Do you feel one group is more emotional? And is the belief that women are more emotional spread by men?
this post was submitted on 28 Jun 2025
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I think the difference is actually between how each sex biologically regulates emotion.
We're essentially the same, the only difference being a tweak of brain chemistry and hormones.
Most of those differences affect mostly how and when we feel emotions.
So while there certainly are differences, we both feel the same feelings. It's just when we feel them, and the frequency in which we feel them, that differs.
For example: Men biologically produce more testosterone. So its much more likely they'll have quick tempers, constant arousal, and aggresive competition as a result. While these emotions are difficult to regulate, which is very commonly seen in young males, the persistent exposure to testosterone does eventually lead to better control over the emotions it amplifies. (Assuming these males are aging in a healthy environment).
Women, unquestionably, can have these same exact emotions. However, due to the lower levels of testosterone, the frequency in which these emotions are experienced are far less than men. Which means over time, these emotions are less likely to be easily regulated, simply because the chemicals that produce them aren't as persistently experienced.
That is, an older male in a frustrating situation is less likely to get angry simply because they've been getting angry their whole life and know how to better bury their anger because of it. While older females may not have experienced anger / testosterone as much, so in frustrating situations don't have the experience needed to know how to regulate their temper better.
Imo, this is why we have the term "Karen" with no male equivalent.
For biological women, they produce more estrogen (and some other cool shit) which is why they tend to have more friends (it's the social hormone), express sadness easier, and also nest-build / want to have children.
Likewise they become experts at these emotions as they age, but get tortured as young teens who have to feel these extreme things for the first time.
Men, likewise feel these emotions, but since it's far less frequent, also have issues controlling them. That's why men have less friends, fear crying in front of people, and take so long to know if they want kids.
They feel the same emotions, but far less frequently so they have no idea how to regulate them. Men treat their sadness like anger, bury it, then want their GF to also be their psychiatrist since they have no clue what to do with those feelings they bury.
Imo, that's why the trope of the insecure male seeking lover / therapist exists as well.
That's all to say, we feel the same things. Just in different amounts at different times. Depending on when you look, either sex could be viewed as "more emotional. "
That's a pretty big assumption, isn't it? Maybe in a Star Trek utopia, what you're saying would be accurate, but in the present day I think most men are growing up in an unhealthy environment.
The term "Karen" is a product of modern day socioeconomic conditions, it's not an innate biological quality. The term was coined to refer specifically to middle-class white women treating service workers badly. This is a learned behavior that comes from privilege and a general lack of empathy, or seeing the target as human, which exists in more subtle ways even when they haven't lost control of their temper. I don't think "being a Karen" necessarily means losing one's temper, it's more about acting in an entitled way.
For your overall point that exposure to an emotion makes it easier to control, I don't think it holds up. Statistically, men are much more likely to commit acts of violence, whereas your theory would seem to suggest that older women are more likely to. I think it's just as likely that a high degree of exposure to a particular emotion will be buried or suppressed in an unhealthy way, leading to outbursts.
No bigger than the one you're making to the contrary:
We'll have to agree to disagree. Unless you want to quantify what a healthy environment is, or provide meaningful research that suggests you're right here, I'm unwilling to do either for you. I'm not going to believe you're right just because you say you are, and you clearly feel the same.
Agreed.
However, I disagree about it not involving anger. Yes, absolutley they act in an entitled way. But that entitlement is very often expressed through clearly angry or upset behaviors. Specifically: frustration / violence / "I wanna speak to your manager" verbal harassment.
In all seriousness, could you provide an anecdote, even a made up one, where someone gets called a "Karen" yet their behaviour doesn't involve frustration / anger / verbal harassment?
I honestly cannot imagine one in which that person would be called a Karen, and not simply entitled. (However, I admit I very much could be wrong here.)
You do realize if I'm wrong about that, it would be ALL men who commit acts of violence right?
What, in your opinion, is the difference that seperates violent and non-violent men if not the development of the capacity to emotionally regulate themselves better over time?
It has to be something, so if not that what is it?
