Men Don't Cry/Playing With

Basic Trope: Men aren't seen crying on the basis that it's not manly.

• Played Straight: Bob isn't normally given to crying, while Alice will cry often through either sentiment or sadness.
• Exaggerated: Bob is The Stoic who never emotes at all, while Alice is the Hysterical Woman.
• Justified: Bob was raised with the mentality that crying is equated to being effeminate, so he believes it's inappropriate to shed tears.
  • or: Bob is The Stoic, or at least not very emotionally sensitive.
  • Bob is driven to cry over trivial things, such as losing at a video game.
• Inverted: Bob is very emotionally sensitive and cries fairly often.
  • Bob is very emotional, while Alice is almost never seen crying.
  • or: Alice refuses to cry because she thinks others will see her as weak.
• Subverted: Bob is at a friend's funeral and doesn't shed a tear the whole time. When he goes home, however, the death of his friend sinks in and he begins to cry over his loss.
• Double Subverted: Until we realize that this is just what his wife imagines him doing and he really never breaks down in tears.
• Parodied: Bob is around age 10 and is shown getting pushed down a flight of stairs, trampled under a crowd of students, hit in the groin with a brick and getting a splinter. He hardly changes his expression.
• Deconstructed: Bob was raised with the belief that men who cry are weak and effeminate. Thanks to this, he suppresses all his emotional anguish to keep up an image in front of others. One day, it gets too much for him and he has an emotional breakdown.
• Reconstructed: ???
• Averted: Manly Tears.
• Lampshaded: "Men aren't supposed to cry, dammit! It's not cool."
• Enforced: "We have to show that the main character isn't some pussy, so we can't have him crying."
• Defied: At a funeral, Bob cries, and his male friends pat him on the back and comfort him.
• Played For Laughs: Bob goes through an over-the-top sequence of trying to prevent himself from crying while being subjected to physical pain.
• Played For Drama: See Deconstructed above.

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