is it better to be tough, or better to be sensitive?

Yeah, as others have suggested, some sort of balance is best really.

There's a lot to be said for resilience, and it should be encouraged, but not at the expense of sensitivity.

If you're engaging in some sort of extreme stoicism where you're not allowing any kind of emotion or vulnerability to surface, you're probably wearing a mask behind which you're quietly dying.

And that strikes me as no more healthy than crumbling to dust in the face of life's vicissitudes.

Healthy personalities are balanced personalities.

Well in the example you gave obviously the tough one but the “tough” son is really balanced and the sensitive one if of the rails. Normally in life you should be a combination of both tough and sensitive.

Why does it have to be one or the other?

I'm not sure, I need to know what "sensative" is first.

It's situational. And the example highlights that both are needed, both make sense and both responses are indicative of the difference in emotional intelligence, most likely dependent on age. If you owned a dog for almost 20 years and it died, I would probably think you needed therapy if you got over it quickly, but for a kid to get over it quickly is normal. There's no better or worse.

A blend of both I'd say if that's possible?? I'd like to consider myself tough, but I also show empathy when needed, especially working at the liberal university I do as Public Safety around sensitive students.. One was taken away by ambulance this morning for trying to harm herself over not doing well academically speaking. No kidding

Jordan Peterson said something like, "be a monster, learn to control it"