#boyswithfeelings

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

making a podcast is hard! i’ve found it difficult to figure out the order in which we want things formatted or recorded. shoutout to all the folks working in radio or making their own podcasts, this work takes time and patience!

this photo is from when we first sat down and did some serious recording (in our bedroom), and were brainstorming what pieces we wanted to included in the first episode.

we are still finishing it up now, and hope for the first episode to be out tonight! <3 fingers crossed

-thomas

[thereisnoescape00]

What inspires you? Boys with feelings.

[amaziginc]

#BoysWithFeelings (at Riverview Tower)

[coryschultz42]

A little urban exploring in NE Minneapolis. Great view from the top of the grain silo.

It was odd seeing all of downtown shut down and dark.

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

we’re actually doing this!

it took some time to really plan and lay out what to say, when to say it, who was going to say it... i am feeling exhausted but so pleased and happy with what we made. i am amazed at creators everywhere. i cannot wait for you all to hear our first episode, coming in a few hours!

-thomas

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

Men & Masculinities: “Assessment & Advocacy”

Hello and welcome back to Boys with Feelings! In this final blog post for my Men & Masculinities course, I will be discussing how the writing of these blog posts, paired with my research and class material, has changed and shifted my understanding of masculinity—in a personal sense, academic sense, and in the world around me. And with these new thoughts, I will conclude with what I think needs to be done, and where we can look for inspiration and direction (because I am certainly not the only one with these questions, and many people have done loads of work before me!). I hope you follow these people and can learn from them as well, ultimately seeing where your own personal stake lies in the complex ties between masculinity, emotion, and health. Before we get into that, however, let’s hit the rewind button for a moment.

Although I have been thinking about masculinity and gender for some time, especially after entering college, I have not done a deep dive academically into the subject(s) until these past two years. I am grateful that each class, event, and casual discussion has brought new knowledge and things to reflect on, since this is a topic I know will never be “complete” for me (or anybody, really). For this class, specifically, one of those big “aha!” moments for me was when we read and discussed the article “Healthy for Whom?,” by Matthew B. Ezzell. The extended title of the article mentions dominance, which is at the core of this article and its discussion. The “aha” moment for me came towards the beginning, in a section titled “Gender as a Category of Inequality.” Before reading this article, I had formed this thought in my head that there could be a healthy form of masculinity to strive for, and that this would be my own personal work and, perhaps, professional work. This might have been evident in some of my earlier blog posts. This article, however, sort of pulled the rug out from under me, describing how masculinity, and gender itself, “is not a category of difference, it is a category of inequality.” Woah. With this framework, with gender being a system of inequality and dominance for one group (men), could there be a possibility for a healthy masculinity to strive for? Has my focus of masculinity and vision for the future been a waste of time, just a reproduction of dominance, but perhaps with a “kinder” face? Is the direction I should be looking echoed within a question my teacher asked my Gender Roles in Literature class my senior year of high school, my first academic class focusing on gender: “so should we get rid of gender all together, and all become androgynous beings?”

I have not come to a solid answer on any of these questions, but I do know I cannot be static while trying to find their answers. And though answers may never come, I may get clues, and the only way to do that is to gain experience and take risks. So I have settled on the philosophy that, for now, I can hold these questions with me, and continue to learn and focus on confronting my own masculinity, welcoming my emotions, centering my health, and working with boys and men to do the same for themselves. It feels too urgent to not do so, for we know the violence that men do to women, trans folks, non-binary folks, and themselves. And I write this not only for you, the reader, but for myself as well, to keep myself accountable.

Too many times, even after all these courses, the countless readings, the essays, I still find myself frozen or trying to talk my way out of confrontation. Even when I know someone is being hurt or made uncomfortable, I try to convince myself that I don’t need to say anything. So for the men reading, hopefully these words make an impact on you and help you understand why this issue is so immense and needs your personal involvement. When I was living and studying in my mom’s home country of Brazil, I came across this phrase spray-painted at the university nearby: “a revolução é interna,” or “the revolution is internal.” To make change, it has to first come from within. So to the men reading, and for myself, spark a revolution within your heart, within your mind, to see how masculinity plays a role in your own life, with your own emotions, with your mental, physical, and emotional health. And pay attention to how this spark changes your interactions, how this affects the people around you, and how it makes you feel. Do it for the people you love and the strangers you will never know, but do not forget to do it for yourself.

