The only pain point to me is that we think of this as a man being willing to break down in tears; to say that things have hurt him.
In my case, a lot of my repressed emotion is anger. I’m more than adamant that anger be directed solely to the horrible things in the world that deserve to receive it, and not the people close to you, but I perfectly understand that people (esp women) have reason to be scared around someone that can express so much anger, even if the claim is it will never be towards them.
I think it’s perhaps easy, or even in some ways enjoyable, to be the shoulder someone else cries on, that they feel safe around. It’s probably harder to be the person in the room when someone is seething furious about a worldly injustice; even if that injustice isn’t targeted at the man in question, and the anger is directed at an unseen entity.
I mean, even the orthodox Christians don’t practice what they preach. Republican senators turn out gay. Priests fuck little boys. All through the ages, speakers of societal virtue have written all kinds of exceptions for themselves behind closed doors.
Many households get to write their own history, present it in a kind manner; and so you get Sherlock Holmes’ terrible prediction that the idea of a peaceful countryside is an illusion; that there’s far more crime out there that goes unnoticed, even if their family record was that of a willing and happy Lord and Lady.
We’re getting better about things. But the betrayals of humanity, and of the supposed “traditional roles” became a lot more visible.