AIBU to feel convinced that most people view crying, even if it's an appropriate/logical response to a stressful or upsetting situation, as being soemthing that is inherently shameful or a sign that someone is a weak person?

Yes, I think this (and also that crying can be deliberately used to manipulate, especially to manipulate men by women who then make things harder for the rest of us by playing into the stereotype of women being emotionally incontinent/helpless).

Obviously everybody cries at things like bereavement or serious injury, and some people also occasionally cry from intense frustration or if very hormonal and exposed to a trigger, but I would very much negatively judge someone over the age of three who cried 'most days' in normal life and wasn't in or recovering from a major trauma or seeking support with depression. (Runny eyes from hayfever would also not annoy me in this way).

On MN crying-people seem to think that crying means they feel more upset than people who don't cry, which is nonsense. It's just a body's reaction to stress. Some people cry, others don't.
What I HATE, is when people say, "she made me cry." NO. You made yourself cry.
And "uncontrollably crying" as if that means anything, when it's clearly the actions of someone with emotional incontinence.
If you cry everyday, it becomes meaningless. Like my nose running when the air is cold. It doesn't mean I'm ill.
ETA. Women "having a little cry" 😱

It’s true!

The snag with that is that some parents don’t respond to the crying of even a baby or young child — mine didn’t. Not because they were evil, but because they had no idea how to be parents, had far more children than they could cope with, and we were living with older male extended family whose needs my mother thought should be prioritised over babies, especially if they were girls. As a result I learned very young that there was no point in crying at night because no one would come, and when I got older (were talking five or six), that expressing negative emotions was a ‘nuisance’ and got irritation rather than care in response. As a result, I will be the first to admit I have a fucked-up attitude to my own tears, which I’m dealing with in therapy (well, plus the CSA.)

I always say to my kids, that that performative hand waving when on the brink of tears, didn’t exist until the 2000s!

I read somewhere that men crying is a turn off for women. Women on here describe themselves as ‘sobbing’ over upsets but most women have little time for a man who ‘sobs’. In fact it would be a red flag for most women.

No, I remember girls at school doing this in the early 80s. One hand flapping in front of the face while saying "I'm filling up..." I think its supposed to be drying the tears (to preserve make up) by fanning them.

I know I’ve seen in my DS12 a move from expressing sadness to showing anger, which seems to be a more socially acceptable option for boys. It’s something I’m actively trying to catch with him though because it’s not healthy and certainly not a safe option. While I know men often sublimate sadness to anger, I’m surprised at how early that process seems to start.

My experience is quite the opposite.
I last cried on 10th November 2015.
It happens so rarely I could count the occasions during my life on the fingers of one hand.
This is learned and ingrained behaviour from an awful childhood.

I have been pressured to cry by a (crap) psychologist and have frequently been misjudged by people who decide I can’t have been upset because I don’t cry or behave in the way they do in extreme situations.

I have sometimes pondered making myself some Strictly style paddles to hold up with sad faces, distraught, furious or whatever so that stupid people can’t tell me how I was feeling at any given time based on their limited personal perspective.

Most people are arseholes.

Other than in certain contexts crying is completely healthy and natural. Shaming women for doing it says more about the judge than the crier.

Vulnerability is a strength, not a weakness

Perhaps a stronger emotion than warranted if the reason you’re crying is because you got caught in the rain?

I would say that crying because you got wet in the rain is not an appropriate or logical response to the situation.

Having something to cry about every day is a bit unusual not because most adults are hiding their true emotions for fear of being seen as weak but because most of us have learnt some resilience and wouldn't be that upset by getting wet.

However, I notice you said you were on your way to an outreach wellbeing meeting, presumably this is to support you because you are struggling in some way, if so then I suspect you need to build your resilience a little? (If you are the outreach worker then you definitely need to work on your resilience)

Strong Emotional responses are not just a sign of immaturity or not having trained the emotion out. They are about temperament, neurodivergence, mental wellbeing, cultural expression. I think this feeling is partly contextual to the UK but honestly it’s all a bit mad how we are taught to suppress and internalise things. I used to be adept at turning emotional responses off as I feel things intensely so it seemed necessary. It was at the expense of my mental health. I’m not saying sobbing at your desk is ideal but if someone feels upset it’s okay not to suppress that. I have cried in conversations with trusted colleagues when I’ve been super frustrated. I wasn’t sad and it was a safe equally senior colleague - we are more friends. If you are regulated through deep breathing etc great but if you are being so grown up that you are pushing everything away to then deteriorate elsewhere that seems unhelpful. I think we need to have a bit more of a pause to understand the why of how someone responds and our own responses.

Is that your assumption of her expectations or her actual expectations though?

I've come across people who are expecting a big fanfare and the world to stop when they cry "I'm crying my eyes out and no one cares!"

But I also sometimes cry when I would really rather not and it's as frustrating for me as for other people because I'm assumed to be attention seeking and manipulative, but people won't leave you alone for a second to compose yourself either and feel the need to confront you over it, or at the very least eye roll and huff, or offer awkward platitudes, just bugger off and give me a minute, I'm as frustrated by it as you are, but you deciding that I "Need telling" has no other effect than to make it worse because I've now been accused of doing something purposefully that actually in that moment I have no control over (or I wouldn't be doing it!). I don't have any expectations of sympathy, but that doesn't stop people deciding I do and reacting to that when just leaving me alone for a minute would resolve the situation and we can all move on with the day.

The only time I've cried at work was fuelled by anger. I was so bloody furious with the lies and bullshit my then manager was accusing me of I cried. I however did make it clear it was due to this and not me crying out of capitulation to him or my own shame of wrong doing.

I’ve always worked in secondary schools. Teachers cry quite a bit (rarely in front of the kids). Things like sad situations with children, stress, frustration, when a pupil does really well, when you say goodbye to a class you’ve been with a long time, leaving speeches etc. Pupils cry a lot. Boys and girls both cry pretty equally (I wonder why that changes when they become older). It seems quite normal to me. I don’t know anyone who cries in an annoying way.

I swear this (yes, murderously annoying) gesture has been learned from reality tv! I don’t think it’s something women used to do when crying, or trying not to cry, before the very recent past, and I think it’s what a certain kind of person does when she has learned behavioural norms from dimwit tv . It may also have something to do with having nails of a length that make actual eye-rubbing unwise, and wearing giant fake lashes that probably also make eye-rubbing unwise. Hence the helpless flapping towards the eyes without touching.

Ooh, i remember that one 😂

I think some people see tears as a bigger deal than others, thinking of crying as a very high level emotional response reserved for the extremely upset. This means that they feel very uncomfortable around tears, feeling they've had big emotions dumped on them, which they find difficult to respond to. It can also be distracting, as the attention turns to the cryers emotions rather than any matter at hand. Sometimes people then censor or restrict themselves because the other person is 'so upset', which can be really inhibiting, particularly at work.
Other people will see tears in situations they feel don't warrant them (such as your example) and think the person is over dramatising, attention seeking and unable to manage things with proportionate emotion.
I think if you're an easy cryer and get tearful over smaller things, or regularly, you probably need to acknowledge it. So when the tears start explain you're fine, it's just an automatic reaction, you're not terribly upset etc, then focus on what you're supposed to be doing, rather than how you feel wherever possible.

😀

Where do you stand on the rending of garments?

Omg the hand waving, what’s that all about! 😂

Sure, but isn’t a more usual response to getting caught in the rain and looking damp and unkempt mild annoyance? Or humour?

I don’t think people are weak but people that cry over ridiculous things annoy me. Honestly I’ve seen posts on SM of people asking for recommendations for sad films because they “need a good cry”! Really?! Does anyone actually do that?

if people are genuinely upset I’m the first one with a hug and comfort though.

Right now I’ve got a friend who is dying so I’m closer to tears as a base line than I might otherwise be. I cry relatively easily, but I’ve had a lot of grief in my life. I know full well that crying for a minute (and I do mean a minute) helps me to reset. There’s a reason for them they help your body shed cortisol thus crying helps you to become calmer. I loathe people who regard them as a sign of weakness. Crying is a completely normal human response to stress. There are times I cry when I wish I didn’t but that is one of my body’s stress responses. I’m not talking full on sobbing just a few tears, It doesn’t make me weak, pretty sure none of my friends/acquaintances would level that at me, but that’s how my stress/distress shows itself.