IT’S WHAT women have known all along. Despite thousands of years of guys swaggering – from spear-throwing cavemen to Super Bowl zealots – their machismo is just a facade.
Men, not women, are the weaker sex.
So says a new report in the prestigious British Medical Journal, which claims that from the womb to death, men are plagued by a host of health and psychological problems women seem to avoid.
“Males are at a disadvantage even before birth,” says Sebastian Kraemer, the London child psychologist who penned the report.
He reviewed hundreds of studies that found that boys have more physical and psychological problems growing up, are more easily damaged by poor parental care and, later in life, suffer more diseases.
Now, alarmed doctors are saying it’s time to treat boys not as the harder sex but as the sensitive little fellas they really are.
“There’s this pressure on parents to produce miniature versions of Clint Eastwood, tough guys with their Stetsons,” Kraemer says.
“They let their male babies cry it out. They teach young boys to hide their feelings. Unfortunately, they’re endangering their child’s health in the bargain.”
A MAN’S troubles begin in the womb, Kraemer says.
Research shows that while about 120 boys are conceived for every 100 girls, by birth, the ratio has dropped dramatically to about 105 to 100.
Even if a fella makes it out, he’s more likely to be born with brain damage, cerebral palsy or congenital defects. He’s also on average four to six weeks less mentally developed than a baby girl.
One theory for this is that the male fetus produces super high levels of testosterone right before and at birth. This is converted into estrogen which may cause injury to the brain.
Studies also show that boy babies are more emotionally needy than girls. That could cause problems, because as male infants tend to be larger than girls, parents may treat them differently.
“Infant boys need just as much attention as infant girls, but parents think that if they cuddle or kiss them too much, they are encouraging unmasculine behavior,” explains therapist William Courtenay, director of Men’s Health Counseling in San Francisco.
Research also shows that as they age, boys are three to four times more likely than girls to suffer developmental disorders.
By the time they reach adolescence, boys are more likely to be involved in accidents. In England and Wales, for example, boys under 16 have a 41 percent higher death rate than girls of the same age.
“Men have higher levels of brain hormones such as MAOs and androgens that lead to a craving for new experiences and sensations,” explains Courtenay.
But part of the problem, says New York psychologist Leon Hoffman, is that while women often relieve anxiety by talking and expressing themselves, boys are taught to relieve stress by pretending they’re Superman.
“Boys and men simply aren’t as capable as women at expressing themselves verbally, which makes physically acting out more appealing,” explains Hoffman. “They attempt to compensate for their weaknesses with a show of bravado.”
NOT expressing their feelings can have other, more deadly effects.
In the United States, men are five times more likely to commit suicide than are woman. Men are also likely to die on average six years earlier than women and are more likely to suffer from a slew of conditions later in life, including circulatory disorders, diabetes, alcoholism, ulcers and lung cancer.
Doctors say this is more due to psychology than biology.
“Men often avoid going to the doctor because they’re afraid they’ll learn something is wrong and it will make them feel vulnerable,” explains Courtenay.
On average, men in this country make 150 million less visits to their physicians than women do, according to Dr. Ken Goldberg, director of the Male Health Center in Dallas.
“If you take eight women and tell them, ‘One of you will be diagnosed with breast cancer,’ all of them will immediately think it’s them,” says Goldberg. “But if you take three men and tell them one of them will suffer from heart disease, they’ll shrug it off and think it’s the guy next to them.
“Men cop the attitude that they’re bulletproof. That’s what’s killing them.” The lesson? Men are just not as tough as they think.