Brokeback Mountain: Our Community's Common Bond > Brokeback Mountain Open Forum

Our Boys Crying..

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Kea:
Hi

Ok...I am going to try to start a new topic here.....help out a bit with Nancy being away......

Here is my question.....it came up in another discussion board... ...that some stories ( fan fic) especially show Jack as weaker ...crying ...etc.....and even Ennis crying and breaking down more...

this person  felt that this would not happen with our real Jack and Ennis......it raises an interesting question for me..


Were they really more in touch with their feelings than we know..??? 

or did they repress them?  ???

Do you think they showed more in private where we would not see them?? ???



Also.....this question came up.......about men crying.....

Do you think men cry as easily as we women do?   or No, they push it down deep  ? ???


Is sensitivity a gender trait? ???

How have you felt seeing a man cry?. ???

Who was more sensitive ..Jack or Ennis??

To quote a buddy of mine...( a sweet guy)  Real men cry....

whatca think??

hugs
Kea

twistedude:
We do see each of them cry..Jack once; Ennis twice, no, three time, nio FOUR times (in the kneeling clinch) (jn the alleyway as well) (twice at the end--in Jack's room, at at the very end)--.  I think it is ingrained in both of these men, and probably still in most men today, that they do not SHOW their feelings by crying.  I don't think that it ingrained in them not to HAVE such feelings, only that they do not make a public exhibition of them.  Country guys don't cry; life is too short, there isn't enough time, people can't be biothered with them cxrying--so they don't.

An interesting question, to me, concerns gay guys in general.  I've found, berneath the sensitive exterior, sometimes and ENORMOUS sophistiocation, that so far exeeds my own, that I'm afraid to express "womanish" feelings around them, "soppyness."  But gay guys, especially city ones, cry easily--at movies, at any rate!  Reading books...but i sometimes have the sense that they can't be bothered with emotions that they had, 100 years ago---

Anyway, I came here to read your poems...

Lynne:
Thanks for the new topic, Kea...I should have replied before now, but I've been dwelling on it privately...even in the shower today!

What is it about this movie that continually resurrects 'stuff' in us that we had no idea was stewing around?!?

Your thread here put me into some serious contemplation and I didn't want to post prematurely before I had thought things through as much as possible.  I keep coming back to the same point, so maybe you can help unstick me?  I'm afraid I'm going to sound unsympathetic or hard or cold or something...

First, let me address the idea of our boys crying...We see them moved to tears but it is very subtle.  For Ennis the tears are in his eyes (along with the hurt) and though Jack may be crying on his way to Mexico, even sensitive Jack forces them back and presses the accelerator on his journey (redlining again?).  I don't think anyone who says Jack is 'weaker' than Ennis has any valid arguments.  Jack was more in touch with his needs than Ennis, but it would take someone with a great strength of character to maintain any sort of relationship for 20 years, particularly when you consider how the frustrations and disappointments had to pile on him.  I wouldn't say that one is more sensitive than the other - they just coped differently.

That said, I think it's entirely conceivable that in the fan fiction world that Jack and Ennis were more expressive with each other privately.

So I was reviewing the men I know and under what circumstances I have seen them cry, which is what brought me to all the introspection.  In ALL cases except one, the tears were not motivated by genuine hurt; rather, they were manipulative, born of frustration or anger, but in general inappropriate.

That does sound hard, doesn't it?  Who am I to judge?  Let me rephrase slightly - I felt manipulated in these situations; that the tears were there to further some agenda, to generate a response in me, but not genuine.

So my own experience leads me to believe that sensitivity is more of a learned behavior and less a predisposition of one gender or another.

ednbarby:
In general, I've always believed that men actually feel things more deeply than women because we women are so much freer to let our emotions show.  When we girls get our hearts broken, we call all our pals and sit around and have a great big weep and eat fest.  With men, it's all false bravado until they find themselves alone with their feelings and don't know what to do with them.  I look at Jack finding himself crying in his truck that way - he's overwhelmed with emotion, and yet pissed off to realize he is.  Hence the almost petulant way he wipes away his tears.

twistedude:
Bob cries freely and openly when something moves him to cry...so there.

Although Jack cries real tears once, on the way to-- Mexico, eventually,  there are several times when he might have cried..and instead, conforts Ennis ( the cheek caress; the kneeling clinch).

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