I believe what is being framed as “pressure” may be something else entirely: unfamiliarity.

A crisis, but not the one being named

The survey found that a significant number of men feel isolated, unsupported, and increasingly disconnected from the idea of relationships themselves. Nearly half said they had considered giving up on love. Many felt that being in a relationship required too much change, too much compromise. Others believed women’s expectations had become unrealistic.

Taken at face value, this reads like a crisis created by external demand. But take a few steps back, and a different picture begins to emerge.

Across India, too, the data points in a similar direction. Studies over the past few years suggest that close to half of Indian men report experiencing loneliness, particularly in urban settings. Yet fewer men than women are willing to acknowledge it openly. Emotional distress, for many, still has to pass through the filters of silence, withdrawal, or distraction before it can even be recognised.

This is not just a social issue. It is a psychological one.

Raised for performance, not presence

For generations, men have been raised to function in a system that rewards performance over presence, to be “useful” before they are emotionally available. To solve, provide, endure, but not necessarily to articulate, reflect, or sit with discomfort.

In India, this conditioning begins early. Boys are often deeply cared for, even indulged, within the family structure. But they are rarely asked to develop emotional accountability. They are not taught how to name what they feel, process rejection, or navigate vulnerability without shame. Love, in its earliest form, is something they receive, not something they are trained to reciprocate with awareness.

And then, as adults, they are expected to participate in relationships that demand precisely those skills. What feels like pressure, then, is often the first sustained encounter with emotional expectations they do not have the tools to meet.

What makes men anxious? (Photo: Freepik)

What patriarchy gives. And takes away

This is where the conversation around patriarchy becomes more complex than it is often allowed to be.

Patriarchy has often been spoken about as a system that privileges men. It does. But it is also a system that prescribes them. It offers a narrow, rigid definition of masculinity: be the provider, be in control, do not falter. It gives men power in structure, but very little flexibility in identity.

When that structure begins to shift—as it has rapidly over the past two decades—the cost of that rigidity becomes apparent.

Women today are more financially independent, more emotionally articulate, and more willing to define the terms of their relationships. The old script—where a man’s role was clearly laid out—no longer holds in the same way.

But the new script has not been taught. And, if we are being honest, many men are not putting in the effort to learn it on their own either.

When identity begins to slip

So what we are seeing is not simply men resisting women or relationships. It is men encountering a form of intimacy that requires them to become someone they were never prepared to be.

This is also why the discomfort around successful or emotionally evolved partners is often misread. It is not always insecurity in the simplistic sense. It is identity disorientation. For a man taught to derive self-worth from being needed, being with someone who does not need him in the same way can feel less like equality and more like redundancy.

That confusion rarely expresses itself as introspection. More often, it shows up as withdrawal. Or dismissal. Or the conclusion that relationships are “too much work”.

From understanding to responsibility

And yet, this is where the conversation must shift—from understanding to responsibility. Because while unfamiliarity can explain behaviour, it cannot indefinitely excuse it.

To say that expectations are too high is, in many cases, to avoid a more difficult admission: that the baseline itself has changed. Relationships today are not built on roles alone. They are built on emotional participation, on the ability to communicate, adapt, and unlearn. Such unlearning could be uncomfortable. It requires giving up certainty, control, and sometimes, even identity.

For many men, that feels like too high a price. But the alternative is what we are already beginning to see: disengagement, men opting out. A generation that wants connection, but retreats from the very processes that make it possible.

The work that remains

The men are in trouble, yes. The survey is not wrong about that. At the cost of repeating, it is not because too much is being asked of them, but because, for the first time, they are being asked for things they were never taught how to give, and must now choose whether they are willing to learn.

That learning will not come from grand declarations, but from smaller steps:

* From recognising that emotional availability is not instinctive, it is practised.

* That listening is not the same as waiting to respond.

* That discomfort is not a sign to withdraw, but often the point at which growth begins.

* That a partner’s independence is not a threat to identity, but an invitation to redefine it.

Also by Vivek Surendran | ‘Hold my hand, I’m anxious’: Why touch is a superpower we’re still afraid of

* That vulnerability, when chosen consciously, is not weakness, but effort in its most honest form.

Of course, none of this is easy. It requires unlearning habits that have been reinforced for decades. It requires sitting with parts of oneself that were and are easier to ignore.

But this is the work now.

Love did not become harder. It simply stopped rewarding the version of masculinity that refused to grow.