Worded like this, though, is it even conflict? There’s no noticeable inequity, just some guy balling his eyes out.
Together, you have made it sound as though the crying shouldn’t even be interpreted as just “plain ol’ conflict”, but instead, only as something that happens in between to allow for the later illustration of potential and actual conflict.
That is, only once we know that someone doesn’t want to see or hear the crying do we know that it is trouble. However, now you must ask why these two things can’t co-exist. Why is he crying, and why shouldn’t he be crying? That sounds like where the source of conflict lies. By both your posts, it appears that the generic answer to this question is “future considerations” (both for the dude who is crying, and for the dude who beat him up).
The above leads to the hypothetical question, though. What if “future considerations” were not the answer? Say, for example, that the answer were more akin to “due to prejudice”… That’s an exercise for later, though.
All of this is another way of saying what I think you both are saying. Some context, something where there can be a “between”, is necessary to find a source. But, I add to that, it seems to be that “leads to” is too specific and linear.