Is patriarchy to blame for steadily rising male suicide rates?

It’s “easier” to be a woman now

Right-wing misogynists love to argue that it’s easier to be a woman than a man in today’s society.

But the binary created by this discussion around ‘who has it easier’ does little beyond perpetuating gender hostility which impacts people’s ability to communicate and socialise with one another as people, rather than as a man or a woman specifically.

Perhaps the ignorance towards days like International Men’s Day – and the imposition of manfluencers like Jordan Peterson, who believe pride is a cardinal sin – is part and parcel of why many men feel like women are busy celebrating each other, while there’s nothing to be proud of when it comes to masculinity any more.

Admittedly, it may be hard to find the good in a gender representation that has its roots in love, sex, and tragedy – according to author Simon Goldhill – and which has modelled itself in line with a patriarchal, colonial conceptualisation of protecting a supposedly antithetical femininity.

It may, indeed, be difficult to find the good in a long history of bloodshed, raping, and pillaging in order to preserve and enhance the prosperity of the ‘motherland’, all while supposedly defending the women it contains.

That is, of course, if we were willing to resign ourselves to this narrow, rigid conflation of masculinity with the dominant protector, provider, and inseminator stereotype.

The current (and arguably flawed) model of homosocial bonding facilitates hegemonic masculinity “which embodies the currently accepted answer to the problem of the legitimacy of patriarchy” and which results in the dominant position of men and the subordination of women.

As Nils Hammarén and Thomas Johannon suggest, “it is likely that the more polarized the gender order and the more heteronormative the sexual codes are the more traditional forms of homosociality one expects to find in society.”

This results in a “polarized view on gender and identity, not the least related to the notion that hegemonic masculinity is defined as opposed to and privileged over femininity,” and, I would add, upholding narrow and unrealistic standards for (straight) men to live up to.

Who’s going to look after the kids?

Lazily reported statistics around men’s higher suicide rates fail to address why figures are so tragically high.

If a more curious researcher were to look into the statistics, they might begin to question the motivation, rather than ignoring that yet another man has been systematically and socially failed by a patriarchal system which oppresses all of us.

The truth is, the cause of male suicide cause is often due to unaddressed mental health problems closely related to loneliness and economic circumstances, for which women have fostered a much more open conversation about.

For example, in 2015 one study found that for every 1% increase in unemployment there is a 0.79% increase in the suicide rate.

However, we can’t in good conscience consider elements like men’s higher rates of loneliness, without also considering their higher tendency and capacity for violence, both towards others, and towards themselves within their suicide attempts.

Nevertheless, it would be ignorant to dismiss the unequal economic circumstances that play a role in many men’s decision to take this final action.

Despite the higher number of male suicides, there are actually more female suicide attempts, which bears a relation to the higher rates of diagnosed depression amongst women.

Once again, we see how it’s not that men are necessarily more inclined to have suicidal thoughts than women, but that we are all trapped in an impossible paradox.

We live a patriarchal society which expects men to make money, and a capitalist society which makes it more difficult for some men than others to feed themselves and their families – never mind having the time nor the inclination to seek mental health support.

Thanks to things like the disproportionate burden placed upon women as caregivers in the familial model, we’re led to ask: if a woman goes through with it, who will look after the kids?

We might reasonably surmise that research which overlooks this gap in people’s motivations for turning to suicide or addiction is not only lazy, but also perpetuates what is known as benevolent sexism.

This is the notion that women continue to be undermined and stereotyped under the guise of chivalry, such as the idea that women are lucky not to have to fight in the army because they’re protected by men.

In reality, women have historically not fought in the army because it was believed that they were too weak to do a “man’s job”.

So sure, perhaps there is little to be proud of the concept of masculinity which forces men to prioritise provisions over people, or which dictates that a man must look and act a certain way in order to fit a quota of strong and virile masculinity.

But – and here’s the clincher – what if we were to dispel this concept of masculinity all together?

This framework for masculinity not only fails to represent the majority of men in the world, but also creates unachievable and harmful expectations around the so-called “ideal” of what a man should be, rather than what a man is – at least when it’s drawn up by the profligates and profiteers of patriarchal society.

Instead, we might look ethnographically at what people do and are, rather than trying to force everyone into binary and narrow categories which only seek to oppress and shame those they contain for never complying enough with an archaic notion of gender expectations.

Then perhaps we might begin to see that there is lots to be proud of about the ability to protect your loved ones, provide for your family, and help to raise and educate a confident and happy future generation.

Each of these things have absolutely nothing to do with how many people you’ve slept with, or how much you can lift in the gym…bro.