Adnan Malik has always been vocal about his views on several social issues and he has never shied away from voicing his opinion on social media platforms. Recently, the actor appeared on a talk show on Indus News to discuss how social pressures, family and popular culture propagate toxic masculinity.
He participated in the show The Coffee Table hosted by Mina Malik Hussain where she highlighted the subject that “toxic masculinity pressurizes men to behave indifferent”. She explained how feminism is deemed to be only about “women” who want to dismantle patriarchy and oppressive structures, but it’s not. Feminism is about everybody and underneath this umbrella, we have women, children and men. It is important to realize that as much as patriarchy is serving men in our society, it is also doing a disservice and is oppressing with old cliches that discourage men to be emotional or supplicate.
As an advocate of mental health and a speaker for gender masculinity, Adnan Malik shares “The idea of alpha-male is propagated through popular culture and how societies are run; it’s kind of hand-in-hand like modern capitalism. Men are supposed to go out and women are supposed to be home. When we come in this world, it is all very instant. It’s like: ‘Boys like blue, girls like pink. Boys need to play with boys. Men are not supposed to be sensitive. It starts at a very early age at school where an older person bullies you for being sensitive and that’s where the process starts and it kind of persists throughout your life.”
Adnan added how men are supposed to conform to a stereotypical image and nothing against that image is acceptable.
“Then, you are shaped in a way that you’re supposed to be competitive, do the job that needs to be done, and provide for your family. It is a very claustrophobic and tight container which causes a lot of mental health issues,” he added.
“Men have to climb this ladder of success that is the idea of perfection. They enter the working world and start running after success and all they have to do is to tick these boxes: money, car, house, marriage, kids, power and then at the age of 60, they are still not satisfied. And now you’re seeing this even at young ages, like men in their 30s, who have achieved a lot and they’re dissatisfied. This dissatisfaction leads them to all kinds of coping mechanisms which are not healthy.”
“Even in our society we see addictions of alcohol and drugs and even food. Food can be an addiction. Love and sex addiction. Unhealthy attachments to parents that haven’t really let go. What happens it that you live a normal working life during the day, but at night you resort to some numbing mechanism to hide your feelings. This builds up to a point when there are real mental health issues like depression and anxiety, with severe communication gap with family because you’re unable to show that you’re really unhappy,” he explained.
Adnan believes that for a healthy masculinity the marriage has to happen between our inner masculine and feminine traits, for both men and women alike. “Everyone is on a spectrum of masculinity and femininity and everyone should be as they are,” he said, adding, “The feeling body has to connect with the mental and physical body. Do self parenting. Ask who am I and what are the values that are important to me and not what someone else thinks.”
Watch the entire conversation here:
