Men’s Mental Health Awareness Month And LGBTQ+ Pride Month
These two awareness months fall in June every year. With that being the case, one group gets a lot of unwarranted hate, and it’s not the men. I’m going to give some data first about both groups to shine a light on the reality of why we have months dedicated to men and LGBT people. Then I will give my perspective on how I feel about the hate the other side gets.
For men’s statistics, I am using Heads Up Guys and healthline. Men are four times more likely to commit suicide than women in America. Suicide is the leading cause of death for men under age 50. The age group with the highest suicide rate is 75 years and older. Native American men followed by white men have the highest suicide rate. To no one’s surprise, male veterans have the highest suicide rate for occupation. Followed by other occupations such as construction, mining, and agriculture to name a few. Basically, hard labor occupations are the highest for men. The only good thing I would take away from these statistics unfortunately is that as you go down, the younger the age the lower the suicide rates get. Men’s mental health is extremely important, and it feels like they get overlooked. Which is crazy considering men commit suicide a lot more than women. A big reason for that is that depression in men goes underreported and they are less likely to reach out for help. To add on to that, there’s this stigma that has been around for a long time that men shouldn’t express their emotions because it will show “weakness”. That can also be the fault of our men. Men try to instill into their children from an early age that you should never let a woman see you in your most vulnerable moments because they’ll take advantage. When that’s just simply not true. I hope men’s mental health will start being taken more seriously.
For LGBT statistics, I am using thetrevorproject and williamsinstitute.law.ucla. For the suicide rates for this group, it’s the opposite. The younger the age, the higher the suicide rates get. LGBT young people are four times more likely to commit suicide than their peers. More than 1.8 million young people ages 13-24 consider suicide each year and there is at least one attempt every 45 seconds. Around 61% of suicide attempts happen within five years of the people realizing their sexual identity. Bisexual people are 1.5 times more likely to have suicidal thoughts than gay or lesbian people. While queer and pansexual people were two times more likely to have those same thoughts than gay or lesbian people. According to the national survey done by the Trevor Project, almost all LGBT people of color reported higher rates of attempted suicide than white LGBT people. It’s no surprise that the younger people in this group are more likely to commit suicide. The majority of households are in some type of religion in America and the LGBT community is frowned upon in most instances. When you are between the ages of 14-21 and you come out to your religious family, most of the time they won’t take it kindly. This drives children to have these kinds of bad thoughts when they can’t even get support from their families. When you come out at an older age, while you still have thoughts, you’re not as dependent on your family and can cut them off. That is why you see suicides from this group increase in states from the South. Southern states are more conservative and more likely to be religious, which is why children from these states don’t feel as safe to come out.
As someone who has struggled with depression and still struggles with anxiety, it grinds my gears when I see people disrespect the LGBT to uplift men’s mental health. It's as if a big chunk of gay men isn’t part of the men’s suicide stats. Since June 1st, I’ve seen more negative posts about LGBT people to acknowledge the importance of men’s mental health. We can do both. We can celebrate both groups. Men are important to our society, but so are gay, lesbian, trans, bi, pansexual, queer, and every other minority we have. it makes me sick when I see men trying to discredit LGBT people when that group has had to go through some of the worst hardships for centuries too. There are still many states in this country that have made anti-LGBT laws. There are over 520 anti-LGBT bills that have passed in the United States. So, pride month is needed to show that we stand with them. These bills are being passed simply because they exist, not because they committed any actual crimes. This country is going backward, and this hate people have towards LGBT people makes it feel like we’re back in the early 1900s when no one except white men had rights. I will continue to support my fellow LGBT people no matter what until they can live in peace and not have to worry about being targeted for being different.