Why Feminism Is Good For Men's Mental Health

When I was growing up, I always found this idea pretty confusing. Isn’t feminism just about women’s rights like pay equality and having the vote?

Once I learned a little bit more about feminism online and from the people around me, I understood that feminism can be used as a tool to help men just as much as women.

Something that’s changed over the last few years is that young men are becoming more and more passionate about mental health and taking care of others – which is awesome to see.

Believe me – just ten years ago it was a very different place to be a young guy struggling with feelings of anxiety, depression or loneliness. The general vibe was always to ‘put up or shut up’, or you’d risk having your status as a man being called into question.

Things are getting better, but they’re certainly not perfect. Men are still less likely than women to seek help for mental conditions like anxiety or depression, and men are three times more likely to die by suicide. These are important statistics, and they’re worth paying attention to.

So, what’s the cause, and how do we change the system so that we can take care of each other?

We have so many unspoken rules about what it means to be a man. We can see that wider society seems to value a certain kind of man – one who is masculinely handsome, sleeps with lots of women, loves danger and adventure, and is totally self-reliant.

The funny thing is that virtually nobody actually fits into that small idea of the ‘perfect man’, but all the same we’re expected to work towards it, and we can see people get punished for not fitting into that stereotype.

You see, masculinity isn’t really a natural law in the same way that gravity is. It’s more like a big game that the whole world plays every single day where society makes the rules. You don’t get to see the instructions, but by ‘winning’ or ‘losing’ you begin to learn them and internalise them to the point that you forget that there’s even a game to begin with.

In this game, some people get a better head start than others, and some of the rules that can help you win, might hurt other people or yourselves. Take for example, the rule about handling your own emotions and feelings. The game tells us that if you want to win at ‘being a man’ you need to be 100% in control of your feelings. Whether you’re feeling sad, scared or lonely, you’re expected to push it down and face the world every single day.

Maybe you’ve been called out for wearing something that looks too ‘girly’, or listening to the ‘wrong’ music, or you feel self-conscious about not having huge biceps, or a six-pack. Maybe you’ve even given someone else crap for not fitting in that box with a cheeky joke or two.

Of course, we all have those days where things can feel too much, or something terrible happens and we don’t know how to cope. The problem is that the game tells us that we’re not allowed to reach out for help, and this can lead to young men feeling like they don’t have any way out of their situations. Some men end up hurting themselves or others, or taking their own lives because they don’t know how to heal the hurt they’re feeling inside.

What if there was a way to take a look at these invisible rules, to pull out the instruction sheet – and maybe even think of a new set of rules that help everyone win? That’s what feminism offers.

Over history, feminist movements have had lots of different objectives, but at its core feminism is a tool and a social movement that helps us look at the ways gender changes and shapes individuals as they grow up.

The question that feminism asks is: what if we could build a new, more positive idea of what it means to be a man, a woman or a non-binary person? What if we could encourage men to take care of each other and the people around them, and be taken care of – not just by being a breadwinner, or someone who could win in a fight, but someone with empathy who genuinely cares about people’s wellbeing?

Young men’s lives are too important to keep using the old tools that we know don’t work. It’s time for a new approach – one that celebrates our differences and encourages us to support each other without bringing other people down.

We at Year13 encourage anyone struggling to speak out about their mental health - reach out to these guys for a chat:

• Lifeline 13 11 14
• Kids Helpline 1800 551 800
• MensLine Australia 1300 789 978
• Beyond Blue 1300 22 46 36
• Headspace 1800 650 890