"I felt I had to be part of it, to fit into the team. To be part of that, I had to have that laddish bravado - I think that's why men can struggle so much," James says. "Then I got caught in this whirlpool of despair - should I be laddish even if I didn't enjoy being laddish? I was trying to fit into how society thinks young men should act."...IN THE COMMENTS: Fernandistein quotes "society's 'Man up' message" and asks:
Simon Gunning, chief executive of Campaign Against Living Miserably (Calm), told MPs masculinity was often equated with having what it took to put food on the table. "It has been defined as this strange conflation of stoicism and strength, meaning the strong silent type," he said....
"Society" has a message? If so, google ngram thinks that society's "man up" message has been declining since about 1920.Here's the ngram:
That made me check out "laddish":
Posts
60 comments:
Man Up (2015) is very good. Lake Bell. A young lady with a self-help book figures in.
Man up also means a male visitor is in the halls.
If anything is fueling a suicide crisis it is the constant attacks on men and manliness from the Left.
They don't figure in, in strong silent, activity as a commenter. There are lots of varieties there.
Girls are bullied online more than boys, a survey says. Apparently being bullied strengthens you, suicidewise.
Perhaps the voice mail in the suicide hot line is a bad idea.
Your call is important to us.
"Is society's 'Man up' message
"Society" has a message? If so, google ngram thinks that society's "man up" message has been declining since about 1920.
I think yes, maybe it is, because "Man Up" is a criticism, it's a statement that the man isn't doing that, like in The Godfather when Vito Corleone tells Johnny Fontane, "stop sniveling and be a man!" he's not trying to be uplifting, he's trying to shame him. And some men, it's never enough, they think they're manning up and then they're told it's toxic, they're doing the man thing wrong.
I'm sorry, but nature has arranged it so that a man's primary functions are to provide for his family and protect them.
Is society's 'Man up' message fueling a suicide crisis among men?
...masculinity was often equated with having what it took to put food on the table. "It has been defined as this strange conflation of stoicism and strength, meaning the strong silent type"...
I wonder where men would get such negative mixed messages?
"Guess who's perpetuating these kinds of actions. It's the men in this country. And I just want to say to the men of this country: Just shut up and step up. Do the right thing for a change"
What do we say about headlines in the form of a question?
"Yet Gunning believes that, just like attitudes to smoking have been revolutionised, there is currently a similar shift in attitudes and awareness of mental well-being."
It's a long article but I think he's saying that if you feel crazy you should self-medicate with nicotine.
Lost within this muddled PC nonsense is an important nucleus of truth: it's hard to become a good man, but it's also worthwhile to become a good man.
So, how does one become a good man?
I don't have the precise answer, but I do have a few suggestions:
-work hard
-stay fit
-play sports
-join the military
-read good books
- treat women with respect
--be on time
-be a good neighbor
-be a good husband
- work on the house
- work on the car
-provide for your family
-protect your family
- coach little league
- work in the garden
- be a good father
- go to church
Stuff like that points you in right direction away from Beta Male or snowflake status, and braces you for any midlife or existential crisis you face.
The Basics!
Let them wear shorts.
It's the men in this country.
Like the narratrix of those slogans, the men in this country should go back where they came from!
Which is the moon, from what I've been reading recently.
Let them eat my shorts.
We put men's "rights" in scare quotes like it's a joke and then wonder why so many men are checking out.
Toxic Masculinity can be good for you. Who knew ?
Do the ngram with "man up " for a different result.
Google
Replaced "man up" with " man up " to match how we processed the books.
'Laddish' sounds like something from a Yip Harburg song in Finian's Rainbow.
Althouse, you misspelled Fernandistein in your tag.
"Tell me I'm a good man."
I think yes, maybe it is, because "Man Up" is a criticism,
It's also marginalizing.
So you're depressed? Take a motrin and get over it, pussy.
But some perv grabs a woman's breast and the whole world catches fire.
From what I've read, Lad culture is the opposite of Upped Man.
"laddish up"! WTF!
"Man up" has always been one side of the bargain. The other side was that men were respected for their masculine traits, and for whatever honest work they did (those who did).
Now men are expected to shoulder the burdens and are spat on by society rather than thanked. That is what's driving depression and suicide. Witness, for example, the absurd judgments against men in family court.