Maybe need some flint to help that spark? No problem: to conclude, I want to point at some resources that have helped me with that introspection, that internal revolution. For this, I think it best to look where human creation lies: art. Art affects the heart (hey, good rhyme), and I think can be very important for us men to see how masculinity, emotion, and health all tie together and personally affect us. Plus, I think art has a certain quality that academia does not always bring: accessibility. Though an article or essay on masculinity can be very intriguing and beneficial, it can be hard to find, and even more difficult to understand. It is a different experience when we are in a story, and can learn and resonate with a character. And this is the first resource I want to recommend: the television show Steven Universe. If you scroll through this blog, you will see some videos about Steven Universe that I have linked here, and I highly recommend you check them out. The main character of the show, Steven, is a young boy who lives with a group of mystical beings known as Gems, of which he is part-Gem (and part-human). We get to follow Steven as he learns who he is, where his family comes from, and his place in the world. One of the powerful things about this show is that it is made primarily by women and people of color, and really gives a nuanced, yet child-friendly, way of approaching and understanding emotions. So for a man like me, who in a way is emotionally underdeveloped, this show really does provide a lot of learning and reflection to be done. Hopefully it can help you to create that spark.

Thank you, reader, for coming along this journey with me and following along with these blog posts, I hope my words have helped inspire questions and reflections. I invite you to scroll down and check out the other things we have posted on this blog, and to check out Episode #1 of our podcast, “Boys with Feelings.” Happy holidays!

Word count: 1157

Works Cited

Ezzell, Matthew B. 2016. "Healthy for Whom? - Males, Men, and Masculinity: A Reflection on the Doing (and Study) of Dominance." Pp. 188-197 in Exploring Masculinities: Identity, Inequality, Continuity, and Change., edited by C.J. Pascoe, and T. Bridges. New York & Oxford: Oxford University Press.

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

Men & Masculinities: “Association”

Hello and welcome back to Boys with Feelings! For this post, I am going to explore the topic of masculinity and emotion through the field of psychology, one of my two majors. Going through this practice will be exciting, as I think it will be beneficial for me to continue to consider how masculinity and gender influences all aspects of life, not just in my studies of sociology and women and gender studies. And hopefully for yourself, the reader, reading about masculinity and emotion through the field of psychology can help inspire you to look at how those two make an impact within your life, within your own interests, hobbies, communities, circles, etc. And in reality, my last blog post (“Awareness”) touched upon some of the ways that masculinity and emotion can manifest themselves in the field of psychology, especially in regards to mental health. So here, let us take the time to dive into the ways that masculinity and emotion can impact the mental health of men and all those around them, regardless of gender identity.

The example I want to look at is erectile disorder, which is listed as a mental disorder in the DSM-5, or the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 5th edition.. According the DSM-5, there are four criteria that must be met for someone to be diagnosed with erectile disorder: for 75-100% of occasions of sexual activity, there must be a difficulty in obtaining an erection during sexual activity, maintaining an erection until completion of sexual activity, and/or a decrease in erection rigidity; these symptoms need to have been occurring for at least 6 months; these symptoms are causing significant distress for the individual; and these symptoms cannot be attributed to another mental disorder, to the use of medication or a substance, a medical condition, or significant relationship stress and other stressors. The DSM-5 also has a section called for erectile disorder called “Associated Features Supporting Diagnosis,” and talks about men who might be experiencing low self-esteem, low self-confidence, and a “decreased sense of masculinity.”

The initial reason I chose to look at this diagnosis is because it is the only place in the entire DSM-5 where the word “masculinity” is used. And there are two things I want to analyze here when thinking about masculinity and emotion, and how they relate to psychology. Firstly, the standards of being a man, or a traditionally masculine person, often include a sense of sexual prowess, or “success” in the bedroom. I would say this standard is applied to boys and men starting from a very young age, all the way to being an older man (“he’s still got game”). Rooting from a point of domination over women, it is frustrating to think that for those men who are not able to achieve this unattainable standard of heteronormative sexual domination, for whatever reason (maybe they actually don’t want to have sex at the moment), there are feelings of emasculation, low self-esteem, low self-confidence, and other distress. If sex is something someone wants, there are many ways to be intimate and sexual without an erect penis, it does not have to be and should not be the center of the experience. 

And secondly, I think it is important to remember that for those men who do feel distress, it is not necessarily their fault. They were taught, either by those around them or society at large, that there is one way to have sex and still be a man. So their feelings of distress, in my opinion, are valid in a certain sense. But I take issue with the psychological community, for instead of looking at why these men are feeling distress, it is labeled as a mental disorder that needs psychological treatment. And, in fact, it is actually quite common for men over the age of 40 to experience problems with gaining or maintaining an erection: 13%-21% of men aged between 40-80 years old report occasional problems with gaining an erection, and 40%-50% of men older than 60-70 years old report significant problems with erections. So for something so common, in a physical sense, it is frustrating to think that so many men still feel distress for not being a “real man,” when in fact the qualifications of being a real man can never be reached.

Word count: 723

Works Cited:

American Psychological Association. (2013). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (DSM-5®). Retrieved from https://ebookcentral.proquest.com

-thomas

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

Men & Masculinities: “Awareness”

Preface: If you were to scroll through this blog, you would notice that the above image (or meme, as I would usually say) is the first image posted to this blog, with the caption “welcome.” This meme, shown to me by a close friend, I feel like encapsulates a lot of what I am interested in as well as my close friend Nicolás Cruz, who is the co-creator of this blog, along with myself (can I say that? I’ve never said that. Yeah! We are co-creators! Woo!). It speaks to the name of this blog/podcast/project, “Boys with Feelings,” and our personal and deep interests in emotion and masculinity (and how that impacts ourselves, our relationships with women, with men, with family, etc.). If you know all this already and are familiar with the blog, first off, thank you for being here and caring about our work! <3 <3 If you are a classmate in my Men & Masculinities course, for which I am writing this blog entry, thank you so much for being here as well and I hope this little preface is helpful when navigating the blog ☺ <3 If you have any questions, feel free to let me know in class, or leave a comment.

~

The purpose of this entry, to my understanding, is to bring you, the reader, some awareness as to what subject I am deeply passionate about in regard to men and masculinity. For myself, that is masculinity and emotion. I hope to do that here in an informative, fun, and accessible way. I will probably share stories along the way, as that does inform why this subject is important and relevant to me. Enjoy!

The topic of emotion and masculinity is important to me in a number of ways, but to start off, I want to focus specifically on why I think it matters when it comes to boys’ and men’s health and relationships. As someone considering to be a counselor or therapist for boys and men in the future, this is especially close to my heart. I do understand, however, that this focus is a little selfish, and I will say more about that after I go through the main pieces.

To me, there are three core concepts when considering emotion and masculinity: experiences, awareness, and expression. Everyone, regardless of gender identity, experiences emotions. However, because of the ways boys and men are socialized in our (Western) society, they learn to be aware and acknowledge limited emotions – primarily anger. Thus, men and boys’ expressions of emotions are limited as well: often verbal or nonverbal forms of aggression, which can escalate to violence; or a projected absence of emotion.

And though many boys and men might like to think otherwise, the ways we are aware of and express emotion do take a toll on our own personal health and relationships. They contribute to an increase in stress and anxiety, increased risk of the common cold and other illnesses (due to that increased stress), isolation from others, increased risk of depression, less help-seeking behaviors (especially for mental health concerns), higher alcohol consumption, and higher rates of suicide. To keep this whole entry brief, I will just list those out here for now, but there are articles at the end of this blog entry from which I gathered this information, so check those out if you like seeking information that way!

I am going to stop here for now, but I hope this wee bit of information helped in sparking some interest in this topic and shows you why I care about it so much and plan to continue exploring it! Thanks!

P.S. For transparency, a lot of the inspiration and language for my writing here comes from work I did last spring in a class called Psychology of Gender, which I highly recommend!