The higher frequency of violence in men is actually more proof I'm right. Because that violence could be a result of those who haven't learned to well manage the amplified feelings their testosterone generates. As men, they have T, but getting used to what that does to you after puberty isn't easy. Those that adapt, cause no violence, those that struggle with it, do. Overall, the average rate of violence increases among men, but is not seen in all of them. Which is what's observed in most studies as you've said.
This is very much a big part of the point I'm making too.
When first experiencing emotions that are intensely enhanced by sex hormones, people get easily overwhelmed. They don't know how to stop those feelings from happening, so some end up burying them.
Doing so, PREVENTS those emotions from actually being felt or experienced. So the longer those go bottled up, the more explosive it becomes because the emotion has now compounded in its intensity, and the person who bottled it still has little to no experience or knowledge in which to handle it.
To be clear, running from or bottling emotions is not the same as experiencing them. And it's certainly not the same as experiencing them frequently.
Those that FREQUENTLY experience the same intense emotions, eventually, have no need to bottle them. They understand what it feels like to be intensely sad, angry, etc and will not be afraid of that experience or lack the tools to well manage it. They learn, over time, to work with those feelings rather than against them.
Basically, the intensity of an emotion matters, but so does the frequency in which it is felt.
For example: If you are frequently, once a month, feeling amplified saddness due to your own hormones (NOT Depression, that's entirely different) you probably have a damn good way of regulating that feeling so you can continue to function when you feel it.
In this example, there was likely a time that sadness was bottled, but because it was unavoidably happening once a month, over time, the use of bottling it becomes pointless. You quite literally get used to it, and learn to live with it. Bottling it is just a step on that journey.
For an emotion like sadness, that journey is much slower for men because they aren't exposed to it as frequently as someone with sadness as a period symptom once a month.
This form of emotional adaptation is also looking pretty scientifically solid these days:
https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2023-25436-001
I'm not going to "agree to disagree" on this any more than I'd "agree to disagree" on any other well-known facts. Here's the APA:
The APA defines traditional masculinity as “a particular constellation of standards that have held sway over large segments of the population, including: anti-femininity, achievement, eschewal of the appearance of weakness, and adventure, risk, and violence.” The guidelines, which were highlighted in the January issue of the APA's Monitor on Psychology magazine, say the pressure boys and men feel to conform to certain aspects of traditional masculinity can lead to poor health outcomes, including higher rates of suicide, substance abuse, violence and early death.
You've moved the goalposts. You were claiming that women are more prone to outbursts of anger specifically, because of being less used to testosterone. Now you're adding "frustration" and "verbal abuse," which aren't inherently linked to testosterone. Let's stick to anger, shall we?
With that in mind, here is one of the prime examples that I remember being used for an example of a "Karen." She's not expressing anger, she is expressing distress (played up on the phone), but it's primarily about exercising her privilege against a minority, weaponizing the police to win an argument. That's 100% Karen behavior.
That's completely idiotic, no. Your claim is that exposure to testosterone makes men less prone to angry outbursts generally speaking compared to women. For that to be wrong would not require every single man to be prone to angry outbursts, let alone acts of violence. It would only require them to be more prone to those things relative to women, which they are, objectively.
How fascinating. It seems that no matter what evidence actually exists out in the world, you're able to twist it around to support your conclusions. There should be a word for ideas like yours that are so obviously true, may I suggest the word, "unfalsifiable?"
You've played a very interesting trick of language in this section. Your argument rests on the fact that testosterone makes men more prone to feelings of anger, that is, to make them "experience" anger, but then you say that those who bottle up anger or react to it in unhealthy ways are not actually "experiencing" anger. This would imply that you think that testoterone doesn't merely cause the physiological symptoms that make people more prone to anger, but also inherently, biologically, causes men to respond to those symptoms in psychologically healthy ways. This of course contradicts your whole argument that it's necessary to learn through practice how to handle those emotions.
If "experiencing" anger means not only experiencing the symptoms, but also handling them in a healthy way and not bottling them up, then testosterone doesn't make people "experience" anger (only because you've redefined the word "experience" in a nonsensical way). If "experiencing" anger means feeling the symptoms of anger, regardless of whether it's handled in a healthy or unhealthy way, then what you're saying in this section is all nonsense. You can choose whatever definition you prefer, but you can't switch back and forth.