There was a post on reddit I saw recently which lays out the reality that men in "modern" relationships have to deal with. Quoted in part:
Here's an unfortunate reality: Women, in general, have very little patience for men's emotions that don't suit their needs. Our emotions aren't really concerned over, except insofar as they affect women. Literally nobody cares if we're sad, depressed, feeling hopeless, defeated, anxious, confused, uncertain, unsure of ourselves, and so forth unless it affects them, in which case it's usually a problem for them. Nobody wants to hear it. Typically it just upsets them because we are less valuable as emotional outlets for their own feelings, less firm rocks in a turbulent sea . . .
This is a lesson we learn many times: *Displaying any emotion except for the one which is demanded of us almost always results in a worsening of the situation, isolation, and shaming.
Do the ngram with "man up " for a different result.
(FWIW, They also replace "man up" with " man up " on ngram)
Interesting. And it shows a google search bug.
ngram uses comma separated phrases, so there's no need to add quotes to get the phrase, as you do in a google search - in fact it just messes it up so you don't get the phrase...
When you try to find an occurrence (click the years at the bottom), it puts quotes around the phrase, so it runs a google search for ["" man up ""] which is the same as searching for [man up] with no quotes, so you get results like "that man was sent up the river" which you wouldn't get in a regular google search of "man up".
So when you ngram [man up] without quotes you get the google search of "man up" with quotes, and when you ngram ["man up"] with quotes you get the google search of [man up] without quotes, although the search count doesn't match either one.
Try ngram with
[" man up ",map up]
I've never encountered this peculiar word "laddish" before, so I looked it up. Here are the definitions I found: boyish, immature, boisterously macho, rough and noisy, drinking a lot of alcohol, having a bad attitude towards women, boorish, reckless, rude.
This dumb article equates *those* with manning up! I, and most of the men here, man up probably every day of our lives - as a matter of routine. If those definitions are what "manning up" is, I've been doing the man thing all wrong since I was about twenty. Well of course, that is not what "manning up" is. Possessing a bit of grit and stepping up to confront your challenges, especially the tough ones, is what men who man up do. It is quite the opposite of this "laddishness."
These people in this article are damaged and this really has northing to do with "manning up." Depression is crippling and it is not surprising that these guys weren't able to man up along with everything else they weren't able to do. No big surprise.
Did I mention that this is a stupid article?
[" man up ",man up], not map up.
"Althouse, you misspelled Fernandistein in your tag."
That tag dates back to when this commenter spelled it that way. If in fact these are different commenters, let me know.
Add to the above the very real turmoil that men (along with women) are going through in the modern world with what John Vervaeke has termed "The Meaning Crisis". Men simultaneously cannot make themselves respectable and appreciated through honest efforts, and have no outlet for the angst that arises as a result.
I don't mean to say this is a completely new phenomenon; you can see it in the life of Adolf Hitler. However, we aren't making it better by delving further into identity politics.
Bay Area Guy asked how one becomes a good man. The most likely way (though not guaranteed) is for a boy to grow up spending time with good men. A lot of boys don’t get to do that now.
I never hear “man up” I hear “nut up”.
My explanation above was terrible -
ngram [man up] -> click year -> google sticks quotes around the phrase for a book search of the phrase ["man up"], which is the correct result. Even though almost all the results seem to refer to something other than being manly...
ngram ["man up"] -> ngram 'corrects' it to [" man up "] -> click year -> google adds quotes around string so you get a book search for ["" man up ""] which resolves to [{empty-string} man up {empty-string}] = [man up], which includes results with the words not next to each other. But the ngram count results are far smaller than the actual number of occurrences of either search.
ngram without quotes -> search with quotes, and
ngram with quotes -> search without quotes.
Something like that would never fly in the real world.
how one becomes a good man
By finding bugs in computer programs and then complaining.
"Grow a pair" or "Sack up" seems more with the current times.
And "nut up", as reader points out.
If in fact these are different commenters, let me know.
I'm still me, Fernandistein's Monster. I changed it when Trump wrote "Al Frankenstien". Then for a few weeks I'd add or subtract a few letters here and there until I realized that would make it harder to find my own old posts in case one of them ever turned out to be interesting or memorable enough to search for.
I don't mean to say this is a completely new phenomenon; you can see it in the life of Adolf Hitler. However, we aren't making it better by delving further into identity politics.
Agreed. It's a pendulum, and it's going to swing back.
