I haven’t read all the posts for redundancy but the disease of depression aside, I believe suicidal ideation comes from a sense of low self worth. A failed career, failed familial relationships, never finding a fit et cetera. Some people are just runts for some reason. In a puppy litter in someone’s laundry room it doesn’t matter because the runt will get forced attention and milk. In nature it will likely die, it doesn’t fit.
I don’t think there is a way to eliminate “runts” but we can handle them differently. Instead of coddling, cooing, making excuses for them et cetera, toughen them up.
It’s my belief we “detoxify” masculinity, bring back a desire to win/conquer, mate prolifically, provide and protect et cetera. Quit trying to treat men like women and then wonder why the idiots who fall for it are unhappy. Deeply, from the point of identity crisis. Society seems to confuse equality in opportunity with sameness.
Lead the weak to be strong instead of “learning to accept weakness” as non-toxic and I’m sure the statistics will drop significantly to just the natural runts vs society induced. And their families can worry about them.
Do you also think perhaps some have suicidal ideation because people failed them?
I’m not saying this about you because I don’t know you after all, but I’ve noticed some people look at this matter and I have a hunch that some of them had a smooth life in which everything worked out, not from their own efforts completely (although some like to think that).
I mentioned social atomization/alienation in a post above and certain elements of America cause this, which is above any individuals efforts for correction.
Athletic events, lifting competitions, market share from a competitor, having a better truck than the neighbor, climbing a career ladder over others/building a business et cetera. For cheap thrills, engage in combat sports and feel the full cycle of competing and winning, or striving to, in minutes.
I haven’t read your isolation quote reference but as a general response to the question above, I suppose it could happen. Likely earlier in life than later. To me, healthy masculinity encompasses a sense of individualism. You may dig roots and grow branches of sorts because you want to, but you always own both the roots and branches in a sense. If a branch withers and dies it’s very sad but you prune and grow another direction.
And this sort of mentality is viewed as toxic and discouraged, yet it’s the way to be. And I believe the way we are naturally wired. Putting up emotional walls and compartmentalizing can’t be worse than being a crybaby pussy who dwells on issues to be “in touch with emotions” because a bookworm psychologist says so.
Speaking generally, if one lets others bring them to the point of their own death, you definitely need to toughen up. Even very close people. Lose the sick limb, scar over and move on.
Sure. Coddled and primed for continued issues. Taught to be soft and accepting instead of running through or climbing over root causes, as this approach would be toxic.
Rise to meet life’s challenges instead of hiding from them in a shrinks office. Men need a coach yelling them through soft times while building them stronger, not the warm bosom of acceptance psychology to cry in to.
I agree with much of what you wrote and I’m not intending to argue because that’s not my online-posting style. I think you are correct for some individual cases and training men generally (which includes raising sons properly).
Perhaps you’ve noticed my writings on manhood and sex (and I don’t mean the act of sex or sexual prowess). I am so non-PC about it that I’ve been (wrongly) called a misogynist and gotten much pushback (which I don’t care about). What I have referred to for the causes of increased rise in male anti-social behavior (including suicide) in the past century, especially since the 80s are:
Deindustrialization
Breakdown of social institutions (including the family unit and feminine flavoring of them)
Removal of exclusively-male spaces
Social atomization and alienation (details can’t be discussed in a normal fashion online without name calling and emotional blackmail
Relating to point 2, and being it’s Daddy’s Day, fatherlessness is common in suicidal men.
You forgot to include losing. You might want to rethink your post. Telling men they need to win and conquer is setting them up to feel like failures since most won’t win or conquer, most will lose. And we end up where we are in this thread, talking about depressed men killing themselves because they’ve fallen short of unreasonable and unrealistic expectations.
You never train to lose. Only to get up and try to win again.
What you’re describing, creating a comfortable place to suck, is the problem. Creating allowance for failure and complacency will encourage more it, and will dig a larger rift from a man’s natural state, leading to an alleged 50% suicidal tendency rate.
Let the pain of loss push you forward, not bury you under.
I would suggest a lack of purpose, and consequently a lack of drive and all it encompasses chasing a purpose, is the root cause issue.
Deindustrialization had led us to a pretty dystopian, detached society where I believe it’s easy to question meaning. Some of our wealthiest simply do dumb shit on an iPhone camera and post it on social media. There is no real accomplishment, no tangible benefit, no lasting value. In the industrial era, the agricultural societies preceding it and hunting/gathering before that survival was very hand to mouth with immediate reward, and status for measurable success. Now a large part of society works in industries with largely existential benefits, so there is a sense of detachment from worth.