Word count: 433 (not including “Preface,” which is 208 words)

Works Cited:

Bazinet, C. G. (2015). Masculinities, gendered expression, and the social, emotional, and academic well-being of high school boys (Ph.D.). Available from ProQuest Dissertations & Theses A&I. (1688327278). Retrieved from http://login.proxy.seattleu.edu/login?url=https://search-proquest-com.proxy.seattleu.edu/docview/1688327278?accountid=28598

Kaplan, M. S., Huguet, N., Caetano, R., Giesbrecht, N., Kerr, W. C., & McFarland, B. H. (2016). Heavy alcohol use among suicide decedents relative to a nonsuicide comparison group: Gender-specific effects of economic contraction. Alcoholism: Clinical and Experimental Research, 40(7), 1501-1506. 10.1111/acer.13100 Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com.proxy.seattleu.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=psyh&AN=2016-32715-017&site=ehost-live&scope=site

Wasylkiw, L., & Clairo, J. (2018). Help seeking in men: When masculinity and self-compassion collide. Psychology of Men & Masculinity, 19(2), 234-242. 10.1037/men0000086 Retrieved from http://search.ebscohost.com.proxy.seattleu.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=psyh&AN=2016-56902-001&site=ehost-live&scope=site

Way, N. (2013). Deep secrets: Boys' friendships and the crisis of connection Harvard University Press.

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

Our first episode is up on Soundcloud! Check it out and let us know what you think! Thank you to everyone who has supported us and encouraged us in creating it :)

-nicolás

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

Men & Masculinities: “Analysis”

Hello and welcome back to Boys with Feelings! In this post, I am going to explore the topics of masculinity, emotion, and health. To be specific, I will get a little more academic and reference some peer-reviewed journal articles. By critically reviewing these articles, I hope to paint a picture of how masculinity is intertwined with emotion and health, why that is important and relevant in our current time, and especially for those interested in the profession of mental health.

To begin, we should get some context for why approaching this topic is worth your time, and how understanding the big picture can help us as we walk through. In an article from 2016, two researchers comb through the data of a 2006 survey that represents noninstitutionalized US adults. This survey had a specific section on mental health, including attitudes on help seeking, which is what these researchers look at. They want to see how gender and masculinity can affect these attitudes and play out in actual help seeking behavior. The major findings in their review of the survey can be summarized with two points: men are less likely to endorse formal help seeking than women; however, overall, gender did not play a significant role in endorsing someone to seek help, for both men and women. The researchers suggest here that many men might actually support the idea of someone seeking help, regardless of gender. And yet this is paired with the second finding: men distancing themselves from formal and professional help. So men seem to want help, and support others getting help, but still stay away from seeking help in formal settings. Why is this the case?

The second article might help us answer this question. In 2018, Nicole Moulding conducted a series of interviews and analyzed the way men discuss their childhood emotional abuse (CEA), specifically how they deal with the emotional impacts of CEA. In Moulding’s analysis, there are two common threads that all the men share: controlling their emotions and “becoming a better man.” “Controlling emotions” means bottling up responses of anger, fear, and confusion, potentially through drinking alcohol, using drugs, self-harm, or ignoring one’s feelings. “Becoming a better man” is seen as the long-term result of one’s experiences with CEA: becoming dominant over the abuser, whether through physical strength, income, education level, and/or forgiveness. Moulding highlights these threads in order to underscore why men might stray away from formal help for mental health issues, and what needs to change: the gender-neutral approach in professional mental health services. In the analysis of these men’s words, Moulding shows that there are deep connections to masculinity and how one copes with distress. If mental health professionals want to help men, there needs to be a recognition of this reality, and a tailoring in the treatment men receive. But what does this look like?

Thankfully, some researchers have asked that same question, and provided a possible answer: therapeutic metaphors. In a 2017 article, three researchers looked at ways to improve the counseling of male college students. With quite the task, these researchers offered the practice of therapeutic metaphors as a way to bring men into the conversation of their own emotions. Therapeutic metaphors are a way of using the experiences of one event or concept, in order to understand another. To directly challenge men to address their emotions, these researchers suggest the metaphor of “emotion as information.” By suggesting that emotion can be looked at as a form of information, therapists hope that men can approach their emotions as a way of viewing and experiencing the world, something that can tell them a bit about themselves, and not something to compartmentalize and hide away. The greater hope of this is that men start to see that reflecting on their emotions is not a sign of weakness, but in fact a healthy process that always needs to be done. There are more metaphors to explore here, and potentially many more ways to improve therapy and counseling for men.

