What does 'be a man' even mean?

Three young males are sitting near in front of a starry night background. One is holding a basketball, another is holding a skateboard, and the third holds a backpack between their legs. They are dressed in casual attire.
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When we tell someone to "man up" we’re also telling them there’s such a thing. But who decides what a real man is? And why?

What would happen if we stopped trying to define what a "real man" is?

Instead of trying to figure out what a supposed real man is, and then putting pressure on ourselves to live up to that, we could just think about what sort of humanwe want to be.

Whether it’s one who is kind, generous, athletic, respectful, proud, humorous, smart, forgiving, supportive, creative, enduring, or whatever.

We can make that part of how we define ourselves, right?

We could also take the pressure off ourselves to be those things all the time.

You might be feeling supportive and generous one day, but not so much the next.

Maybe you’ve had a full-on week and you just need to lean into that humorous or creative side. It’s all good.

Apart from losing the idea that any of us should "man up", let’s also recognise some of those emotions that "real men" might have been told not to have.

It’s a nice little clip, right? The first line kind of says it all – “When most people say ‘man up’ they mean ‘toughen up, don’t be emotional’.”

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We've been sucked into a video black hole for a while now, but luckily, we're turning up some pretty good vids.

Here's another video that asks some young males to talk about the phrase "man up".


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