"Grow a pair" or "Sack up"
Those peaked in 1934 and 1954.
I'm still me, Fernandistein's Monster.
I'm curious about the origin. What does it mean to you?
@Reader,
"The most likely way (though not guaranteed) is for a boy to grow up spending time with good men. A lot of boys don’t get to do that now. "
Totally true. My Dad split when I was 3. Coulda been a nightmare. But, I had some great uncles, and neighbors, and baseball coaches, and even a decent Stepfather to fill that void.
Good men teaching young men to become good.
What does it mean to you?
I don't remember, but right now it's:
Tags: Fernandinande, masculinity, psychology, suicide
Ok, what about "strap on a pair"?
I'm confused: were you also Fernandinande?
I'll echo what BAG and Reader noted above and add: self-sacrifice (and don't ever whine about it!). Seriously, stop navel gazing and go find something productive to do.
My earliest male influences were my father and my brother, who is nine years older than me. I was six when he was fifteen and the next 5 years were very instructive! My dad was Gallant and you can guess who was Goofus.
Better go reread Kipling's If, my son. Your notion of manhood is sorely lacking.
You don't have to be a lad - you can be a chap. And yes, read "If."
Or a brick.
The Chav business I don't get.
Bonus points for what Jimmy Carter would feel.
I could write so much more and have, only to delete it. I just find stories like this revolting and counter-productive. There are two issues going in the life of the guy interviewed for the story. He is being judged, either by himself and how he sees himself to his friends or others that judge him based on his friends. In all cases, the judgement is negative and helps to devalue his personal self-esteem. And he is being given anti-depressants, which he may need, but if he does; then the societal pressures are probably not the biggest driver of his suicidal tendencies. The "man-up" culture is irrelevant.
And that clever campaign is horrible. It creates a false premise that a recognizable term can mean something different, if only by putting up grotesque signs. "Grow a pair" is a dismissive term used when someone doesn't want to hear it anymore. They are allowed to be that way and are far more psychologically sound than the person that sign will influence. The sign is more likely to work on the guilty mind, creating a person with doubt like the man in the article, and causing more depression.
If "No" is boring; I'm sorry; but it is the correct answer for the headline.
A colleague with Scots-immigrant parentage is the only person I ever knew who used the term "lad" in real American life, and he said it knowing how unusual most would find it. "Laddish" is derivative (as pointed out) and has connotations the noun never did.
"Man up." I used to work for a little SOB who would exhort, "Act like a man, and you may grow up to be one!" Pretty soon I did, and got a better job with a less asinine boss.
As for the list BAG@1016am provides, I score 10/17, but since I have other other measures to use I'll grade myself on a curve and get a sold B.
Hunter@1102am references Hitler; please expand on how you see him in the frame of "man up" and "laddishness."
Narr
Ein Kerl
Which is the moon, from what I've been reading recently.
Yeah, its back in the 90s when they were from Mars, but the moon stuff is back in style this past week.
I like when a woman announces "Shark Week" when she is starting her period. When did that start?
Former President Selena Meyer (Julia Louis Dreyfuss) in a presidential debate, responding to a fellow candidate's self-adoration as a woman and a woman of color:
When I was coming up as a lawyer, I didn’t have to remind everyone I was a woman every 10 seconds, because they never let me forget it. How about for once in your life you stop whining… and just man up?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uxuHb-UPsTw
Is he talking about society's actual message about masculinity, or is he talking about the message the academic left has been telling him is society's actual message about masculinity.
Because, "society is telling you to be something sad and dirty, and it's okay to feel suicidal about not living up to that standard" is a pretty solid way to fuel a suicidal crisis, whether it's true or not.
because "Man Up" is a criticism
I disagree. It's an acknowledgement that things are going to get ugly. My father's generation would have said "Fix bayonets!!"
Wait -- society has a "man up" culture? Since middle school, I've been told to get in touch with my feelings, etc., etc., and we've had a very recent spate of "toxic masculinity" discussions about how bad it is to "man up." Whose society are they living in?
Then he shot her in the leg,
And this is what she said
"Only a lad. You really can't blame him."
"Only a lad. Society made him."
"Only a lad. He's our responsibility."
Oh, oh, oohh oh oh oh
"Only a ...
Catchy, infuriating tune. From Oingo Boingo.
So did he kill himself or did he just make a big show to get attention, like a girl would do?
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