The paper you linked is very tangentially related to your point. Yes, people adapt emotionally to their environments. That has very little with your bizzare claim that men are less prone to angry outbursts or acts of violence than women because of biology.
That is a definition from an academic journal you are clearly taking out of context. It is not an actual study, experiment, or metric.
Nothing in your link confirms the AMOUNT of men being raised in poor conditions.
It is simply about "large segments" of men being exposed to negative portrayals of masculinity.
Specifically this exposure is defined as what's seen in social media, films, television, ads, podcasts etc.
It is NOT, in any way:
These are all ASUMPTIONS you are making.
This article quotes ZERO studies reaching these conclusions.
You are treating the amount of "traditional masculinity" exposure in social media, as if it is a ready part of the majority of young men's upbringing that's already affecting them negatively.
As a logical comparison, if this article was defining "traditional masculinity" as something like a billboard with Joe Rogan advertising McDonald's, you are coming to the conclusion that the majority of young mens families are shoving Big Macs into their mouth.
That's not what this article is saying at all.
You are even avoiding the clarifying statements in this link to reach the wrong conclusion. From your link:
So, literally, traditional masculinity is bad, and it's destroying men. NOT traditional masculinity is being forced onto the majority of young men. It is just a big part of current media, and that's affecting men poorly.
Also from your article:
That is certainly what I've been striving to look for in this thread. The encouragement this article provides in searching for such an answer is absoule proof that it has not been provided yet, especially from this article.
You have made incredible leaps of logic not at all supported by the link you provided.
I have not, in anyway, moved the goalposts.
I used basic logic, specifically the process of elimination to point towards a clear result:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Process_of_elimination
I did this, specifically, to avoid the pedantic argument it looked like you wanted to start, and now are very clearly continuing.
Specifically, this is pedantic.
You aren't allowing for the individual interpretation of her behavior in this video to be anything but distress. Based entirely on your own observation that it is distress. I, and a bunch of others could very easily interpret her behaviour differently.
Which is all pedantic, because it doesn't matter.
"Distress" is just as much of a negative-stress response as anger.
https://dictionary.apa.org/distress
Quite literally, you are trying to argue that distress and anger are different emotions, despite both of them coming from the same place.
You are basically saying that Pepsi isn't cola flavored because the can it comes in doesn't look like Coke.
It's still cola. You are just trying to redefine what that is.
So, even if this person is feeling distress in this video, it doesn't really prove she's managing negative stress well. It just proves, only to you, that she isn't "angry."
Which makes you appear right, but does absolutley nothing to further this conversation.
Which is why you then chose to avoid all the questions I asked as if they didn't matter. Specifically:
Whats the difference between men who are violent and men who aren't?
ALL men are exposed to testosterone. SOME men cause more violence.
ALL does NOT = SOME.
But you very much seem to not understand this when you insist:
If they ALL have TESTOSTERONE. They would ALL be violent. They aren't. You even acknowledge this by saying "more prone" to violence relative to women. What you don't acknowledge is that:
Not ALL men are violent. OBJECTIVELY. Do you agree?
Unless you want to admit to being bigoted. The answer is no.
You've already twisted facts to favor a world view that you've only assumed to exist. In addition to the pedantic nature of your critique, I don't feel this conversation is worth continuing unless I know I'm talking to someone who rationally wants to stay on topic more than get on a Soap box for attention.
Not ALL men are violent. OBJECTIVELY. Do you agree?
What an idiotic, rambling comment. You ignore basically everything I said and latched on to a couple random pedantic points, while accusing me of being pedantic.
Except the distinction does matter, because testesterone is connected specifically to anger and not to general "distress." Women are just as likely to experience feelings of distress as men, that means that there's a significant difference in the context of this discussion between the two.
Of course. At NO point did I ever claim otherwise. What I have claimed is that, generally, statistically men are more prone to violence, which is just as objectively true as the fact that not all men are violent, despite your claims to the contrary.
This is complete nonsense. Testosterone only makes people more prone to violence, generally, statistically, it doesn't make every single person violent.
