Four Myths About Modern Men That Need To Die
We can't start fighting the "good fight" until we stop the fighting amongst ourselves.
I love a good meme, but
I think our generation and Gen Z have gotten a little out of hand with making jokes about the opposite sex.
More and more I’m seeing that the memes are becoming meta, and that the people consuming them are starting to believe these are immutable traits about their counterparts.
As it pertains to men, it seems to me like we’ve become too comfortable meming and making fun of ourselves instead of actually addressing and standing up to stereotypes.
Newsletter Summary
Four myths about modern men that need to die
How I think this pertains to health
One quote about stress (from me)
Four Myths About Modern Men That Need To Die
As someone who’s really passionate about mental health, I’m always trying to find the balance between taking a joke — something I wasn’t very good at growing up — and being serious.
Jokes are funny insofar as they don’t sting too hard, and if you tolerate the sting for too long, you might start to wonder if there’s some truth to the jokes.
That said, I’ve never taken belittling people lightly. I’m not one to knock someone down a peg with a jab — when I’ve tried it, it hasn’t worked out super well for me.
It’s important to keep an eye out for people who are underrepresented and try to advocate for them when you can. Throughout my teenage and college years, I saw standing up for the women in my life as a crucial task.
My mom is the strongest person I know. My first manager and mentor at my first big-boy job out of college was one of the smartest fitness minds to coach me, and she probably only had a few years on me.
My wife is the second-in-command at one of the most up-and-coming fitness brands right now. And about 70% of my coaching clients are women. So I take standing up for them very seriously.
But lately, I’ve noticed a shift in the zeitgeist.
It seems like there’s been a paradigm shift too far away from men. And when we try to talk about it, it gets stigmatized.
Thankfully, there’ve been some pretty impactful voices (shout out to Chris Williamson of Modern Wisdom, Rich Roll, and others) who have brought more attention to this.
In the past decade, men have died from taking their own lives at the same rate women have died from breast cancer.
More men are reporting feelings of loneliness, lack of close friends, and an unwillingness to seek help. More women seek therapy options than men, and that’s because society as a whole still views men who do that as weak.
Those of you reading this, I hope, aren’t those people.
I’m also not saying that men enjoy any fewer privileges or opportunities than they historically have. It’s still a great time to be alive, regardless of sex.
But I can’t simply let this become normal and sit back while some of my male peers still think it’s okay to not be asked how we’re doing or work 60 hour weeks with no vacations.
There are four myths that still live on about men that need to die in 2025:
Men Don’t Need Help and Can Figure It Out On Their Own
The most common stereotype. Since hunter-gatherer times, we’ve innately been expected to work without question. Asking for and receiving help, however, is a two-way street, and men could also be better at speaking up in this regard.
However, until they do or someone else steps in to ease the burden, many will persist (sometimes at the expense of their physical and emotional health) in working through trauma, stress, and anxiety without so much as a simple conversation. The more we normalize “pushing through,” the more troublesome it gets when burnout happens.
Men Have Hidden Resentments Toward Women
Exacerbated by our current, well…White House situation, the general consensus is that a strong woman is intimidating to a man, and we would rather see women doing “traditional” things like staying home, raising kids, cooking, etc.
While an annoyingly large cohort of men think this way, it’s not all men, nor should that be the assumption. It’s hard to think of many instances where men lost some sort of opportunity directly because of a woman. Marriage, as Rob Henderson points out, is one of the most significant determinants of upward mobility in life. So if anything, the smart men realize that women are necessary financial pieces to their life puzzle as well as emotional.
Men Who Hold Onto Their Childhood Are Weak
An unfortunate amount of TikTok accounts (I hate that that’s how this idea came about) are girls ranting about how men need to “step up” when it comes to first dates, second dates, relationships, and husband business. They will use words like “immaturity” and “disrespect” when describing a man who uses his leisure time to indulge in things like sports, video games (more on that in a second), or grabbing a beer with the boys.
Make no mistake — too much of this can lead to feelings of neglect — there is an optimal (and non-optimal) amount of leisure time. But this is another over-generalization of male tendencies.
A man who is in-touch with a childish side and finding time for play, relaxation, sport, competition, and laughs is a healthy one. As men age, we lose touch with these things, which can at least partially explain rising rates of depression, anxiety and loneliness.
Men Who Play Video Games Are “Low Value”
My bias toward video games is creeping in here, but this is just plain wrong.
People who engage in electronic gaming — not the fake-Elon Musk kind where he lied about his Diablo score — have higher amounts of gray matter in their brain and are better critical thinkers. The idea that a man can’t play a video game without being unattractive is silly.
Side note: Streamers clearly have proved that gaming is not just for fun. There is money to be made as a gamer, albeit not much if you’re not dedicating your life to it, but categorizing men who casually game with the “low-value” trope is tired and reeks of the same generalization tactics as assuming a pretty woman on Instagram has an Onlyf*ns link.
What The Hell Does This Have To Do with Health?
A lot, actually.
Healthy relationships with your peers determines a lot of your life outcomes. People who live alone, on average, have shorter lifespans than their peers with partners or many friends.
Both men and women can be toxic.
But that doesn’t mean they all are.
Understanding that you can find friendship (and partnership) with anyone and not putting them in a box before you meet them is a great way to keep an open mind about things like this.
The health of men as a whole is at an inflection point. In the current economy, we could work ourselves so hard that we might become resentful down the road of the people in our lives who didn’t check on us when we needed a break.
It’s also on us to know when to take breaks, so as men, we have work to do on our own to bust these myths too.
But it starts by spreading the word.
It starts with creating awareness, asking about someone’s day, being willing to evade the small talk and have a deep conversation.
One Quote To Keep You Going This Week
From Me:
You’re not as weak as you think you are. Your body and mind remember everything.
The next time you convince yourself that something is too difficult for you, ask yourself why you think it’ll be difficult. The chances are you just haven’t actually faced it head on yet, so you can’t adequately assess it’s difficulty.
With more repetitions comes less difficulty. Your body will remember and improve each rep.
See you all on Friday.