What no one talks about: men's mental health in Colombia

The world of humanitarian work, social justice, and equality tends to focus on those perceived as most in need of help: children, women, racial minorities, members of oppressed communities such as LGBTQ+ people, etc. Questions can be asked about whether these groups should be victimised, as they are often wrongfully treated as incapable of fending for themselves. However, there is one group that is rarely even discussed by NGOs and human rights organisations, with little funding available for their cause: young men. They are almost never victimised themselves—they are expected to fend not only for themselves but also to take care of their families, no matter how dismal the circumstances. And it is this particular group that experiences by far the highest suicide rates in the world, no matter where you look.

Globally, twice as many men die by suicide as women, while in Colombia, about 80% of all suicides are men. It is the second leading cause of death for men under 40 years old. Suicides are more common in countries and regions with higher income inequality (Irish, 2024), and patriarchal cultures tend to further increase the risk of suicide, supposedly because traditional masculinity doubles men's suicide risk by discouraging emotional help-seeking (Eggenberger, Lukas et al. 2024).

For this reason, Upeksha traveled to Sucre, Colombia—a place where suicides among young men are particularly common. In order to find out why this is happening, we opened a discussion with several men about mental health, breaking the silence on a subject tainted with shame, pride, and fear. But as we will hear from these young men themselves, one of the main causes of suicide is silence itself. Men keep their pain to themselves because patriarchal norms tell them to do so. Additionally, patriarchal norms expect them to take care of themselves and their families, without any help, while social economic circumstances prevent them from being able to do so. The failure to adhere to these expectations and the inability to talk about it with anyone, leads some men to turn to the only thing that they can control: to take their own life.. But more often than not, other solutions do exist, a better life is possible. The first step: break the silence.

In the video below we discuss the causes and the solutions to mental problems in Colombia. The message is clear: "Find someone to talk with, to cry with, and to share everything with. Despite all the hardship, there's always light at the end of the tunnel."