Men do seem to want help when it comes to mental health, and endorse others to do the same, but face specific challenges when it comes to entering professional contexts and having their emotional experiences connected to their masculinity. There is hope as researchers in the field are looking for ways to improve therapy and counseling that address the needs of men in a supportive way, one which directly challenges their notions of masculinity and emotions.

Word count: 745

Works Cited

Genuchi, Matthew C., Brian Hopper and Charles R. Morrison. 2017. "Using Metaphors to Facilitate Exploration of Emotional Content in Counseling with College Men." Journal of Men's Studies 25(2):133-149 (http://search.ebscohost.com.proxy.seattleu.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=sih&AN=122936660&site=ehost-live&scope=site). doi: 10.1177/1060826516661187.

Moulding, Nicole. 2018. "’Becoming a Better Man’." Affilia: Journal of Women & Social Work 33(1):39-55 (http://search.ebscohost.com.proxy.seattleu.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=sih&AN=128291665&site=ehost-live&scope=site). doi: 10.1177/0886109917729665.

Wendt, Douglas, and Kevin Shafer. 2016. "Gender and Attitudes about Mental Health Help Seeking: Results from National Data." Health & Social Work 41(1):e28 (http://search.ebscohost.com.proxy.seattleu.edu/login.aspx?direct=true&db=sih&AN=112385205&site=ehost-live&scope=site). doi: 10.1093/hsw/hlv089.

 - thomas

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

question to the community: undergrad first-year men & participation

today, during my student leadership training, we had a portion of the day where we broke out into small groups and could choose short sessions to attend. those sessions had different themes or topics, specifically different identity-based groups, which were chosen based on research done by the university. this research showed that these different groups had low attendance for campus programming, aka events put on by student leaders and the groups or organizations they are a part of. for example, an RA might organize a “breakfast for dinner” event to get more residents to meet each other and build a community. this would be an example of campus programming.

one of those sessions was about men, why men have a very low turnout for campus programming. upon hearing that men are a significant group who do not attend much programming, i was not surprised, but i still did not really know or understand why that is the case. so i went to this session, hoping to hear the thoughts and questions of others, to maybe get a better idea.

i still feel i did not get much of an answer or path to go down, as i felt there was an essentializing of men and their interests, and more of a focus on how to attract men to more programming, as opposed to why they do not show up in the first place. i am still pondering on this myself, and would love to hear any thoughts people have about why this may be the case. thank you!

-thomas

p.s. if i have more thoughts or ideas, i’ll update this post! thanks :)

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

i thought this was a super interesting video, making the connections between men’s insecurity with their own masculinity, constrained images of beauty and sexiness upon women, men’s perception of women’s purity and innocence as sexy, and loooads more. very thought-provoking!

-thomas

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

hi friends!

i realized that nicolás and i never shared the spotify playlist we made for this podcast, so here it is! hopefully the link works, if not, please let us know!

there is no particular order or driving purpose for the songs we have chosen and added to this playlist, i guess they are songs that we feel should be connected to this work. we will keep adding songs as life comes by. i hope you enjoy :)

p.s. there is also a link to this playlist if you go to the “menu” in the top left corner of our blog when viewing it on a desktop, so you don’t have to scroll and search for this post everytime. a link to our soundcloud is in the menu too, where we will be posting our podcast episodes <3

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

#relevant to our first episode and my own interests/recent writing, plus my current fav show: steven universe! i highly recommend watching this show if you have not seen it already, it teaches a lot, especially in regards to masculinity, emotions, and relationships. it’s almost been like a source of life philosophy for me.

-thomas

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

a really interesting video that i have not visited in some time, but it is the video that introduced me to the “Pop Culture Detective” youtube channel, which has a lot of excellent and interesting videos about masculinity and pop culture (tv shows, movies, and more!). i recommend! <3

-thomas

[boyswithfeelingspodcast]

we mention the term intersex in our first episode; here is a little more information about the term and identity of intersex!

-thomas