This is a ridiculous strawman that you've constructed to divert the course of the conversation into utter nonsense. It has nothing to do with anything I said.
This is about the response I expected.
Nothing I said was idiotic. If anything, it was oversimplified. I even provided analogies.
But like I said, your overreaction was expected. It is the common behaviour of people who prefer avoiding hard questions instead of considering answers they don't like.
It's hard to admit you're possibly wrong. A "traditionally masculine" behaviour you keep providing great examples of. Quite to the contrary of your own conclusions.
Thank you for clarifying that this conversation is exclusively about your opinion, not the clear facts outside them you keep ignoring willingly.
You can have the conversation with yourself from here.
I just got the report now, I've permabanned them. Sorry you've faced such aggression, it's shit
Thank you! All good. Appreciate the notice, and great mod work.
Thanks mate
What "hard questions" have I avoided? I responded to everything you asked me.
It's a clear, objective fact that men are, statistically, more prone to violence than women. That means that you are, objectively, wrong. There's no reason for me to "admit that I'm wrong" when the facts and evidence are clearly on my side, lol.
How about answering the following question first to prove you actually intend to answer what you've avoided:
I'll bet you do.
It's the same identically flawed reasoning you're using for men and testosterone.
Specifically:
Do you also have thought terminating memes about vaccines in that vein too? Maybe something equally sarcastic and dismissive like the Kool Aid man bursting through a wall saying "NoT aLL VaXxED haVe Autism!"
Do you think everyone who got the COVID vaccine is also prone to death too?
What you are completely failing to grasp is what "prone to" means in an analytical and scientific context. And through that failure of comprehension you are driving through a dump truck of bullshit trying to convince me it's fertilizer.
With that context, here's the "hard question" you keep avoiding (this is the third time I've asked):
This is the same as if I were to ask:
These are the questions that actually get us meaningful answers in science. You shouldn't be avoiding them.
I've provided my hypothetical answer to this question, specifically, that men can adapt to managing their increased emotions from testosterone over time - and I supported it with a study you dismissed due to poor reading comprehension or malice.
You have provided no answer, and have only avoided this question as if it doesn't need asked. This is despite this question literally being the whole point of this conversation.
Instead, you've spent this time making it very obvious you have no interest in what I have to say. Especially when I clearly proved you are only arguing on assumptions, having interpreted the source you provided wildly out of context.
You dismissed all that as "rambling and illogical" because you can't admit to being wrong - that you clearly came to the wrong conclusion from your source.
So now you are pretending to need help seeing these questions and details despite how you've been ignoring them due to your own insecurities in the first place.
I fully expect you'll ignore these two questions further, and asked them simply to prove that assumption right.
The question you asked me before, multiple times, was "Do you believe all men are violent?" Which I answered. I will now promptly answer every single question you asked.
No, obviously. Irrelevant nonsense.
No, and that logic is complete nonsense. Vaccines do not make people more prone to autism. Do you think they do?
No, of course not. This is all coming out of nowhere.
There isn't a singular difference. Some men are more violent than others because of the conditions they're born into, or the way they were raised, or different reactions and ways of handling testosterone (as you suggested). This question is largely unconnected from the point I've disputed, which is your claim that men are generally less prone to violence than women.
The ones who are vaccinated and have autism happen to have autism. What even is this question?
There you go. I'm not interested in responding to the rest of your rambling. I asked what question I haven't answered and then answered every question you asked, if you have another question you forgot, I'll answer that too. What did I have for breakfast this morning? Do I condemn Hamas? Go for it. You can say whatever you like about me, but I'm not afraid from answering questions or engaging with hard concepts, that's just false.
You absolutley are.
You just redefine any hard concepts you encounter as rambling, then refuse to engage with it.
You even admit to this readily:
Conveniently, what you've labeled as rambling is all the comparative analysis and supporting studies I've provided that immediately prove what I'm saying as valid.
We very much could be having that conversation if you were willing to listen.
Instead, you're trying to convince yourself this conversation isn't reasonable unless we ignore everything I've said that you don't like.
Here's another question to prove my point:
I would very much like this list, as it's the same list of hard concepts you keep running away from.