead of comforting the boy, his friends started laughing and agreeing with the girl. Even I thought it was ridiculous for the boy to be crying. Now I understand that this incident was just a display of toxic masculinity. If a girl had been in that boy’s place, countless other children would have comforted her, telling her that it was ok, and to not let the insults get to her.

We have made it impossible for men to shed a single tear without being judged for it, and this social standard in which men have to be tough must be demolished. If we humans were the ones to implement these absurd standards, then we can also be the ones to abolish them.

Sources:

–https://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/depression/in-depth/depression/art-20047725

–https://afsp.org/suicide-statistics/

–https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/22/us/toxic-masculinity.html