Man Up?
One of the themes of that came across in many of the comments in my post about male closure was this idea that men needed to man up when it comes to dealing with their emotions. A brotha seeking out some closure was probably going to exhibit stalker behavior and say everything with his chest. Fair enough, there are definitely a lot of men out there who absolutely suck at dealing with their emotions.
Mostly because we are always expected to man up.
But what does that even mean? Does it mean that you just suck up anything that could be perceived as hurting your feelings? Between doing that and always managing to pretend that we are emotionless, logic driven machines its no wonder why ninjas start dying when its gets hot outside. A brotha can’t even complain about the heat without getting told to man up and just deal with the sh*t.Which leads to a prideful confrontation which leads to summertime gunshots.
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Which, ya know, okay. If a man stubs his toe and starts boohooing like ole b*tch, then yes, he needs to man up. That does hurt like hell though. Stubbed toes are not the business. But I can understand how a woman might look at a man who’s all in his feelings because of something like that with the side-eye. If he needs his woman to kiss it and make it feel better than perhaps he needs to, well, man up, and move on. At least publicly. What a grown ass man does in the privacy of his home is his business.
What’s interesting about this is the double standard. And forgive me, shots are about to be fired. As I’ve said before, many women display toddler tendencies when they’re tired and/or hungry. I feel like if you react the same way that my 2-year-old daughter does to anything then I have a right to kick your ass straight to the curb. But I had a convo with one of my boys about this and he was like, dude, that’s just how many women are. And he was right. If I kicked women to the curb for that I’d be a lonely fool for a very long time.
Now imagine a tired man showing some signs of b*tcha**ness and complaining and throwing a tantrum and being all irritable because he was tired or hungry. Hell I inadvertently referred to that behavior as b*tcha**ness. Any man who did that would be considered a b*tch off break and would be ridiculed. And it’s not that we don’t want to complain about those things its just that we can’t without being emasculated. Effectively, manning up is taking everything that life throws at you and pretending that you aren’t fazed by it.
Or…if something needs to get done, motherf*cking doing it.
John Q is one of my favorite movies. For those who haven’t seen it, it’s a movie about a family with a son who needs a heart transplant and the struggle of the family to keep their son alive. It stars Denzel Washinging and Kimberly Elise and is an indictment on health care for the poor with the overarching message that the have-nots have to resort to damn near government overthrow and anarchy to get any help, and even then, they’re going to jail. But there’s a particular scene in the movie where a frustrated Kimberly Elise angrily tells Denzel’s character to “DO SOMETHING! DON’T LET OUR BABY DIE!” That ninja didn’t have any guidance but he was expected to do something to keep his son alive. The entire burden was on him. The buck stopped. So he resorted to his final option…this ninja took over the hospital’s ER, took hostages, saved some lives, and became a folk hero while trying to save his son’s life.
He manned up and did whatever it took to get the job done. Whatever it took. Throughout the movie you saw him trying to take care of everything. Because that’s what men are supposed to do. There’s no time to get in your feelings and feel sorry for yourself. No. You have to take care of business. There’s no empathy for the man because he’s not supposed to be in that situation in the first place.
When a man is told to man up, he’s supposed to be fully accountable to whatever situation he’s in and not be defined or constrained by the limits of it. He’s supposed to overcome. Martin.
And mainly not succumb to any feelings. It’s amazing how that starts so young too. If a little girl falls down, everybody sweeps in to hug her and tell her its okay and kiss her to make sure she’s okay. Little boys get the, “ninja get up, you’re alright. Don’t cry” treatment. When you’ve been suppressing feelings for that long, you’re either going to become cold or murder somebody. Sure there are degrees in the middle, but they’re not keeping anybody warm at night.
Bazinga.
Here’s a quick story. I once had a chick put her hands on my face in the most nonsensual way possible because I made a comment about something she was doing at the time. My comment obviously irritated her and it caused her to react angrily. If you ask anybody about that situation they would tell you that her actions were completely unjustified. Hell she might tell you that. She apologized…and then told me I was going to need to build a bridge and get over it. Basically, “I said I’m sorry, man up ninja.”
And women wonder why men are so screwed up when it comes to dealing with certain situations. Women don’t mind emotions as long as they’re deemed productive, which means catered towards them. Displays of love and affection are great…but even then there are women I know who don’t want a man fawning all over them because they don’t want men showing all that emotion. That was an actual convo I had.
Man up. Mind you, I’m not saying that there’s anything wrong with any of this. I’m a man. I man the f*ck up and do what I need to do to get whatever needs to get done. But I also acknowledge that there have been times when I’ve completely forgone dealing with emotions because of this ridiculous notion that I wasn’t allowed to feel anything. It’s probably why my default response to “how are you doing?” is always “Cool” and have no idea how to really elaborate.
Then again, I’m a man…who wants to hear how hard my life really is anyway?
I’m writing a tome right now but I think this even goes deeper in the Black community. I’ll leave that alone for now though as I’m sure it will come up in the comments.
I’m curious about the entire concept of manning up and if men and women view it any differently. Ladies, what does “man up” mean to you in relation to men? Fellas, what does it mean to you?
Basically, if you have to tell somebody to “man up” what are you really saying? And do you think we place a heavier emphasis on “manning up” in the Black community?
Inquiring minds would like to know.