Male Bonds Form Differently, Female Friendships Another. Is It Time to Cease Attempting to Make Men Into Women?
It is healthy to talk. Or so men are constantly instructed, by everyone from mental health advocates to the women they live with. They remain bemused by the typical male tendency to spend an entire evening in the pub with longstanding friends, yet return utterly clueless about the personal struggles in each other's lives. What might they possibly be doing, all that while? How come they didn't they inquired how X is coping with his breakup, or how Y is managing the loss of his father?
For women, whose personal friendships typically center on an intimate and encyclopaedic understanding of each other's private feelings, this form of male closeness—based on seemingly sidestepping meaningful conversation—can look oddly hollow and unfulfilling. It's no surprise, one might think, that more than 25% of British men state having zero close friends; that male loneliness is pervasive; that many hesitate to see a doctor unless seriously ill; that male suicide rates repeatedly outstrip female ones; and that countless middle-aged men, especially, seem chronically frustrated for unspoken reasons. Suppressing emotions up helps nobody.
Reconsidering the Merit of Quiet Friendship
However, according to anthropologist Thomas Yarrow, this view may undervalue the merits of the resilient and silent friendship. Professor Yarrow, based at Durham University, was studying volunteers at a historic steam railway in the north of England when he was impressed with the closeness developed among these mostly older men. His lengthy study has been distilled into a paper contending that, particularly for men raised in an era of the stiff upper lip, the worth of friendships built around shared activities—"shared activity, often in companionable silence"—may be underappreciated.
This quiet form of friendship "isn't bad or outdated, it's just distinct," Yarrow states.
Admittedly, this can sound oddly similar to how young children interact—next to each other rather than engaging with each other. But Yarrow's argument is clear: simply due to the fact that it's not your ideal idea of friendship doesn't mean it lacks significance. Perhaps we should let these men in peace with their trains, golf, or vintage auto projects—whatever activity allows them to enjoy time in the company of others who also value less talk.
Past Verbal Expression: The Unspoken Language of Care
Thankfully, Yarrow is explicitly not claiming that expressing emotion is harmful, nor advocating for a reversion to the past. Instead, he highlights that touchy-feely talk isn't for everyone, and that deeper things may be occurring beneath the exterior of seemingly reticent friendships. Is he right?
As a female perspective, one is obviously no expert on male-to-male conversation. But years of observation indicates that while men may be more reluctant at first to open up sensitive matters, once they do, they can be remarkably forthright. A absence of visible emotion should not be equated with a lack of feeling altogether.
Furthermore, while younger men brought up in a more expressive culture may be better at voicing feelings, traditional men are far from incapable of it. Repackage soft emotions as masculine "political opinions" or "team allegiance," and many men will happily vent frustration, yearning, discontent, or satisfaction endlessly.
The most striking about Yarrow's railway volunteers is that, for all their aversion of discussing feelings, they still found ways to express what seems remarkably like care and solidarity. When an elderly volunteer didn't appear and later returned struggling, his friends observed and were concerned. But, as the professor notes, they deliberately didn't probe what was wrong. Rather, they offered tea, told jokes, and tried to be discreetly supportive while maintaining routine. They were caring for each other much as female friends would, except without ever verbally acknowledging the obvious issue.
The Core Question: Does Bonding Require Words?
It's not everyone's ideal way of bonding, and it may not be yours. But if the true therapeutic value of friendship—the thing that combats loneliness and low mood—is fundamentally the awareness that another person is there enough to walk through life's challenges with you, does that always be articulated with words?
The debate continues. Perhaps the healthiest approach is to acknowledge that different forms of friendship carry comparable value, respectively satisfying the emotional needs of various individuals in unique effective way.
