mard-ko-dard’nahi hota- a false narrative

From my childhood all stories that I heard or cinemas that I watched, the hero fought the evil men hard and saved the pride of his parents and saved the girl (heroine). The hero faced all the pains, but never cried, and finally that "atmanirbhar-purush" (self-reliant man) without much support from the law of the land defeat the evil men. That is the show of strength, right? Whereas everyone else had to wait till the hero entered the car garage/ abandoned mill (a typical Indian cinema backgrounds for fighting) and fight single-handedly with a bunch of heavily weapon loaded goons to save his near and dear ones and in some cases the entire world till the police reaches the spot only to discover that the goons got grounded by the hero. Finally, we all celebrate the hero with a statement of pride- Mard ko dard nahi hota.

You must have heard this frequently used statement- "mard ko dard nahi hota"a quite common saying. It is mostly expected that if you are a man then you need to possess some supreme skill of never experiencing pain. May come any ordeal, a man is expected not to shed tears and unwaveringly continue with the responsibility defined for him in society. We (both men and women) fail to understand that this statement has been detrimental for the men in society. Moreover, we have miserably failed in distinguishing sex and gender, which has paved way for greater gender-based discrimination. In the name of strength and masculinity, society in large has used gender and gender roles to curtail men's freedom to express their vulnerability. If you ask me, there have been multiple situations when I felt like crying aloud, telling my friends my mental status, but the very idea of gender that tells you how a man(woman) should conduct himself(herself) did not allow me to do so. The best example I can quote is from my mother's funeral when everyone came to me and asked me not to cry because that made me (an earning man) weak in front of everyone (relatives in large). People had no business with my expression of vulnerability but had a lot to do with the pride attached to masculinity that could be in danger because of expressing my pain. I think almost all men have experienced such moments where your freedom or right as a human had been overturned by the socially constructive idea of gender.

The space of freedom to choose what we want to be, what we want to do and the capacity to express our happiness, pain, fear is very crucial for human development. The biggest crime that we can commit to ourselves is by not allowing our emotions to flow. The freedom to express ourselves and most importantly to express our pains and fear is something we need to celebrate more often by speaking it loudly. But the term 'gender' which is socially constructive where the society has a lot to do in your decision making has affected that space of freedom to express ourselves badly. The problem is even today when we use the word 'gender' both men and women relate it to only women whereas most of us fail to recognize the discrimination it brings to men too. The idea of gender is also affecting our natural actions/ movements. A human being cries out of happiness, fear, pain, and there is nothing gender about it. But when we see a male crying we end up saying “Ladke rote nahi hein” Or ”Kya ladkiyon ki tarah rota rehta hai” leading us to believe, crying signifies weakness. And our men are not entitled to be weak! Please don't be surprised, if men don't ask for help from women at the workplace- gender limited this too- the idea of mutual cooperation, coordination, and asking for help from others.

This is the time, for all the men to stop connecting ‘gender’ to only women and start recognizing that it is negatively impacting them too. This is high time for men to understand that how a socially constructive thing (gender) coupled with ‘patriarchy’ has severely affected the mental condition of most men. If we go by studies and dig on statistics, it is noticeably clear that men are more prone to depression, suicides, and suicidal attempts, and alcohol dependence or substance abuse. In developing countries, 1 out 3 men are consuming alcohol due to mental stress whereas it remains 1 out 12 for women. Similarly, according to a world bank report, the suicide rate in India is 16.4 for women and 25.8 for men per 100,000. It is the time for not only men but for us as a society to help unburden themselves from appearing as ‘strong’, ‘fearless’, ‘savior’. It is now imperative to condition our children to not let sex lead to gender-based differences. We need to learn that It's okay for men to be not okay as per societal norms ( a man must be emotionally and physically strong) and ASK for help from anyone and everyone. And the next time someone puts up a gender-based restriction, don’t hesitate from asking- kaun kehta hai mard ko dard nahin hota?