Same for a breakdown of social institutions, especially with replacement ideals slanted towards feminine. Detachment and loss of natural order/fit. And I would tie this in to removal of exclusively male spaces. Although, I would suggest private garages and fire pits have always been best for this, and you can control a private guest list.
I’m still not sure what you mean by atomization for context.
Society has effectively removed the purpose of masculinity. Leading, driving, defending, conquering et cetera. There is a large sense of displacement.
So rise above it and win. As a business owner, this is probably easier than in the corporate world with a woke/equity agenda. Bring the best product/process/service to market and let it compete on its own merits. Date women who appreciate a male lead, they’re still out there. Be a husband and father, with presence, if you choose that route. Just be a man and don’t worry about how it’s perceived.
But most will lose. That’s reality. Most won’t conquer. Telling men they need to be better than the other guy when they won’t be, does not help. You can focus on winning, on beating the other guy, meanwhile your life passes you by. Your relationships, if you even had any, are neglected.
I haven’t described anything, you’re making assumptions. And there is a difference between not wanting to suck and wanting to be Ghenghis Khan.
Wrong. You are setting men up for failure by telling them they need to conform to your view of what a man should be doing and what he should value above all else. Failure is not always a sign to get up and try again but a sign to maybe try something else.
Happy men don’t kill themselves. If your reason for living is to be better than other men, to judge your value and self worth by comparing yourself to others, then you will never be happy because someone will always be better than you in some way.
Who have you conquered? The answer is no one. And it will always be no one. How do you live with that failure?
So get up and work towards winning again. That’s the “learn to lose” counseling. Condition for drive, not excuses. You’ll build grit like this, not self-pitying, suicidal babies looking for their next mommy figure to hug them through a tough time… or suicide.
The problem isn’t unrealistic expectations, it’s defaulting to weakness as strength.
As a society, let’s start by re-introducing merit based trophies to competitions.
Russel Brand talks about 44% of young men being suicidal. Now I will say that this is an unbelievably high number IMO, and I think many who report this could not also accurately define “depression”.
Depression (in laymen’s terms): A condition in which everything in your life is great, but a chemical imbalance in your brain is causing you to still be genuinely unhappy. If your life sucks and you are ‘depressed’, but you will stop being ‘depressed’ when your life stops sucking - you are not depressed.
I really have a hard time believing that 44% of men are suicidal. This typically means that they would idealize suicide. As in, their ideal outcome is suicide (someone correct me here if I’m wrong).
HOWEVER
I think the growing number of involuntarily celibate young men (some 33% of men under 30) has a high likelihood of relating to this. Most of these young men don’t even try to speak to women. Hell, I work with a number of dudes my age who make as much as me (comfortably into 6-figures) and I am positive that they are sexless and have not been in close contact with a woman in years. These are prior service members too.
Depends on the definition in the article. If they are going by “has at one point or another considered harming themselves” (or some similar type definition), I believe the number. It’s getting harder to care for one’s family (expenses are huge and the average male income has not risen to keep up with costs). Women are getting more picky (supposedly if you watch “red pill” type content or believe many of the studies about dating apps and such) with unrealistic expectations (i.e. relatively average women wanting a man who is greater than 6’ tall (14.5% of US males) and makes > 100k (23.4%) based on a quick google search). Combining those two numbers as probabilities (P(>6’) union P(>100k)), gives that 3.4% of males qualify for something the “average” potential mate might have as minimum qualifications (note, there are a lot of assumptions about these potential mates here - but this is the image portrayed on social media pretty much across the bored).
Extrapolating and lets bake some numbers in that makes things a little more reasonable. Say only 20% of women are looking for the aforementioned qualifiers, that’s still a >16% discrepancy in the available supply compared to the demand.
A lot of this is just a thought experiment on my part, but it reinforces the idea of large amounts of self-harm/suicidal ideation in mean.
My guess is it’s more likely “have considered suicide,” or “have had suicidal thoughts.”
This is something I wasn’t even aware of. Are there any studies on this? 1/3 of men under 30 are virgin? No way. If that’s true, why? Has porn taken the place of actual women for them? Are they just swallowed up by “the system” and don’t care about sex?
I don’t know man, women say all that stuff, but in practice it falls apart. There’s always been a part of the population that are stupid cunts and believe all that +6ft +100k stuff, but most women are just looking for a decent guy who wants them. And the aforementioned stupid cunts, they end up banging dudes while their criteria meeting husband is at work.
